The issue of paid advocacy—the practice of being paid to promote something—has long been thorny on the English Wikipedia. The most recent battle was over the public relations company Wiki-PR, whose employees created, edited, or maintained several thousand Wikipedia articles for paying clients using a sophisticated array of concealed user accounts, violating several English Wikipedia policies in the process. These practices were exposed by the Signpost and other news outlets.
Shortly after, the executive director of the Foundation, Sue Gardner, authored a press release that in part distinguished between paid editing and paid advocacy:
| “ | Editing-for-pay has been a divisive topic inside Wikipedia for many years, particularly when the edits to articles are promotional in nature. Unlike a university professor editing Wikipedia articles in their area of expertise, paid editing for promotional purposes, or paid advocacy editing as we call it, is extremely problematic ... [violating] the core principles that have made Wikipedia so valuable for so many people." / Being deceptive in your editing by using sockpuppets or misrepresenting your affiliation with a company is against Wikipedia policy and is prohibited by our Terms of Use. | ” |
Gardner could not have predicted that the very next controversy would be so close to home, involving the dismissal of Sarah Stierch, whose paid-for editing activities were first revealed in a blog post. This included a screenshot of Stierch's profile on oDesk, a global clearinghouse for the hiring and management of remote workers. The profile showed that she had been paid US$300 to author a Wikipedia page for an "individual", along with two billed hours for a "Wikipedia Writer Editor" job that was "in progress". Since that screenshot, the profile has been updated to rate her work at five stars, saying "Thanks, Sarah! I really appreciate you!".
The topic also hit the talkpage of Jimmy Wales, the outspoken co-founder of Wikipedia, who immediately intoned: "I very very strongly condemn such editing, and this is no exception."
Just days after the revelations, Stierch found herself without her WMF job. Frank Schulenburg, the Foundation's Senior Director of Programs, told the community that she edited for pay "even though it is widely known that paid editing is frowned upon by many in the editing community and by the Wikimedia Foundation" (he later corrected this statement to read "paid advocacy editing" rather than paid editing).
In his announcement of Stierch's dismissal, Schulenburg wrote, without overt irony: "I would like to believe that the Wikimedia movement is a place of forgiveness and compassion. ...". It can only be speculated what the motivations were for Stierch's paid editing, but a sense of this might be gleaned from her tweets in late December.
The Signpost asked Schulenburg whether Wales was involved in the decision to sack Stierch. He replied: "We aren’t going to give specifics about a personnel matter. In general, decisions about dismissals are made by an employee's manager, in consultation with HR and other parts of the staff." On whether the boundary between paid editing and paid advocacy was a factor in the decision to dismiss, Schulenburg was unforthcoming: "The terms paid editing and paid advocacy are very specific, and may not always be clear to many." Other questions he deferred as a "personnel matter", declining to go beyond what was stated in his opening post.
The WMF does not appear to have an explicit agreement with its employees or contractors that bans them from either paid editing or paid advocacy. We asked WMF spokesperson Jay Walsh whether the Foundation explicitly forbids its employees from either paid editing or paid advocacy:
| “ | In the Foundation's experience any form of paid advocacy editing runs against the values and editorial policies of the Wikimedia projects. Foundation staff are expected to uphold the values of the Wikimedia projects and the movement as a whole, and like any user of our projects, they are also expected to honor our Terms of Use. / Our staff receive clear standards of conduct in our employee handbook, and sign an agreement which outlines conduct expectations and conflict of interest guidance when they begin employment. / That agreement doesn't necessarily go into specific detail about what activities are permitted or not permitted. Like any employer, the Foundation expects staff to bring good judgement and to be able to interpret the guidance as it applies to their lives and to their work. Of course if they aren't sure, staff are always encouraged to discuss any potential conflict situations with their managers, HR, or legal counsel. | ” |
Walsh told us that some of the basic substance of the agreement is in the WMF's COI policy, which is specifically aimed at officers, board members, and executives; however, "this is not exactly the same as the employee agreements. Not all of those agreements are necessarily identical, given that staff work in different jurisdictions around the world. But the basic principles and expectations are the same."
The Signpost was unable to find definitive evidence in the terms of use of a clause that Stierch might have breached, even though both Gardner and Walsh have both cited the terms in relation to paid advocacy—Walsh specifically in relation to the Sarah Stierch dismissal. One term of use listed under "Engaging in False Statements, Impersonation, or Fraud" mentions "misrepresenting your affiliation with any individual or entity, or using the username of another user with the intent to deceive". In this respect, the Foundation may be relying on Stierch's failure to openly and proactively disclose her "affiliations" (contractual relationships) with clients. However, if this interpretation of the terms of use were applied evenly throughout the movement, many editors would be in breach, and accepted practices in a number of foreign-language Wikipedias deemed invalid.
Back in the early years, I had a little statement on my userpage encouraging people to donate money to me if they liked my work and wanted me to do more on Wikipedia. —Erik Möller, deputy vice-president, WMF
The Foundation's conflict-of-interest policy does insist that a "Covered Person"—which does not include employees such as Stierch—acknowledge "not less than annually, that he or she has read and is in compliance with this policy on a pledge of personal commitment."
Wikipediocracy, the persistent blog and forum dedicated to discussing and criticizing the Wikimedia movement, kindled press coverage by tipping off the Daily Dot's Tim Sampson. The resulting article outlined the controversy and explored the site's previous coverage of the English Wikipedia's experience with paid advocacy. Another early runner was the major German-language news portal Heise.de, with a particular focus on IT. Ars Technica, The Independent, Netzpolitik, and Il Messaggero followed. Although Stierch is saying nothing publicly about the incident, Walsh told the Signpost that "it's her decision if she should wish to speak about the matter."
Many commentators confuse paid editing with paid advocacy, despite Sue Gardner's attempt to distinguish the two. Paid editing is commonly accepted on Wikimedia projects, most prominently in the form of collaborations with public institutions such as galleries, libraries, archives, and museums. One such editor is Dominic McDevitt-Parks, the recently hired digital content specialist at the US National Archives and Records Administration (NARA). NARA has contributed a set of guidelines for its staff when editing Wikipedia during the course of their job, created after the unrelated Gibraltar scandal in Europe.
McDevitt-Parks has uploaded to the English Wikipedia his full job description and a personal FAQ page, where he takes on the notion that he could be considered to have a conflict of interest when editing the site: "As a cultural institution with an educational mission, we believe that there are certain activities we can undertake where NARA and Wikimedia have a shared interest, rather than a conflict of interest. ... The two organizations have a conflict of interest when it comes to, for example, the National Archives and Records Administration article itself, but we do not have an interest in editing those types of articles."
Some of the other Wikipedias take a starkly different approach by allowing corporate-named accounts and direct editing by the paid employees of firms. Dirk Franke is a long-standing member of the German editing community and has just taken up a position with the German chapter (unrelated to paid editing). The Signpost asked him what the German Wikipedia's current stance towards paid editing/advocacy is. Emphasizing that he was speaking only for himself, not his employer, he said the situation is complicated: a number of editors are very outspoken against it, but the project had two major "non-binding" polls on banning it completely, and both failed by big margins. "The majority of the community seems to grudgingly accept a policy of toleration—we can't stop it without massively violating WP:ANON, so we try to make the best out of it." In his opinion:
| “ | ... the community by now has a pretty good grasp how they can recognize PR-editing and how to differentiate the behaviour of different kinds of editors. If people try to be manipulative, stealthy, or insert POV, Wikipedians react rather aggressively. But when paid editors ask and try to work with the community, normally people tolerate them or even help them. | ” |
The German Wikipedia and its local support team keep a register of official institutional editor accounts. It has a "user verification" system in place that attempts to prevent unauthorized people from operating from what would appear to be an official account for a business or individual. The process is simple, involving an email from a company domain sent to Wikimedia's OTRS system. The result is editors like Benutzer:Coca-Cola De, an account for the Coca-Cola Company. Such an account would be immediately blocked on the English Wikipedia under its username policy. Oddly, they are still free to edit—as long as they use a different username that would not be considered "promotional".
The Swedish Wikipedia also welcomes paid editors. Anders Wennersten wrote that the paid editing problem "is a privilege that only the biggest version can have"—the site is by some orders of magnitude smaller than the English Wikipedia (about 2% of the active users and fewer than 4% of the total edits; while the Swedish Wikipedia has a relatively high total article count of more than 1.6M articles, these are in large part due to the operations of an automated computer program). Wennersten said that as long as paid advocates play by the basic rules, they are key stakeholders in ensuring that the site continually improves in "value and quality", despite its small core of active editors. He related an anecdote about a publishing company that had contributed "excellent" articles on their affiliated authors. While they have to work with them to remove "fluff and promotion", they obtain valuable information for the area that was not previously covered.
So, too, does the Norwegian Wikipedia. Erlend Bjørtvedt added that a major discussion among the site's administrators concluded that a straight ban on paid editors was wholly impractical, as it would also ban editors who were working for public institutions. Edits from third parties paid to edit for a commercial entity and non-neutral editing for pay are frowned on, but the site attempts to judge editors on their actions, not affiliation. In fact, employees' editing their employers' articles "is not only tolerated, but quite common" on the site; according to Bjørtvedt, many of the administrators and bureaucrats who joined a debate at Oslo's Wikipedia Academy last month had participated in paid editing:
| “ | During the discussion, it appeared that a large proportion of the admins and bureaucrats who joined the discussion, had edited the articles about their employers. Most were aware of the COI potential involved, but asserted being able to write objectively even about an employer. | ” |
In contrast, the English Wikipedia has had a tortuous relationship with paid advocacy and the related "conflict of interest" (COI) guideline. Some of the most prominent paid editors have been banned, such as Gregory Kohs, but three proposals that would have abolished or severely limited paid advocacy were voted down. An entire section on the COI guideline is devoted to financial issues, yet some advocates have found that they can thrive—if they are careful. Jimmy Wales has championed a "bright line" rule where advocates would not be able to edit articles directly, but few support it. McDevitt-Parks is free to edit in his role, but those suspected of advocacy are vigorously criticized.
There appear to be at least four questions hanging in the air over the dismissal of Sarah Stierch. First, how is the Foundation interpreting its terms of use in relation not just to paid advocacy, but to paid editing where the contractual relationship is undisclosed but the product adheres to the requirements for balance? Second, is the WMF basing its decision to dismiss solely on an interpretation of the English Wikipedia's discourse on paid editing and advocacy, without regard to the policies and practices of non-English-language WMF sites? Third, is the Foundation clearly setting out where paid editing ends and paid advocacy editing starts? And fourth, is the Foundation making it sufficiently clear to its employees and contractors that they should not engage in any form of paid editing?
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Comments re "paid editing"
Sentence fragment: He is unconnected with the current--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 08:26, 11 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
This is not what Frank said: «[...] had been dismissed from her position»; it's just speculation, or a misleading usage of the verb "dismiss". --Nemo 09:28, 11 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Adding to that, the Signpost article includes personal commentary by its authors about subjects and interviewees. Schulenberg didn't write something, he wrote it "without overt irony", a setup by the Signpost authors to interject their opinion that the forthcoming statement was counterfactual or otherwise disingenuous. He was "unforthcoming" when he didn't answer a question to the author's approval, a clear characterization of what otherwise appears to be an adequate answer. Yes, some columnists write like this, but those columnists are a) columnists and b) writing in an environment of blog posts and "trend" pieces. The Signpost, in contrast, bills itself as a newspaper-style publication, and though it disclaims that its writers' opinions are their own, they write them in the Signpost's voice.
This is all in addition to recent Signpost history involving salacious coverage that was revealed to be using unrelated sexual images, as well as issues of the Signpost going to press with a complete lack of basic editorial control such as copyediting. In short, the impression I have is that no one is manning the store and that Signpost writers are angling for "trendy"-sounding coverage without worrying much about accuracy, either in writing or in meaning.Added after edit conflict: Tony, please do not accuse me of bad faith. I am addressing this issue in the best of faith, from the perspective of someone who is seeing a respected publication go down a very questionable path that could cause it to lose respect, readers, and community trust. Say I'm wrong if you disagree with my points, but to say that my criticism is being done in bad faith is incredibly defensive and insulting of you. A fluffernutter is a sandwich! (talk) 00:27, 12 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
The e-mail you used as a source does not contain the words dismissal or sack. Can you explain why you have decided to use these specific words when there is no evidence provided in your own sourcing ? Do you have a source you can quote (even if you need to ask for permission from the author) that says "Sarah Stierch was dismissed" (or words to that exact effect, so that no interpretation is needed on the part of the reader to discern the meaning of the e-mail message). Yes or No. Can you also tell us the question you asked Frank that resulted in his reply stating "Again, we aren't going to give specifics about a personnel matter. In general, decisions about dismissals are made by an employee's manager, in consultation with HR and other parts of the staff." as it is necessary to know the context of that reply in order to determine its truthful meaning. Nick (talk) 00:56, 12 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
As noted by many of the editors, speculative reporting. Please see Fair Witness for discussion of objectively reporting facts. NE Ent 04:12, 12 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I'm pleased to see that the wording has been changed here in a few instances, but I note that several claims that the WMF "dismissed" Sarah Stierch remain in the article (and "let go" means pretty much the same thing): was this intentional? I agree with the comments above about the email plainly not supporting such wording. Nick-D (talk) 09:50, 12 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I am saddened but unsurprised to see a discussion which started out with a number of people expressing sincere concern for Sarah as a person and a colleague who's in a difficult situation, the facts of which are quite murky, has degenerated into yet another Wikipedian bitch-fest about the intentions of the meanings of the connotations of the words used to define the statements which may or may not have been perceived to have been made in good faith. It's a performative demonstration of so much that's wrong with this place. Perhaps when things have settled down Sarah can read over it and consider what she's lost and what she's gained. Meanwhile, while she's obviously suffering, why doesn't everyone just stop bickering at the funeral, eh?— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 16:39, 12 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Terms of use prohibit sockpuppeting where exactly?
Sue Gardner is quoted as saying, "Being deceptive in your editing by using sockpuppets or misrepresenting your affiliation with a company is against Wikipedia policy and is prohibited by our Terms of Use."
I have read the Terms of Use several times. They certainly prohibit saying that you work for a company when you don't, but they do not prohibit NOT saying that you are working for a company. Nor do they prohibit sockpuppeting – after all, sockpuppets are explicitly allowed when used for privacy reasons. Could someone who is more clued up than me point out which passage in the Terms of Use forbids what Wiki-PR did, i.e. using sockpuppets to edit articles for pay? The Terms of Use are here: http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Terms_of_Use Andreas JN466 10:05, 11 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Moreover, the sections of the terms of use dealing with violations of privacy could be read to actually protect Wiki-PR's right to do what they did, by implying that it is a violation of paid editors' privacy rights to even raise the question whether a particular account is operated by a Wiki-PR employee or contractor. Andreas JN466 10:13, 11 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
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Let's take an example then, Smallbones: User:Bjoertvedt. His user page states that he is the vice-president of Telenor. He has made 19 edits to the English Wikipedia article Telenor, and has made 228 edits to the Norwegian Wikipedia's Telenor article.
His user page states that he is also an administrator and bureaucrat at the Norwegian Wikipedia, and the vice-chairman of Wikimedia Norway. His contributions were discussed on Jimmy Wales' talk page some weeks ago, a discussion which Jimmy Wales commented in. So we can assume that the Wikimedia board has been well aware of the matter for some time. I see no indication that Mr Bjoertvedt has ceased to be the vice-chairman of Wikimedia Norway.
The Wikimedia Foundation has a well-staffed legal department. I find it hard to imagine that the Foundation would continue to recognise Wikimedia Norway as an affiliated chapter it they thought its vice-chairman's Wikipedia edits "violated applicable law", and thus also Wikimedia's own Terms of Use.
As for the first half of your post, I see no evidence that anyone has demonstrated that Wiki-PR's agents have, "With the intent to deceive, post[ed] content that is false or inaccurate", or that they have attempted "to impersonate another user or individual, misrepresent[ed their] affiliation with any individual or entity, or us[ed] the username of another user with the intent to deceive", or that they have "engag[ed] in fraud". They have simply created a pseudonymous user account without saying who they are and who they work for, and have edited Wikipedia articles. That's what you're doing, too, as I am sure Smallbones is not your real name, and I have no idea who you work for. Andreas JN466 18:54, 11 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
So Andreas is pushing wikipediocracy as his source of wisdom on this. Frankly, I think wikipediocracy is a piece of crap, and has no bearing on this or any other discussion on Wikipedia. So I'll just repeat. Watch the video at http://www.ftc.gov/news-events/audio-video/video/endorsement-guides and if you are still not clear what deceptive advertising is in the context of Wikipedia you can pose the question directly to the US FTC at endorsements@ftc.gov . Smallbones(smalltalk) 14:07, 12 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
"an endorsement means any advertising message (including verbal statements, demonstrations, or depictions of the name, signature, likeness or other identifying personal characteristics of an individual or the name or seal of an organization) that consumers are likely to believe reflects the opinions, beliefs, findings, or experiences of a party other than the sponsoring advertiser"
"When there exists a connection between the endorser and the seller of the advertised product that might materially affect the weight or credibility of the endorsement (i.e., the connection is not reasonably expected by the audience), such connection must be fully disclosed."
These are from the FTC Endorsement Guides http://www.ftc.gov/sites/default/files/attachments/press-releases/ftc-publishes-final-guides-governing-endorsements-testimonials/091005revisedendorsementguides.pdf
In short if a paid editor puts their "findings" in an article it's an endorsement and the paid relationship needs to be disclosed. Smallbones(smalltalk) 13:20, 13 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Judge by edits, not accusations
Excellent piece. Here's another thought: in all that fuss, do we even know which articles were affected? I would expect, in fact, that an experienced Wikipedian like Sarah would edit ethically - respecting notability, neutrality and such, and thus, if we were to review the "paid for" articles, we would find nothing to remove or delete. If I am right, this would just go to show that we are totally overreacting when it comes to this form of paid editing, making it into a boogeyman, and carrying out witch hunts. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 16:29, 11 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
"an endorsement means any advertising message (including verbal statements, demonstrations, or depictions of the name, signature, likeness or other identifying personal characteristics of an individual or the name or seal of an organization) that consumers are likely to believe reflects the opinions, beliefs, findings, or experiences of a party other than the sponsoring advertiser"
"When there exists a connection between the endorser and the seller of the advertised product that might materially affect the weight or credibility of the endorsement (i.e., the connection is not reasonably expected by the audience), such connection must be fully disclosed."
These are from the FTC Endorsement Guides http://www.ftc.gov/sites/default/files/attachments/press-releases/ftc-publishes-final-guides-governing-endorsements-testimonials/091005revisedendorsementguides.pdf
Your next question is likely to be "What is an advertisement?" Believe me, the FTC defines "advertisement" extremely broadly - essentially any communication to consumers from the company. Smallbones(smalltalk) 00:57, 12 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Taking a stance where none was needed
Based on what I've read here, Sarah Stierch could have been let go because as an employee of the WMF, she shouldn't have accepted money to write content -- that's a conflict of interest few employers would have stood for, & I doubt anyone would have faulted the WMF for its actions. However, by the way this was handled it's clear that the Foundation -- & Jimmy Wales -- don't want to see any contributors making money from writing for Wikipedia, no matter what the conditions of employment are. Even though they are doing quite well living off of the volunteerism of others. -- llywrch (talk) 01:34, 12 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Note to the WMF
As a condition of employment, my employer asks all employees to read and sign an eight-page document outlining ethical policies and conflicts of interest, providing clear and generally problematic situations. If WMF hasn't done this already, the legal counsel needs to get to it immediately. -- kosboot (talk) 01:11, 13 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Character assassination
No evidence of advocacy, no evidence of problematic editing, and no evidence of any harm. Meanwhile, a person's reputation has been damaged by having these accusations made public by her employer, while the government and corporate PR shills, hacks, and spooks edit away as before. The more things change, the more they stay the same. Viriditas (talk) 11:42, 13 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
- Yes. Sacrificed on the altar of political PR correctness, because there was the Wiki-PR scandal a few weeks ago, and the WMF had to be seen to take a strong stance against paid editing given the comments they'd made at the time that scandal broke.
- I thought it was most interesting that the Foundation did absolutely nothing about Wiki-PR, whose activities had been under investigation for months, until the matter hit the press, and has done nothing to date to establish clear ground rules with regard to the thousands and thousands of paid edits Wikipedia receives each day. These are all Wikimedia PR efforts in their own right, rather than measures to address the actual problem. The Foundation should update its Terms of Use one way or the other to make clear what is and is not allowed, looking at present accepted practices not just in the English Wikipedia, but all major Wikipedias. Andreas JN466 15:42, 13 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Per WP:GRAPEVINE:tl;dr, sorry but where was the advocacy?
So there was evidence of WP:PE, who cares? Where is the evidence of that combining with the advocacy she has been so publicly accused of? As if ideological advocacy is any less pernicious... Where's the evidence? Could someone point me in that direction? I saw none presentend in this piece (but perhaps I missed it). Thanks. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. {{U}}) while signing a reply, thx 19:54, 15 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
"Paid Advocacy Editing" a polemic term
So-called "paid advocacy editing" is a polemic term — a conscious attempt to muddy the water with respect to paid editing. It's really quite simple: there is paid editing; there is non-paid editing. Both are permitted under Wikipedia policy. There is POV editing; there is Neutral POV editing. The former is prohibited (whether or not the content writer is paid or not), the latter is required (whether or not the content writer is paid or not). Now, the rub is this: paid editors have a financial incentive to "cheat" on NPOV. This is why they must be supervised. They need to declare their COI editing and their contributions need to be subject to even-handed, fair third party examination. Instead, we have a small handful of anti-paid editing fanatics running roughshod over any paid editor they can find. And so the paid editors hide, and so they can't be supervised like they need to be. This problem starts at the top, with a few WMF insiders who act as flag-bearers and enablers of the anti-paid editing extremists. These extremists do not reflect community consensus. Their abuses need to be reined in by the community. Only then can we address the problem of paid POV editing in a realistic way. Carrite (talk) 06:00, 16 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
More commentary at Wikipediocracy
I suggest that interested readers here check out the current Wikipediocracy blog post on this subject, published earlier today. I'm not allowed to post the link on-wiki. Cla68 (talk) 22:37, 16 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]