To the issue of editors benefiting themselves: In the cases where a company helps with creating a good, fair and neutral article in-line with Wikipedia policies and guidelines, would you agree that this is a benefit to both Wikipedia and the company?

It might be interesting if a quantitative study could be made of the reliablity and accuracy of company articles in Wikipedia.

However, this post is not about the background of editors, but on writing about topics that will directly benefit editors. Interestingly, one could leverage his/her authority about a certain knowledge area writing good stuff in Wikipedia, in collaboration with the community. That’s good for you, but you wouldn’t have direct intrests. However, writing an article about your company in *an encyclopedia* is a different case. In fact, the real rationale behind this debate is outreach: the +400 million unique visitors in Wikipedia every month. I wonder if many companies would have ever considered to be displayed in Wikipedia, should it had 1% of those monthly visitors. Thus, the clear goal is plain promotion and IMO that does not fit the main goals of an encyclopedia.

“These folks are explicitly considering Wikipedia as a key part of a social media marketing strategy, comparing it to Twitter, MySpace or LinkedIn. Should we really do that? Well, I think the answer is: no, we shouldn’t.”

I agree that Wikipedia is much different then the likes of Facebook, Twitter, etc. However interaction with the Wikipedia community is something companies need to consider, along with the basics of what makes a good article. No one owns an article, and current policies and guidelines allow folks with Conflicts of Interest to participate and contribute in order to improve Wikipedia.

“All the same, we can even find the WikiExperts code of ethics, where they state they adhere to Wikipedia policies, such as avoiding opinionated, biased or unsupported content, not removing negative information, writing about not notable topics or performing activities contrary to Wikipedia principles. Even after reading this, one wonders how this could be ever achieved if you are being payed, explicitly, to improve the public image your contractor.”

Perhaps the question is if clients will pay for advice and services that are in-line with Wikipedia policies and guidelines? If your topic is notable, then it is reasonable to ask for a fair and neutral article.

Companies, organizations and people can, and do, create articles about themselves on Wikipedia. It’s not an easy task, and requires much time and effort for their contributions to be accepted by the community. It often goes wrong, because they were not yet aware of how to interact with the community.

A note: because of our Code of Ethics, WikiExperts.us has sadly had to decline many potential clients.

This is going to come across as a bit harsh, and I apologise for that, but there’s not really any other way to write it. Only someone with absolutely no experience in communications, journalism or technical writing could make a statement to the effect that it is not possible to write in any particular way.

Not only is it possible, but it is, to some extent, the raison d’etre of those professions. It is why proper communications professionals are paid so much.

On the other hand, I can see where you are coming from. I certainly have the capacity to believe that your average wikipedian pretending to be a writer would fail the “NPOV” (is that what you all it, how quaint) test you set.

Regarding your last sentence, I think it is clearly not supported by the accounted history of the different Wikipedias. The policies and guidelines are established by the community of editors, like in many other open collaborative projects. Community members decide, and the best example is that a number of guidelines and recommendations are specific for certain languages.