Re: Paid Editing on WP is permissible

[ericbarbour]

So blatant:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lola_Astanova

A pianist who's more famous for wearing tacky miniskirts and heels than for her playing. Ample YT videos if you need to gawk.

Article was mostly the work of V.Yaris, an obvious undeclared SPA who did almost nothing else on Wikipedia. They didn't even pretend to hide it. And no one's noticed. A little bit of complaining about "peacock phrasing" on the talkpage and nothing else.

Once again, not getting their money's worth....

[ericbarbour]

Well, THIS guy is getting his money's worth, because he did it himself:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chad_Prather
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:C ... hadprather

[CrowsNest]

Well, THIS guy is getting his money's worth, because he did it himself:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chad_Prather
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:C ... hadprather

The Wikipedia need to recognise that while their response to such things is so inadequate, people will still do it.

Unless he is socking, this guy stopped editing in August 2017. This is all that has happened to that article since then......

https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?ti ... =794232801

Lots more beneficial edits for him, the only downsides being the removal of one obviously promotional paragraph, arguably not even needed.

The Wikipediots can't say they aren't aware of the issue. The article has been tagbombed to death, so it is in all the maintenance queues awaiting attention. And the user himself was warned repeatedly, enough for whoever was warning to realise they either didn't understand or didn't care.

The tags don't appear in mobile view, and given what this guy is famous for, in the subsequent ten months he is likely to have squeezed all the promotional benefit from Wikipedia that he needs. If they fixed it now, even if it was deleted, who would care? It might even do him a favour - nothing says your career has died more than an abandoned wiki page.

[ericbarbour]

nothing says your career has died more than an abandoned wiki page.

Which reminds me of Billy Jay Stein again. I posted this on the old WS board long ago and forgot. Stein is notorious for his self-promotion and waving pics of his jam-packed studio around. He's made a video that is currently circulating on Facebook, with the stupid emojis attached.

And one of those pics is now on Commons and his badly-written, poorly-sourced WP article. Created in 2015 by a paid editor, Stein himself expanded it, then another paid editor expanded it further.

https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?ti ... on=history

[ericbarbour]

cachecreek.gif (65.08 KiB) Viewed 4969 times

Not only but also: it was created in 2006 by a premium example of a paid editor who tried to hide the paid editing by editing unrelated stuff. And succeeded--until others changed it.

https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?ti ... t=Lmarbury

The article looked like this when Lmarbury finished. The tribe should ask for their money back, dammit.

https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?ti ... d=91096339

[ericbarbour]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ray_Holt

Ray himself was messing with it.....
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:C ... ns/Zajacik
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:C ... ns/Rayholt

[Cruizir]

The most recent SanFranned user, Elbasyouny, seems to have been a paid editor. See the wikipediocracy thread on him for some proof.

[ericbarbour]

Because it's been in the news lately:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/People_of_Praise

In 2006 most of it was written by Danbold, who at least doesn't look like a member or paid editor. You can decide on these later major editors yourself.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:C ... ons/Swanae
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:C ... inlavergne
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:C ... erberry214
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:C ... n_Veritate

And then there's looneytoons.
https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?ti ... d=95870830
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:C ... ghostofgod

The editwarring, thanks to Amy Barrett's possible consideration for the Supreme Court, has just begun....as soon as her name was mentioned in the press last week, people started messing with it.....and of course, there is now an article about her. Created in May 2017 by a really questionable account. And diddled later by another one. Articles about lawyers and judges really should be watched for paid editing more carefully.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amy_Coney_Barrett
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:C ... s/Bjhillis
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:JocularJellyfish

[Graaf Statler]

The most recent SanFranned user, Elbasyouny, seems to have been a paid editor. See the wikipediocracy thread on him for some proof.

Well, I start to understand I have done something very, very wrong, because it costed me only money. (for the diesel for my car to take the pictures for my articles.)

I didn't even get a cup of coffee or a syrup wafflel for all my work! I don't like stroopwafels, to sweet, and they destroy your teeth, that is not the point, but I also have never had any digital present, or even a thank you. Yes once, for my help with the article Peter Ritzen. And of course the famous SanFan Ban reward from WMF.
And it makes me so proud I have won that rare SanFanBan, because I really did nothing wrong, not one single edit.
Nobody ever will find a peace of evidence against me, simple because it doesn't exist.

[ericbarbour]

Ever heard of queer-studies academic Jack Halberstam? Neither had I. But obviously he/she either has an aggressive fan following, his/her students took it upon themselves to venerate Jack, or someone's paying these SPAs to enormously expand his/her article. On 30 Sept/1 Oct 2016 it went from 15k bytes to 38k bytes, most of it unreadable academic-jabber. Not explained: what makes Halberstam important enough to deserve 40k bytes on Wikipedia. Apart from being an LGBTQblahblah hero.

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