Wikipedia talk:Conflict of interest

Sources on conflict of interest

• Davis, Michael and Stark, Andrew (eds.). Conflict of Interest in the Professions, University of Oxford Press, 2001.
• Krimsky, Sheldon. "The Ethical and Legal Foundations of Scientific 'Conflict of Interest'", in Trudo Lemmings and Duff R. Waring (eds.), Law and Ethics in Biomedical Research: Regulation, Conflict of Interest, and Liability, University of Toronto Press, 2006.
• Lo, Bernard and Field, Marilyn J. (eds.). Conflict of Interest in Medical Research, Education, and Practice, National Academies Press, 2009.
• Stark, Andrew. Conflict of Interest in American Public Life, Harvard University Press, 2003.

Template:Connected contributor

Please see discussion at WT:COIN about whether it's appropriate to use Template:Connected contributor on an article talk page in a specific situation. Link to discussion. --Middle 8 (contribs • COI)

reordering

hey Wuerzele - about this reordering. i reverted, as this was worked over when we added the ToU section (which was a big negotation!) back when it was changed.

the idea of having our paid editing section just under that, is to tie them together, at least rhetorically. there is (to my chagrin) no consensus as to the status of the ToU in Wiki-en... Arbcom has said, for instance, that they will not act on it until the community agrees that the ToU is policy. That can happen two ways. There could be an RfC (which we have never done) or it could become practice (e,g admins block people for violating it). In my practice at COIN, i work the two of them in parallel, as seamlessly as I can, which has worked pretty well so far. Happy to discuss, of course. (the rest of your edits have been great, btw - as far as I am concerned. thanks for them!) Jytdog (talk) 02:13, 22 April 2015 (UTC)

I moved the paid editing section, which is an EXCEPTION to the COI rule, from its prominent spot of the beginning to the end of the section close to another subsection (!) on paid editing. the effect of jytdog´s revert is that paid editing again "sandwiches" the problem of paid advocacy (by appearing at the beginning and end) and diffuses it, as if paid editing wasnt unusual and as if it wasnt always bad... lalala etc pp. for fresh eyes on this guideline, this is a very very prominent spot.

plse provide link of referred to the "consensus of this order" and need of a "rhethoric tie".--Wuerzele (talk) 02:28, 22 April 2015 (UTC)

i am not going to engage with you like this "lalalla". i self reverted and others can disagree and engage with you if they like. Jytdog (talk) 10:11, 22 April 2015 (UTC)

I assume that there is no link of a "consensus of this order of mentioning COI´s" and no link of a "need of a rhethoric tie" (?). I changed informal expression lalala to formal "etc pp" so nothing stands in the way for jytdog to engage. --Wuerzele (talk) 23:15, 22 April 2015 (UTC)

wuerzele i cannot remember the last time you just talked decently with me. as i said above, i am not engaging with you on this. i am engaging with you as little as possible. really your changes are fine with me. Jytdog (talk) 23:20, 22 April 2015 (UTC)

Thanks for confirming that there are no diffs to back up your claim, selfreversal and confirming agreement with changes. (i struck irrelevant part, since this is a content discussion page, where editors must refrain from WP:PA, because they WP:IDONTLIKE edits.)--Wuerzele (talk) 00:16, 23 April 2015 (UTC)

nope, that's not what i said. there are 3-4 pages of the archives where we worked it out. don't alter my comments, please. smallbones seems interested in discussing your changes with you. Jytdog (talk) 00:27, 23 April 2015 (UTC)

please provide the diffs to back up your claims, for the third time. I have read your old discussions.

The offtopic and irrelevant sentences "i cannot remember the last time you just talked decently with me. as i said above, i am not engaging with you on this. i am engaging with you as little as possible." are mudslinging, personal attack and biting the newbie on this page. My strike out is completely legit based on WP:TPO see removal of prohibited material. Your re-reversal of my legit edit is a pyrrhic victory, unproductive, contradicts policy and by leaving the WP:IDONTLIKE you have with me on this page, is a testament editing behavior. --Wuerzele (talk) 02:48, 23 April 2015 (UTC)

Series of edits to improve layout, readability, succinctness and accuracy

I reverted back to the start (Last Little Olive Oil). I'm not sure what the reordering means and am not necessarily against it, but we need to have consensus. It struck me as similar to rearranging the deckchairs on the Titanic - what's the point? Smallbones_(smalltalk) 23:37, 22 April 2015 (UTC)

I agree that the first section, the Foundation's position, should be moved into the paid-editing section, because it's about paid COI, not COI in general. It is followed by Wikipedia's position, which is about general COI, so the juxtaposition looks odd. Sarah (SV) ^(talk) 01:03, 23 April 2015 (UTC)

Sarah (SV) the change you describe (above without a diff) has never been made as far as i can see, correct me if i am wrong. I certainly did not make such an edit. therefore your writing you "agree" is confusing. That said, I certainly would agree with such an edit, because it creates clarity. --Wuerzele (talk) 01:32, 23 April 2015 (UTC)

Sorry, I misread one of your diffs, and just assumed that's what it referred to. Would anyone mind if I were to move that section? Sarah (SV) ^(talk) 06:04, 23 April 2015 (UTC)

Smallbones, I was alerted by your revert of my 12 edits with detailed edit summary today. It is different from the interaction with jytdog above, who was temporarily uncomfortable with one edit, 658029130, so I am starting a new section. If you click on each of the 12 diffs you will see the nature and quallity of my edits, their description and my intent.

Example of first edit: "expand quote to completeness, add url". The quote was incomplete, which is not good practice. The ref did not have an url ! I added one. let me know if this edit is not ok with you, why not.

Example of last edit:"collapsing legal subsection consisting of 1 sentence , and subsection campaigning which is part of political COI." The unnecessary partitioning some of which was against WP:MOS, inhibits WP:readability. let me know if this edit is not ok with you why not.

I would prefer if you raised your general concern ("I'm not sure what the reordering means") by reverting the particular diff that reorders 658029130. Or revert any other that you feel is no improvement. i hope this helps--Wuerzele (talk) 01:09, 23 April 2015 (UTC)

I agree with Smallbones' reversions of your edits, as I do not feel that in the main they were improvements. Coretheapple (talk) 18:32, 23 April 2015 (UTC)

Thanks for your (albeit pingless) reply. can you please be more specific of your "feelings" please? For example, why is expanding an incomplete quote no improvement, or why is adding an url to a ref no improvement? why is collapsing excessive partitioning like a subsection consisting of 1 sentence , and a separate subsection which is part of a subsection, and inhibits WP:readabilityno improvement? please refer to teh specific diffs you find no improvement . Thanks. --Wuerzele (talk) 20:52, 23 April 2015 (UTC)

Image files

What about the case of territorial photographers, ie, replacing others' images (even Featured Images) with their own (arguably inferior) photos until the article is stacked, and then keeping others' images out? Even though I doubt there's any pecuniary interest there, it appears to show intent contrary to the goal of writing an encyclopedia. The guideline doesn't appear to cover this but it should be like WP:SELFCITE. Geogene (talk) 22:47, 22 April 2015 (UTC)

Geogene, how big of a problem is WP:selfcite of images on WP overall, can you give any qualitative estimate ? Is territorial photography your niche or do you think is it a particular problem area? I can see how the correlation of username and user uploaded file could be figured out statistically, but I can also see many false positives, when users upload a file since no other files are available, which is completely in line with the goal of writing an encyclopedia. --Wuerzele (talk) 23:28, 22 April 2015 (UTC)

If anyone has statistical data on how common any type of COI editing is on Wikipedia, they haven't shared it here. Why should I be the first? I'm not suggesting we unleash bots to look for it (you're right that that would be extreme overkill), I'm suggesting that a holistic approach to COI should mention it in passing. Geogene (talk) 23:42, 22 April 2015 (UTC)

(EC)I've always expected this territoriality to happen at WP:NRHP, but it never really has. I'd hope that if it ever does that a project would take care of it itself. If the articles Georgene is referring to are looked after by a specific project, then I'd refer the problem to that project.

This isn't to say I've never run into the problem myself. In one of about 3 cases where the replacement worked against my pix, it was about a railroad buff who liked to show pix of the tracks and platforms, vs. my pix of the RR stations. After talking with the guy and finally agreeing to disagree, I put a notice on the talk pages of the affected articles and after about 6 months most of them were switched back.

From the other side, I do replace pix if I think mine are head-and-shoulders better pix for the article. It's a bit like changing text; if you think yours is better, please replace. But with photography there's a bit more ego and subjectivity involved, so I strongly suggest not to replace unless you're really sure yours is better. Hope that helps. Smallbones_(smalltalk) 23:52, 22 April 2015 (UTC)

Geogene, thank you for your reply. I see that I wasnt clear. Let me start over:

Thanks for raising this issue, which I wasnt aware of at all. Since I am completely ignorant as to how big of a problem WP:selfcite of images is on WP overall and since you raised the issue, could you please educate me, a fellow editor, give any qualitative estimate (ie very common common uncommon rare)? Furthermore since you mentioned territorial photography: Is taht your niche/expertise, and if not, do you think it may be a particular problem area compared to others? Forget the rest that I wrote its thinking out loud. I am not asking you to share on how common any type of COI editing is on Wikipedia, only the one you brought up!. I can tell you that from my reading of these pages I have seen people express a few qualitative (not quantitative) estimates of how common they think COI editing is, so you certainly would not be the first ! --Wuerzele (talk) 00:29, 23 April 2015 (UTC)

I suspect it's relatively uncommon and limited to certain types of article, but that I also think that a systematic search of the right articles' edit histories would come to look like a nature documentary. To answer your second part, it's a trivial matter compared to other types of COI, which is the reason there's no mention of it in the guidelines. One of those annoying things, like self-cite and linkspam, but not a dangerous thing, like Wifione. Geogene (talk) 00:54, 23 April 2015 (UTC)

Ok.... I dont quite understand what you mean with "systematic search of the right articles' edit histories", especially since I said forget about it, it was self talk, and you didnt become specific on where you edit or where youve noticed it, but now ....to the point of your suggestion: what wording do you want to add, so that the guideline will "appear to cover this"?--Wuerzele (talk) 01:22, 23 April 2015 (UTC)

Propose adding "Avoid replacing others' images with your own without getting consensus first." to the end of SELFCITE. Geogene (talk) 01:34, 23 April 2015 (UTC)

I don't think that replacing one photo with your own is actually a conflict of interest. If your photo is better, you shouldn't need to jump through bureaucratic "discuss first" hoops; if it's worse, someone else will probably revert you; and if they're the same quality, then who cares? Unlike editing by someone whose job is to make the article promote a particular POV, the effect of Picture 1 vs a very similar Picture 2 is the same from the reader's perspective. The photographer might get an ego boost from seeing his/her image in an article, but there's no real conflict of interests. In fact, it's no different from you editing the words of an article because you think it's cool to know that your words are what thousands of people read each day.

If we see a widespread problem with this, then we should contemplate a change to the WP:Image use policy, rather than here at COI. WhatamIdoing (talk) 15:33, 23 April 2015 (UTC)

• hi WhatamIdoing, agree this should be addressed at WP:Image use policy . I d like to agree more with you, but after reading the WP:Image use policy I see that it does not contain the issue Geogene brought up.--Wuerzele (talk) 20:58, 23 April 2015 (UTC)
• Re: "might get ego boost" - Not quite so. The photographers who seek ego boost usually release their photos with "attribution required" clause in CC license. So in fact it amounts to shameless self-promo, unlike you and me who do not attach their signature to every phrase entered into an article. And (I saw this question) yes, I've seen this several times, even I am not paying much attention to images. Staszek Lem (talk) 21:21, 8 May 2015 (UTC)

"one of the top", "one of the leading" etc.

Claims like this are meaningless. If the group is meaningful, and if there is no 3rd party RS, the thing to do is to remove them. If meaningful and there is actually a 3rd party RS, check to see if it gives an actual ranking. If it does , I reword it in the form " 4th among the 10 ...." or whatever; if it is an unranked list, I reword it in the form "one of the 10 ..." or whatever. If the group is meaningless, for example "one of the top engineering firms in West Podunk," I remove it, sourced or unsourced.

Similarly, claims to be "the top" or "the leading", etc. must be meaningful and must also have a third party RS that says this explicitly. DGG ( talk )

Seconded. Nearly every company brags about being "industry leader in..." or smth. Even if a secondary source says so, we can include such claims only if these are reasonably substantiated in the source or the source is a recognized expert in this industry, not just some blogging reviewer. Staszek Lem (talk) 19:24, 8 May 2015 (UTC)

RfC on COI for alt-med practitioners

Arguments have been made that practitioners of alternative medicine (for instance, acupuncturists) have a conflict of interest with regard to content describing their field of practice.

Broadly, the argument for that claim, is that alt-med practitioners have a need to legitimize their field (adding positive content, and removing negative content) in order to get more people to use their services.

Broadly, the argument against that claim is that within Wikipedia generally, professionals are not considered to have a conflict of interest for content about their field; indeed we welcome experts' contributions, as long as they don't edit to promote their individual practices, publications, or pet theories (see for example the part of the COI guideline on Writing about yourself and your work and the essays WP:EXPERT and Wikipedia:Conflicts of interest (medicine))

Arguments over this are causing conflicts at the acupuncture article, for example, with some editors tagging the article for COI due to editors who have disclosed that they are acupuncturists directly editing the article, and other editors removing the tag.

So the RfC question: do practitioners of alternative medicine (for examples, acupuncturists or naturopathists) have a conflict of interest with regard to content describing their field of practice? The question is narrow, on the yes/no. If the community says "yes", a subsequent RfC will address what limits such practitioners should abide by. I am publicizing this widely. Jytdog (talk) 16:39, 10 May 2015 (UTC)

• added note: if you are an alt med practitioner, please disclose that in your !vote. Jytdog (talk) 17:29, 10 May 2015 (UTC)

Survey

• Do not support this idea. Are we willing to deal with western-medicine MDs the same way? Support of this idea implies all experts in all fields have a COI. If that is the case and if we want to restrict their editing we can shut down Wikipedia. My comment here has resulted in this discussion which is both threatening, and is intimidation. [1] (Littleolive oil (talk) 16:49, 10 May 2015 (UTC))

It is a false equivalence between (most) altmed practitioners and "western-medicine MDs". The latter operate in a wide field and if certain therapies and products are found useless they simply adjust to new ones. In altmed the therapy is usually one specific intervention and so there is no "off ramp" - the practitioner's livelihood is thus strongly bound to assessments of that therapy's worth. So, an advocate of crystal therapy does not operate in a way which responds to evidence. Of course in conventional medicine too editors here have COIs when they have close links to particular medical products or therapies; problems like that happen here often too. Alexbrn (talk) 12:50, 11 May 2015 (UTC)

• Yes "Alternative" and "complementary" medicine are polite phrases to describe a group of practices that don't have adequate evidence supporting them to be described as simply "medicine", and includes practices that can be adequately demonstrated to be nonsense. People that practice them have a strong bias to make them appear to be plausible (you can see how important they consider it to have inaccurate articles about such topics here. Note Jimmy's impolite, but accurate response). As for the notion that "experts" in fraud should be given deference to their expertise, no.—Kww(talk) 16:51, 10 May 2015 (UTC)

• No COI: I think the community would never say MD's have a COI even on the debated topics of our day like vaccines or whatever. Why should we treat any other professions differently? LesVegas (talk) 16:52, 10 May 2015 (UTC)

Inappropriate off topic forum shopping

Please note. User:LesVegas was asked on two separate occasions to stop making misleading comments against me.[2][3] He is continuing to make misleading comments against me.[4] There was an ArbCom case involving LesVegas. See Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Acupuncture. QuackGuru (talk) 17:30, 10 May 2015 (UTC) Yes. There is some useful on-point secondary material on this topic referenced at Alternative medicine#Conflicts of interest. In a nutshell because the outcome of research into altmed topics often seeks to verify (or not) the very worth of an altmed offering it has a direct bearing on a practitioners' livelihood: the stakes are high and these go to the heart of what we mean by a COI. The Cochrane Collaboration counts having any "clinical speciality" as a source of conflictedness, which can only be "laundered" through participation in a larger team of non-conflicted colleagues: Employment in a clinical speciality relevant to the Cochrane Review should be declared in the interests of transparency, but this does not prevent an individual from being a review author, including taking on the role of lead (first) author. In addition, for calculating whether a team has a majority of non-conflicted authors, if this was the only declared interest, an author who was employed in a clinical speciality would count as non-conflicted. And of course Cochrane authors are not anonymous and their contributions and subject to the scrutiny of peer-review with full knowledge of each author's identity (and so repercussions for impropriety). Like Cochrane, Wikipedia does not absolutely prevent conflicted editors from contributing but since the question at hand is whether an altmed practitioner has a COI in respect of their altmed specialism, I think the unambiguous answer is "yes". Alexbrn (talk) 17:00, 10 May 2015 (UTC) Alex, that quote from Cochrane says it regards specialist authors as non-conflicted. The danger with this proposal is that it feeds into the "experts will be banned" fear that those opposed to this guideline argue. The question is what role money plays and when does it matter. We don't ban gynaecologists from gynaecology articles; we welcome them. We do get uncomfortable when plastic surgeons edit in their area because the money/promotion issues seem more pressing. Ideally we should try to develop a general policy about this before declaring that some professions are conflicted but others not. That is, how directly must a conflicted editor be involved in selling a product? Often things boils down to how much we trust the individual, and how helpful they're being at the article in question. Sarah (SV) (talk) 17:58, 10 May 2015 (UTC) @SlimVirgin: That's not my reading of the Cochrane policy,[5] it seems they only count such people as non-confliced in the context of assessing the overall team's conflictedness. It clarifies later: "Health professionals might wish to evaluate an element of their practice. Any such employment should be declared. This does not prevent someone from being a review author and if this declared conflict is in isolation such an individual is counted as non-conflicted from the perspective of the need to have a majority of non-conflicted authors." (my bold) By "in isolation" I take it they mean that such conflicts don't add to the tally in team COI assessment. I agree is good to be clear about what the conflict is. As with any specific medical product or service if an altmed practitioner is charging money for supply of specific products/service then they have a conflict. This is different from the case of general medicine or a wide field like gynaecologoly. As Ernst has put it: "Some might say that this not different from conventional medicine, but I disagree: if we take away one specific therapy from a doctor because it turns out to be useless or unsafe, he will be able to use another one; if we take the acupuncture needle away from an acupuncturist, we have deprived him of his livelihood." I agree editors with a conflict may be trustworthy/helpful, but that's a different question that that being asked. The background here is altmed practitioners flatly asserting that on Wikpedia they have no conflict of interest. Alexbrn (talk) Comment Financial coi aside: They are practitioners, not professionals. Their area of practice has no grounds in evidence-based practice, and they have no ethical guidelines based upon evidence-based practice. Likewise, they are practitioners, not experts. They've no expertise in the scientific basis for their practice (which simple doesn't exist in most areas of alt med). However, "...describing their field of practice" is very broad indeed, and I'd expect there are some situations where they could be used as primary sources. --Ronz (talk) 17:07, 10 May 2015 (UTC) Yes/Depends, same way that businesspeople/enterpreneurs have a conflict of interest with regard to topics close to their services/products -- they need to exercise caution when editing those articles. Even if it's a general topic that doesn't refer to a certain company/product. For example someone who sells liquid soap shouldn't go around writing about how Liquid soap is much more better than solid soap, because he's indirectly serving his own interest rather than that of Wikipedia/the readers. Compare the alt-med people to businessfolk, not to doctors. — Jeraphine Gryphon (talk) 17:06, 10 May 2015 (UTC) Lean No -- I've considered this extensively, and there are valid arguments pro and con, but I find real-world precedent -- or the lack thereof -- decisive. At the Cochrane Collaboration, which produces the strongest types of MEDRS we use and is probably the leading publisher of such sources worldwide, practicing acupuncturists write about their field (including all the controversial stuff about lack of efficacy, which is the crux of the matter) and are not considered conflicted. (I know this for a fact because I -- as an acupuncturist myself, see my signature -- personally know at least one of the authors, who is not just a researcher, but is also paid to perform acupuncture as well.) In fact I'm not aware of a single journal or institution whose policy on COI applies in the way contemplated here: anyone? COI can be a grey area with some conflict existing but not amounting to a recognized COI -- hence the validity of the arguments for COI but the lack of their translating into known real-world precedent. --Middle 8 (t • c | privacy • COI) 17:13, 10 May 2015 (UTC) P.S. Two more points: Anyone can play up the benefit and play down the risk/downside of the service they perform. Alt-med practitioners are hardly the only editors who are potentially "conflicted" in this way; whatever differences exist are of degree, not kind. COI, on Wikipedia and elsewhere, is not generally considered to arise from one's profession per se. Rather it arises from ones external relationships within ones profession (e.g. sponsorship) or outside of it (e.g. family relations). cf. User:Monty845 below [6] --Middle 8 (t • c | privacy • COI) 18:21, 10 May 2015 (UTC) One more: See WP:CGTW, #4. In practice, all this will do is drive the less honest/reasonable alt-med practitioners underground, leaving the decent ones "tarnished". Brilliant. Just judge editors by their edits, not their affiliations (what a radical idea). --Middle 8 (t • c | privacy • COI) 19:28, 10 May 2015 (UTC) Yes in almost all cases. We have had, for example, "practising" homeopaths being extremely disruptive at Homeopathy; unsurprisingly, as they have been irritated that the "treatment" they provide (and thus make money from) is described as scientifically useless. On the other hand, we have had similar editors there and elsewhere who have edited in a completely neutral way. Frankly, though, if you are someone who makes money from a subject, you shouldn't be editing it. You're not neutral, and that is clearly a violation. Black Kite (talk) 17:20, 10 May 2015 (UTC) Are you saying that an ophthalmologist should not edit in ophthalmology-related articles? - Location (talk) 17:28, 10 May 2015 (UTC) This is an RfC about alternative medicine. Of course, ophthalmologists should not edit any article that is relevant to their ability to earn money (i.e. an article about their own practice, if such articles exist), but since ophthalmology is not a disputed medical practice, the base article is not going to be disputed in any major way. Black Kite (talk) 18:20, 10 May 2015 (UTC) If the issue is "making money from a subject", then that is a point that is not unique to an Rfc pertaining to alternative medical practices. It seems to be a double standard to state that an ophthalmologist can edit ophthalmology but an acupuncturist cannot edit acupuncture. - Location (talk) 19:37, 10 May 2015 (UTC) Yes they do, and I think that WP:FRINGE makes such a conclusion apparent. These are people who make their living from the adoption by the public of views that run contrary to longtime Wikipedia practice of not giving such views equal footing with the views of established medicine. That's a clear conflict of interest. Coretheapple (talk) 17:31, 10 May 2015 (UTC) Oppose as a mater of principal. An expert is always going to have a conflict of interest when it comes to questions about the validity of the field they have invested themselves in. Alt-Med is no different. To treat Alt-Med practitioners as if they have a COI, but not all other professionals, would require that we essentially accept as an official position that Alt-Med is not real medicine. Not withstanding my own personal views on Alt-Med, Wikipedia should not take sides on such issues, and thus should not treat Alt-Med practitioners differently than we would a medical practitioner in another field, at least for COI purposes. Monty845 17:34, 10 May 2015 (UTC) But we do have that position. To give an example, if an employee of a school that uses Montessori education edits that article to make it sound more effective than standard education, that person has a COI. It's exactly the same concept. Black Kite (talk) 18:27, 10 May 2015 (UTC) I'm curious how that played out, can you point to an example of it being enforced, preferably where the person didn't engage in any editing relating to specific institutions where they would also have a COI? Monty845 18:37, 10 May 2015 (UTC) It was purely an example that occurred to me; there will be dozens of examples in various professions, though I have no idea if it has ever happened. The theory, however, is exactly the same as - for example - someone who earns a living as a homeopath trying to skew the Homeopathy article to be more favourable. We would treat the former as a COI, so I don't see why we should not for the latter. Black Kite (talk) 08:32, 11 May 2015 (UTC) Oppose Largely per Monty845 and others. I'm loathe to go down the line of saying that a person has a COI in an area of expertise simply on the grounds that they work in the field. It creates too many problems long term if we do this. WP:MEDRS and strong sourcing requirements provides a better solution, without running the risks that this approach might entail. - Bilby (talk) 18:02, 10 May 2015 (UTC) Yes, most of the time. This is a difficult scenario, trying to balance our desire to have experts write on a subject, but also not unduly slant a subject due to a conflict of interest. Taking an example from above, I am not particularly worried about ophthalmologists in general editing neutrally about general ophthalmology content, as their editing about general eye health content is probably not going to affect them personally to a strong degree. However, if there were a specific eye surgery that ophthalmologists have promoted for use which have not gained wide acceptance in the medical community and their livelihood depended on this one particular surgery being used and gaining acceptance, I would have strong reservations about their editing on the topic of how effective that surgery is. This would be analogous to alt med practitioners; I am less worried about their editing on the description of their beliefs, historical facts, etc, but do have significant reservations about their ability to edit material related to efficacy of their particular alt med modality without undue bias as their livelihood depends on their modality being seen as effective. Yobol (talk) 19:31, 10 May 2015 (UTC) yes--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 19:40, 10 May 2015 (UTC) Strong Oppose aka No COI - practitioners are experts in their respective practices and all get paid to practice unless they are retired practitioners or students. WP should not encourage a double standard, therefore if we say some experts can't edit articles while others can we are demonstrating bias. Furthermore there are quite a few alt med practitioners who are mainstream medical doctors, therefore any medical doctor who prescribes CAM (or integrative trmts) would be prohibited from editing as well. It would also apply to ALL experts in their relative areas of expertise ranging from science to ranching. This is not a well thought out RfC. Atsme☯Consult 19:44, 10 May 2015 (UTC) side discussion Jytdog (talk) 22:07, 10 May 2015 (UTC) The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it. the survey is just yes/no as to if there is a COI. it is not about the consequences of having a COI. Jytdog (talk) 19:51, 10 May 2015 (UTC) Really? I thought this was an WP:RfC as in, Request for Comment. You'd better get busy explaining to all the other editors who commented here or they might think you're showing partiality by gracing my comment with your comment. Atsme☯Consult 20:07, 10 May 2015 (UTC) The difference is that your Oppose comment isn't an oppose to the RfC question but to something else. It isn't unreasonable for this fact to be noted in some way so that the RfC closer can determine whether and how to factor it in to the consensus. Ca2james (talk) 20:34, 10 May 2015 (UTC) FWIW, it sounded like a direct oppose to me, looking at adverse consequences of a "yes". --Middle 8 (t • c | privacy • COI) 20:44, 10 May 2015 (UTC) (edit conflict)I don't see that. The question is, "do practitioners of alternative medicine have a conflict of interest with regard to content describing their field of practice?" I see almost every sentence in Atsme's contribution being directly relevant to that question. This isn't because you want 'No', not 'Oppose', in bold do you? I'd better change mine, in case you try to get the closing admin to disregard that too. --Nigelj (talk) 20:52, 10 May 2015 (UTC) The comments made by Jytdog and Ca2james regarding my comment conflict with achieving consensus and how RfCs are to be determined by the closer. See WP:Closing_discussions The closing editor/administrator will determine if consensus exists, and if so, what it is. To do this, the closing editor/administrator must read the arguments presented. If no arguments are presented how is the closer supposed to determine consensus? Based on the comments made by Jytdog and Ca2james, it would be by vote. I was unaware this RfC was intended to be a vote. Atsme☯Consult 21:15, 10 May 2015 (UTC) (edit conflict) Whether this !vote started off with a bolded oppose or a bolded no had nothing to do with whether I thought this !vote addressed the RfC question or another question. The RfC question is "do alt-med practitioner editors have a COI in their field?" but this !vote appears to me to be in answer to the question "should alt-med practitioner editors be prevented from editing because they have a COI in their field?" These two questions are not the same and don't have the same meaning. I can sort of see how this could be taken as an oppose to a yes answer to the RfC question but it presupposes one consequence of this RfC, which is that editors with this COI be prevented from editing, when it's possible that the consequence might not be so drastic. For example, the consequence might be that alt-med practitioners receive the same guidelines as mainstream med practitioners, or mainstream med practitioners might also be asked not to edit. Ca2james (talk) 21:30, 10 May 2015 (UTC) Oppose First, "alt med" is very broad. It covers practices from the utterly absurd (e.g., homeopathy) to those that appear to have some limited benefit for specific uses (e.g., chiropractic) and everything between. Second, and more importantly, it opens the door in directions we don't want to go. There already are people who argue that expertise is an inherent COI -- doctors shouldn't edit medical articles, academics shouldn't edit in their fields, and so on. We don't want to set a precedent for that nonsense. I'm as concerned as anyone else about aggressive promotion of dubious claims but this isn't the way to solve that problem. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 20:01, 10 May 2015 (UTC) No By this logic, we would prevent Christians from editing articles about Christianity, liberals from editing articles about politics, and French people from editing articles about France. COI prevents people from editing where outside interests are more important to them than advancing the aims of Wikipedia. It is a grave failure of WP:AGF to assume that this is ipso facto true of everyone in a field, without any other evidence about any specific editor, indeed the guideline states in its lead section that "Wikipedia's policy against harassment takes precedence over this guideline." If someone feels that an editor is not following WP:NPOV and other policies for whatever reason, there are sufficient channels in place to deal with it. This topic is not a special case, and does not need such draconian special measures. --Nigelj (talk) 20:28, 10 May 2015 (UTC) Oppose and I'm not entirely sure if this was ever meant to be taken seriously. Has anyone considered that Doc James and those who work for the pharmaceutical and Western medical industries would have a COI, too, given this reasoning? Or does the skepticism and discernment only swing in one direction on WP? petrarchan47คุก 20:58, 10 May 2015 (UTC) Yes, sort of Alt-med practitioners have as much of a COI as practitioners of mainstream medicine, in that members of both groups may place their own interests ahead of Wikipedia's. It doesn't really matter whether or not those interests appear to conform to Wikipedia's, which is the case for mainstream medicine practitioners. The point is that these editors may be editing to advance their own views over Wikipedia's; just because we can't see the COI because their thinking matches the current mainstream view, doesn't mean that the COI doesn't exist. That said, I don't think all members of either group necessarily have a COI, and while it's possible that more alt-med practitioner editors have a COI, I don't know that for sure. If there's data on the numbers of mainstream and alt-med practitioners with a COI as a percentage of the numbers of editors in those areas (possibly weighted by the number of edits), I'd be interested in seeing it. Ca2james (talk) 21:09, 10 May 2015 (UTC) Thank you; that has helped me clarify my own thinking. I think my point is that anyone may turn out to have a COI - or not to have one - in any area. You can't 'block-book' COI on behalf of whole classes of potential editors in advance of meeting them. It has to be decided on a case by case basis on the basis of their editing, their ability to meet NPOV, and what we know of their off-Wiki life. --Nigelj (talk) 21:21, 10 May 2015 (UTC) Yes. A CoI exists when editing an article leads to an increased likelihood of people giving their money to the specific person editing the article. Western medical practitioners shouldn't edit articles about specific products or services they offer, but they don't have a CoI when editing articles about their field of expertise, because readers are no more likely to give them their money than any other similar doctor. Alternative medicine practitioners inherently offer a product or service that other alt-med practitioners don't. This means that they have a CoI when editing articles that support whatever specific product or service they advocate. Roches (talk) 21:19, 10 May 2015 (UTC) Yes. William Connolley was found to have a COI on climate articles. SCAM practitioners have a vested interest in their practices. See also Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/Homeopathy#DanaUllman_banned, WP:QUACKS and numerous others. A doctor does not have a COI in respect of a certain drug or practice unless they are prominently identified with it. A doctor will move on to a new treatment if it is found to be more effectove, but a homeopath, say, will not move on to anything else however comprehensively refuted homeopathy is because it's a quasi-religious belief as much as anything. That's the difference between evidence-based practice and faith-based practice: EBM follows, well, the evidence. Guy (Help!) 21:39, 10 May 2015 (UTC) Should Christians be allowed to edit articles on Christianity? A committed Christian has an unwavering belief in a lot of non-evidence-based practices. Many of them, I suspect, still manage to edit WP sensibly. --Nigelj (talk) 22:03, 10 May 2015 (UTC) comment, FWIW: William Connolley having a COI for climate change per se (as opposed to, maybe, some particular organization with which he is/was connected) would be an incredibly flawed finding. Literally saying expertise = COI. --Middle 8 (t • c | privacy • COI) 22:08, 10 May 2015 (UTC) False Dilemma COI and Tendentious Editing are two different ills. If altmed practitioners engage in tendentious editing, they should be warned and sanctioned. However, it is not the case that they have an automatic COI that forbids them to touch the articles. Chiropractic, for example, is a licensed profession. While you might not choose to see a chiropractor, it is wrong to prohibit chiropractors from contributing to the article to explain (in appropriately verifiable and neutral terms) some facts about their profession. Jehochman Talk 21:47, 10 May 2015 (UTC) Some jurisdictions license fortune tellers. Licensing is not the magic pixie dust that determines whether something is evidence-based. Chiropractic has as much evidentiary basis as fortune telling. jps (talk) 21:51, 10 May 2015 (UTC) I think so Alternative medicine is medicine that does not have serious evidence-based backing. It is true that there are journals dedicated to alternative medicine and even some less-than-convincing research published in mainstream journals about the subject, but at the end of the day what we have are forms of medicine that have no empirical nor theoretical basis. Practitioners, by definition, are in it to make money. Their business depends on people believing, contrary to the reliable sources, that there is something more to their practice than wishful thinking. As such, they are fundamentally conflicted when it comes to writing a reference work that is supposed to be "neutral". Having a conflict of interest does not mean that practitioners should be banned from Wikipedia, but I do think that they should be prevented from acting in articlespace. I have argued this in the past with respect to acupuncturists, for example. We already have a de facto system in place for chiropractors and homeopaths. It should also apply to transcendental meditators, naturopaths, and faith healers. jps (talk) 21:51, 10 May 2015 (UTC) Yes. Of course practitioners of alternative medicine like acupuncturists or chiropractors have a potential COI with regard to content describing their field of practice. Please see Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/IncidentArchive843#Proposed_topic_ban_of_Neuraxis and Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Acupuncture. QuackGuru (talk) 22:21, 10 May 2015 (UTC) Yes, naturally. Their financial well-being is at stake, if Wikipedia indicates that their field is, um, not universally admired - and yet, Wikipedia must write so. Since it has been asked - yes, many experts have conflicts of interest. A "normal" medic who writes that one must go and have a check-up every week (and pay) would also have problems with conflict of interest. The difference is that problems with "alternative medicine" are far more common. But problems here are not unique - after all, that is the reason why we do not give experts the right to ignore the need for sources etc. However, I guess it would be worth to emphasise that conflict of interest does not mean that the editor must stay away from the article at any cost. It simply means that the editor has to be extra careful. Speaking of which, the current version of guideline (Special:Diff/661606832) seems to be rather unclear... Maybe explaining the difference between merely "having" a conflict of interest (having interests that might conflict with interests of Wikipedia) and "COI editing" (actually editing in the way that is beneficial to the editor and harmful to Wikipedia) would be a good idea..? --Martynas Patasius (talk) 22:25, 10 May 2015 (UTC) Yes Miniapolis 23:01, 10 May 2015 (UTC) No in general - not unless MDs and many other occupations are treated the same way. I don't doubt that HVAC people will aggressively push ASHRAE guidelines demanding that people turn their buildings into one giant fan room, for example. The COI policy should only apply in the rarer case in which a specific COI is involved, rather than mere POV pushing, such as when the practitioner markets a unique brand or product so that increasing sales transfers money directly into his pockets. When it comes to general pro-alternative medicine bias, bringing a few extra sales that are split up between tens of thousands of practitioners has a financial value for the editor of basically nothing. Wnt (talk) 23:38, 10 May 2015 (UTC) No: Very dangerous precedent estasblishing COI based on expertise instead of affiliation. What's next, Wikipedia editors have a COI when editing articles related to Wikipedia. This is a slippery slope and an attempt to suppress content that provides no benefit to WP. --Mike Cline (talk) 01:00, 11 May 2015 (UTC) Yes, in general. --L235 (t / c / ping in reply) 01:17, 11 May 2015 (UTC) No COI On the contrary, we need more editors that practice alternative medicine to balance out the already active group of traditional medical practitioners and to get a more diverse range of views. We should be looking to increase diversity among our editors, prompt debate and encourage productive edits - not using COI accusations to bully-out editors with views that differ from those held by our current editor demographics. CorporateM (Talk) 03:19, 11 May 2015 (UTC) @CorporateM: This doesn't make a lot of sense. Are you also advocating for more participation from climate change skeptics/denialists and creation scientists on Wikipedia? --NeilN talk to me 03:32, 11 May 2015 (UTC) I don't think that's a compelling analogy. First we wouldn't say a climate change skeptic has a COI, just that they hold a fringe view, which would make it unlikely for them to edit neutrally. An oil company may have a COI. Second, the example given was acupuncture. I don't know very much about the topic, but I understand that it is a long tradition with a rich cultural history and not as fringe as being a climate change skeptic. CorporateM (Talk) 03:53, 11 May 2015 (UTC) The long tradition is irrelevant to the scientific soundness of the process. Placebo effect is a real thing. Tigraan (talk) 09:11, 11 May 2015 (UTC) Oppose. This Rfc is not neutrally worded in that it targets one subset of Wikipedia editors, presumably to set-up a double standard as to who can edit certain articles and who cannot. A neutrally worded Rfc might ask if health care practitioners have a conflict of interest in describing their fields of practice, or if those involved in an occupation have a conflict of interest in describing that occupation. Requiring that those same editors disclose who they for the Rfc is a violation of WP:AGF in that there is an assumption that some editors are capable of objectivity while others are not. This is not the way to deal with disruptive or tendentious editing. - Location (talk) 03:30, 11 May 2015 (UTC) You're right that it's not neutrally worded, but I don't view that as a problem because Wikipedia is not neutral on fringe theories be they homeopathy or Holocaust denial. Thus an ophthalmologist is not viewed on a equal footing as a practitioner of the Bates method of curing nearsightedness by eye exercises and staring at the sun. So yes, a practitioner of the Bates method makes a living by pushing that fringe theory, and would have a COI in articles about that dangerous and medically-abhorred method. That doesn't mean that a regular eye doctor would never have COI, but just not inherent COI by editing articles on ophthalmology. Coretheapple (talk) 15:31, 11 May 2015 (UTC) So the essential difference is related to pushing fringe theories. We already have policies and guidelines to deal with that. The attempt to change those guidelines to state that certain people are not allowed to edit certain articles — and that is the driving force behind this discussion — seems like unnecessary WP:CREEP. - Location (talk) 16:01, 11 May 2015 (UTC) No, for three reasons: 1) while POV-pushing and general advocacy of fringe views is a serious problem, I don't think it's usefully analyzed within the "conflict of interest" paradigm; 2) describing this kind of behavior as "COI" encourages the junior-detective squad to go WP:OUTING; and 3) it sets a very bad precedent to claim that editing within one's general field of professional interest is a COI. (And by "very bad" I mean "there are already terrible precedents set on this topic, we're already seeing in the responses above a preview of the terrible arguments that will result, and I'm not capable of distilling into a single sentence just how very terrible an idea this is and how much you will regret it the next time some pseudoscientific BS goes to arbitration.) Opabinia regalis (talk) 06:33, 11 May 2015 (UTC) comment Really there's abit of a false dichotomy here. They don't inherently have a COI. They can be trusted to act as responsible wikipedia editors. While there is no COI one can become apparent, arise, or what have you. If they start pushing for some oddball, fringe, whatever thing... Say, "acupuncture can cure gingivitis." If they are pushing something with low quality sources. Once it's clear that advancing outside interests is more important to an editor than advancing the aims of Wikipedia, that editor stands in a conflict of interest. This is the standard I see as the best option. While an editor who happens to be an acupuncturist could attempt to advance a pseudoscientific belief, it stands to reason that an acupuncturist/editor could also positively help to advance the aims of wikipedia as well. A biologist/editor could attempt to advance a pseudoscientific belief in a biology article, and again they could also positively help to advance the aims of wikipedia. We are not targeting biologists however.There is no actual yes or no here. There is a maybe. As with any other potential expert on wikipedia we have to trust them to manage a potential COI and only when they fail to do we take action.-Serialjoepsycho- (talk) 07:45, 11 May 2015 (UTC) No, a COI is inherent if an editor has interests that bear on a topic. Whether that editor engages in conflicted editing is another matter. More generally, the very presence of a undeclared conflicted voice in discussions undermines the consensus process. As WP:COI quotes: "conflict of interest is like 'dirt in a sensitive gauge'". Alexbrn (talk) 08:48, 11 May 2015 (UTC) Interests that bear on the topic? This would be worth mentioning if you went more in depth. What you have mentioned is really to minor to respond to, but why not. An acupuncturist who edits the acupuncture article and attempted to do something other than advance the Aims of wikipedia would have failed to manage their conflict of interest. Until they do that there is no conflict of interest to actually worry about. I have not discussed being undeclared above, I would only agree with your view if wikipedia was a democracy and consensus was determined by vote. However that's not really the case. However yes someone with an undeclared COI, who is found to have a COI, one (specifically in this case) that they have failed to manage, they should be dealt with. Is there no longer a means to do this? There's plenty of ways to wikilawyer a COI out of this, but in my view of this policy, having a managed COI in this scenario does not violate this policy. Again you really have to lose the false dictomy here. There is no yes or no. It comes down to maybe and you have to (as is common in wikipedia policy) apply common sense. Not everyone in the group mentioned will have an issue related to the COI policy, but then some will.-Serialjoepsycho- (talk) 12:13, 11 May 2015 (UTC) Well the question at hand is simply whether a class of editors have a COI or not. That question is independent of their behaviour. If there was an article here on my wife, I'd have a COI in relation to it no matter whether I edited it or not. For altmed practitioners we could borrow a medical-centric definition from the Cochrane Collaboration of what would constitute a COI: it's when people are connected with entities which have a "real or potential vested interest in the findings of a specific Cochrane Review"[7] - so in the acupuncture case if a contributor runs, owns, or is paid by an acupuncture clinic they have such an interest in statements of acupuncture's worth as a treatment. In particular, they have an interest in having Wikipedia not say that the treatment is worthless and in saying, on the contrary, that it has worth. (Note they would not necessarily have a COI in relation to other aspects of acupuncture.) The assumption is that people with a COI are (or may be) subject to uncontrolled or unconscious bias. In decision-making this is significant because it skews discussions where editors are assumed disinterestedness from other participants - which is why in serious decision-making organizations COI is managed in some way, usually at least by requiring declarations of any such COI. And yes conflicted editing would not generally manifest itself in voting, but more in WP:CPUSHing. If it's determined that altmed practitioners have a COI for altmed that they practice, then the intention I believe is for there to be a second RfC about what might be done. It may for example be enough that such editors are transparent about their affiliation. Alexbrn (talk) 12:39, 11 May 2015 (UTC) Yes, I am absolutely aware of what the bullshit irrelevent question is. Because the question is bullshit and irrelevant I provided the above answer. An Alt-med practitioner writing on an Alt-med article that is in their field has no more of a conflict of interest than a biologist editor editing an article that is in their field of biology. There's is a line (in this case), before this line there is no conflict of interest. One could wikilawyer the piss out of it and have it become a conflict of interest. I hope that doesn't become the case here. I'm personally not a fan of instruction or policy creep. It may be enough that they are transparent about their affiliations? Hmm it seems to me that it's enough if they don't since the COI provides instruction of what to do when they don't. If there's an issue with sources take it to RSN. If it's an issue with advocacy take it to NPOVN. If there's evidence of sock puppetry take it to SPI. -Serialjoepsycho- (talk) 15:13, 11 May 2015 (UTC) Yes per Kww. Also, many opposers have suggested that the logical extension of this is that all eg. doctors have COI in their field of practice. Well, this is true in certain cases, for example a medical researcher might have a COI with regard to their new technique that they're developing. However it cannot not be the case that a practioner of so-called "alternative medicine" will promote it or the whole edifice of their work would be defeated. Real evidence-backed medicine is, well, evidence-backed and something editors can have legitimate discussions over. BethNaught (talk) 07:18, 11 May 2015 (UTC) Yes alt med is without evidence base and scientific acceptance thus contentious and those who profit from alt med have demonstrated a strong ongoing tendency to edit to obfuscate this. There is a clear financial interest in presenting alt med subjects as having validity for those who profit from alt med practices. This is not the case with traditional medicine with clear exceptions, those that profit from one particular treatment or drug have a COI in editing on those subjects. Experts in traditional medicine who contribute accepted empirically supported information would not have a conflict of interest. COI is not a prohibition from editing and I would hope (and expect) that alt med practitioners would continue to edit while following COI guidelines. Even precise descriptions of various alt med modalities create a COI in many cases, who is the authority on what is the "true" practice? Those in one school of practice have a COI in attempting to validate the practices of their group. Such conflicts can also arise in trad med and COI should be applied there also. But as this RfC deals with alt med, which usually lacks the evidence generally required for WP content those who subscribe to and profit from an endorsement of alt med have a COI in editing on the subject of their specialty. - - MrBill3 (talk) 07:41, 11 May 2015 (UTC) No, but... This nomination is poorly worded in my view, because there is "conflict of interest" in the common language (= editing when one has vested interests) and WP:COI, which is "when advancing outside interests is more important to an editor than advancing the aims of Wikipedia" (emphasis added). Every person that earns money from an occupation or holds political views has the former form of COI. I am pretty sure the consensus is against banning users to edit about their pet subjects if only for operational reasons (who is going to write about the trade of vegetables in the 7th century Byzantine Empire, if the historians cannot?). Deciding that some category of users has a COI in WP's meaning (i.e. they would rather violate policy than reconsider their views) is assuming bad faith from them. This being said, assuming bad faith because of the history of tendancious editing on some subjects could still be reasonable. In my view however, if this ever happens, this needs to be done by subject and not by person (since nobody knows you are a dog). Guess what, that's why indefinite semi or full protections are here (of course naive good-faith people will say indefinite protection does not mean eternal protection and it is just waiting for the dust to settle, but I am would not hold my breath in some cases). Tigraan (talk) 09:11, 11 May 2015 (UTC) Not for the most part - I believe that we need experts on alternative medicine to help make sure thgat the basics of these systems, the basic history, etc. remain reliable. I see no reason to think that conventional medicine experts have any less COI here than practitioners of these alternative medicine methods do. עוד מישהו Od Mishehu 11:09, 11 May 2015 (UTC) Yes there is a coi for alt-meddists writing on their belief of choice. -Roxy the Viking dog™ (resonate) 13:03, 11 May 2015 (UTC) Oppose as per User:Short Brigade Harvester Boris and the realisation stated above that this proposal would prevent conventional medical practioners that use acupuncture from editing. This would almost certainly be applied to the very many veterinarians who use acupuncture.DrChrissy (talk) 13:58, 11 May 2015 (UTC) Oppose per Monty, petrarchan47, and Wnt. We don't want to discourage experts from posting in field of professional expertise, and this is opening the door to saying nurses, MD's, physical therapists, lactation consultants, speech therapists, etc, can't post on related articles, simply because of their profession. If there are concerns in such cases, it seems a potential COI should be judged via disruptive POV-pushing behavior, and not simply the mentioning of professional expertise, which can be relevant in some discussions and otherwise might just be something a user chooses to share on his/her user page to let others get a sense of who they are. --BoboMeowCat (talk) 14:25, 11 May 2015 (UTC) OK. First of all, it's silly to equate the COI issues faced by an acupuncturist or homeopath with those of a physician. Physicians employ a range of treatments; if one is shown to be worthless, then the physician can and will abandon it. In contrast, if acupuncture or homeopathy is shown to be worthless, then its practitioners don't have the option to abandon their chosen field. That asymmetry should be obvious, but apparently is not (based on many of the comments above). I understand that this comparison is rhetorically useful, but it doesn't withstand a few moments of critical thought. On the RfC question, my views are in line with those of Boris (as they usually are). I don't have a problem with an acupuncturist editing our articles on acupuncture, and I've had positive experiences with a chiropractor (User:Dematt, now long gone) who was a thoughtful and productive editor of chiropractic articles. Acupuncture and chiropractic may have some benefits, for some people, for some conditions. And I can envision (in fact, I've seen firsthand) contexts where practitioners of these fields have been valuable contributors to our Wikipedia articles on the subjects. In contrast, from a reality-based, scientific perspective, fields like homeopathy do not (and cannot) work. For a homeopath to edit Wikipedia, s/he would have to be willing to acknowledge that. S/he would have to be comfortable with Wikipedia clearly stating that homeopathy is scientifically ludicrous and clinically useless. For obvious reasons, that is a hard acknowledgement for a homeopath to make, and so it's difficult for me to imagine a context where a homeopath can productively edit here. I don't think we can make a blanket pronouncement about "alt-med practitioners" without acknowledging these shades of gray. I also have zero confidence in the "community" when it comes to common-sense distinctions between real and bogus COIs (a lack of confidence which is borne out by many of the comments above), so I would prefer not to write this into policy because it will be misused. And now for the requested COI disclosure: I don't practice or profit from any form of alternative medicine, although I have occasionally recommended some forms of alternative medicine so long as people are honsetly informed of the evidence base, and so long as they're willing to commit the money/time/etc with a clear understanding of the state of the evidence. I don't have a problem with alt-med; I have a problem with dishonesty and with people who take advantage of others who are desperate for hope or solutions. MastCell Talk 17:01, 11 May 2015 (UTC) Discussion comment: I have no position on this issue. I will be interested to see what the community has to say on this. Jytdog (talk) 16:45, 10 May 2015 (UTC) Question: Do we consider the opinions of people associated with alternative medicine in this survey? If an editor associated with the Maharishi School of Management declares that that wouldn't give him a COI in respect to an alt-med topic like transcendental meditation, should we even consider that input?—Kww(talk) 17:07, 10 May 2015 (UTC) I would leave that question for the closer. Following the spirit of the header at the top of this page, somebody with a COI on the question itself should disclose that for the closer to consider. Jytdog (talk) 17:09, 10 May 2015 (UTC) I note that none of the conflicted editors has done so at this point.—Kww(talk) 17:16, 10 May 2015 (UTC) I disclose it in every single post; it's in my sig line. But I did go back and explicitly state it as well. AGF please. --Middle 8 (t • c | privacy • COI) 18:06, 10 May 2015 (UTC) Actually, I do give you credibility points for admitting it, but it's a little bit unreasonable to expect an RFC closer to chase down signature links. Now for the other two that had already entered comments at the time that I made this point: I haven't seen them make a rush to disclosure.—Kww(talk) 18:14, 10 May 2015 (UTC) Middle 8 the question is only yes/no on whether a COI exists. If the answer is "yes" a subsequent RfC would deal with what the COI means, with regard to advice for alt-med practitioners. For example, does Cochrane require practicing acupuncturists to disclose that? Jytdog (talk) 17:17, 10 May 2015 (UTC) @Jytdog: - AFAIK Cochrane's COI policies do not mention the kind of COI contemplated here, and they do have practicing acu'ists authoring stuff, and those same acu'ists are not declaring conflicts. --Middle 8 (t • c | privacy • COI) 17:46, 10 May 2015 (UTC) I quoted the 2014 policy above. Such conflicts would be declared in the pre-publication paperwork. Alexbrn (talk) 08:44, 11 May 2015 (UTC) @Middle 8: - are not considered conflicted ← what evidence do you have for that, it seems to contradict Cochrane's policy (quoted above)? They are considered conflicted, but this does not mean they are prevented from contributing. The question at hand is of conflictedness. Alexbrn (talk) 17:21, 10 May 2015 (UTC) @Alexbrn: - Re Cochrane. The evidence is the lack of any conflict disclosure at Cochrane by the author I personally know, or AFAIK by any other acupuncturist-author. But you're claiming something exists, so where is it, in practice, apart from what you think Cochrane's policies mean? Are there any acupuncturists (or other alt-med practitioner) at Cochrane (or for that matter any journal or institution) declaring a COI for writing about their own profession? Is there any policy explicitly stating COI exists in these cases? I've seen bloggers agreeing with your position, so your idea is not novel; I've seen no institution practicing it, so anyone practicing your idea perhaps is. --Middle 8 (t • c | privacy • COI) 17:46, 10 May 2015 (UTC) I have no idea whether the 2014 Cochrane policy applied to your colleagues, but the text is plain: "Health professionals might wish to evaluate an element of their practice. Any such employment should be declared." Alexbrn (talk) 08:44, 11 May 2015 (UTC) OK, here's what I (still) think: WP should follow precedents like Cochrane. Given their 2014 guidelines (nice find), that means: (1) the same standard for all specialists, MD or Chiro or whatever, and (2) a "COI" that means: you have to disclose your specialty, for transparency, and otherwise are not burdened. Asking "is there a COI or not" isn't very meaningful unless it's clear what happens when one has a COI. So, I do believe COI exists if we mean the Cochrane kind that's applied with an even and light hand. I don't believe COI exists if one means the heavy-handed, COIADVICE-type that WP currently has, which means that COI-editors cannot make edits "if another editor objects for any reason". Cochrane doesn't have anything remotely like that, and wisely so, imo. --Middle 8 (t • c | privacy • COI) 09:56, 11 May 2015 (UTC) Ronz about your comment above. I think this varies from alt-med field to alt-med field. Many countries (and states within the US) require acupunturists to be licensed - see Regulation of acupuncture. In my view, that makes a least some alt med practitioners "professionals". Jytdog (talk) 17:26, 10 May 2015 (UTC) My understanding is the license is a requirement to gain some control over the practice without regard to there being or not being any (or any degree of) evidence-based practice. --Ronz (talk) 17:42, 10 May 2015 (UTC) I'm still trying to get my head around what this Rfc is all about. I find it completely odd that we want to seek opinions as to whether one group of editors has a COI for some undefinable reason, and we are requiring them to disclose a COI in order to give feedback. - Location (talk) 17:43, 10 May 2015 (UTC) Location as I described in the setup, this has become a point of contention at the acupuncture article, with some editors claiming there, that editors who practice acupuncture have a COI. The subject has come up at COIN twice before: Wikipedia:Conflict_of_interest/Noticeboard/Archive_71#Acupuncture and Wikipedia:Conflict_of_interest/Noticeboard/Archive_43#Middle_8 with no resolution, and at the Talk of COIN here: Wikipedia_talk:Conflict_of_interest/Noticeboard#Template:Connected_contributor. There is no consensus on this recurrent question, so it is time to try to settle it. Jytdog (talk) 18:21, 10 May 2015 (UTC) Please note that User:Middle 8 previously declared a COI. See Wikipedia_talk:Conflict_of_interest/Noticeboard#Template:Connected_contributor for full discussion. QuackGuru (talk) 17:18, 10 May 2015 (UTC) I link to discussion of my (potential?) COI right in my signature. It's a nuanced issue, and I've struggled [8] with whether to describe it as "yes but..." or "no but...", so resolving this community-wide will be a good thing. --Middle 8 (t • c | privacy • COI) 17:56, 10 May 2015 (UTC) Another question: Do we consider the opinions of people associated with Guerrilla Skeptics in this survey? If an editor associated with this fanatical group declares that this would give him a COI in respect to an alt-med topic, or critic of Western Medicine and the pharmaceutical industry, should we even consider that input? petrarchan47คุก 20:53, 10 May 2015 (UTC) I am not a Guerrilla Skeptic, but a true skeptic is never fanatic or dogmatic about anything. True skeptics are dedicated to truth-finding and they never pass judgment until evaluating the most relevant evidence. Skepticism is not a prejudice, so skeptics demand evidence, they do not claim to have evidence where there is none. And of course, they demand extraordinary evidence for extraordinary claims. In fact, as Merton stated, science is organized skepticism and we as an encyclopedia learn our facts from science. So, by default Wikipedia has a bias in favor of organized skepticism (aka the scientific community). So, skepticism advances the purposes of Wikipedia and Guerilla Skeptics are welcome to do what they know best, i.e. debunking baseless claims and claims relying upon shoddy evidence. Tgeorgescu (talk) 01:42, 11 May 2015 (UTC) Note: RfCs do not typically exclude editors either explicitly or implicitly since an RfC is expected to be a place for a range of opinions from multiple editors. Any comments about specific editors should be posted on their talk pages and not used here to confuse this RfC. (Littleolive oil (talk) 21:29, 10 May 2015 (UTC)) No one asked for editors to be excluded from the discussion. But, if, for example, an editor voicing the opinion that being involved with the Maharishi School of Management stated that this didn't present a COI for editing articles about transcendental meditation or other pseudoscience and alt-med related articles, it would certainly be the honourable thing to do if that editor pointed out that they personally benefited from the stance they were taking. After all, not all editors have been around long enough to remember all the various issues with COI editing and the resulting Arbcom cases that they would recognise the involved editors by name.—Kww(talk) 22:39, 10 May 2015 (UTC) Kww. I am always flabbergasted by the things some editors get up to, assume, or are ignorant about. You are suggesting some editors while not others should be taken seriously in this RfC. There is no such WP regulation. Further, I said before and strongly suggest again, If you have accusations to make, take them to the user/user pages page and make them. Be straightforward. That would be honourable. Right now the innuendo here is confusing this RfC. (Littleolive oil (talk) 22:57, 10 May 2015 (UTC)) I see that there is a distinction being insisted upon in comments and relies among the !votes, and in the question, that this is a question only about whether a COI exists, and not about what we might do about that. This seems to be a bit of a nicety, as the COI guideline is very clear what happens when there is a COI. In a nutshell, it says, "Do not edit Wikipedia in your own interests..." (my bold). In the body the guideline obviously expands on this - COI editors can make some non-controversial edits etc. Are we dangling the idea here that if this RFC produces a 'yes', that it may lead to a special sub-class of COI editors, who have some edit rights in their area that are not presently covered by the COI guideline? That would seem a little ludicrous to me, but I can't any other point to drawing this distinction between yes/no now and 'what limits such practitioners should abide by' later. Obviously, they should abide by the same limits as any other COI editor, if we're not going to redesign the whole concept of COI because of this. --Nigelj (talk) 22:38, 10 May 2015 (UTC) Nigelj there is little to no consensus about what people with a COI should do; WP:COI is just a guideline and not policy exactly because of that. Some folks say there should be no restriction on people with a COI; lots of people (but by far not all) agree that paid editors should not directly edit articles (the "Bright Line" rule); some folks say anybody with a COI should not directly edit articles. Some people would have the community ban at least paid editors altogether but there has been no consensus for that. There is little consensus on anything related to COI. Most everybody (but by are not all) sees serious problems with enforcing any kind of COI ban or restriction in light of OUTING. Little about COI is simple in WP. But yes, if the community finds that alt med practitioners have a COI, what that would mean with regard to restrictions, would need a separate RfC. It is a whole other ball of wax. Jytdog (talk) 22:53, 10 May 2015 (UTC) I don't think that the question "is there a COI?" is meaningful unless we know what happens when you have a COI. (Would you like to eat a gram of some white powder tonight? Just answer yes or no; we'll identify the powder later.) :-) [9] --Middle 8 (t • c | privacy • COI) 10:11, 11 May 2015 (UTC) I have deleted a number of rants and walls of text I wrote in response to this thread. For the record, I have been guilty of WP:HOUNDING ALT-Meddists in the past, I now recognise that particular behaviour as not allowed here. Also I have no coi in this area. Consider some synonyms for "charlatanism" "deceitfulness" "dishonesty" "misrepresentation" "pretense" "deception" "imposture" and "trickery" ... and now, antonyms, (for quackery - same ref). "frankness" "openness" "truth" "honesty" "reality" "truthfulness" I think most mainstream editors have forgotten that snake oil sales is a despicable practise, and do we need people whose moral judgement, or ignorance and lack of education, is like that, working here, on the article about snake oil? They are allowed to edit here at the moment. We do not need to WP:AGF about the nature of the scurrilous treatment. Lastly, and on a lighter note, it is a disappointment to me that, unlike 'The Litmus Paper" which drew alt med advocates to comment in droves, we only have the usual suspects here so far. -Roxy the Viking dog™ (resonate) 12:58, 11 May 2015 (UTC) How can we have a community debate on a 'yes/no' proposal, when everyone first votes yes or no? With most respondents answering the survey rather than the discussion, we seem to be getting nowhere. I propose that the survey vote be set aside, and frozen for a few days, until some progress is made in the discussion. --Hroðulf (or Hrothulf) (Talk) 14:02, 11 May 2015 (UTC) not neutrally worded? Coretheapple per this how is it not neutrally worded? it asks plainly if a given group of editors has a COi. Jytdog (talk) 15:47, 11 May 2015 (UTC) Because it singles out alternative medicine practitioners and not all medical practitioners. As I point out in my response to User:Location, there is no problem with that because Wikipedia is not neutral on alternative medicine. It has a predisposition toward the scientific consensus on all matters, be they climate change or medicine. We give special scrutiny to fringe theories. A person who lives through the promulgation of fringe theories therefore has a conflict of interest whereas a person who makes his living by treating eye conditions via accepted medical methods has no such conflict of interest in writing about, for example, some basic eye test (unless he or she makes a living selling a particular brand of eye-test equipment that would be specifically promoted in the article). But if I'm a practitioner of the Bates method you're damn right I'm not going to add material to Wikipedia on the glories of "sunning." Coretheapple (talk) 15:53, 11 May 2015 (UTC) i don't agree (clearly) and tried very hard to make it a neutral qeustion. it is a question that was raised twice at COIN, once on the Talk page of COIN, and several times at the acupuncture article. That it is about a specific group doesn't make it un-neutral, it just makes it specific. Jytdog (talk) 16:04, 11 May 2015 (UTC) The important point to remember is that the medical practitioners under examination think it is ok to sell snake oil to their victims. -Roxy the Viking dog™ (resonate) 16:08, 11 May 2015 (UTC) If you think having a conflict of interest is just about selling snake oil, then you're fooling yourself. Plenty of people think optometrists sell them eyeglasses that they don’t need. I’ve spoken with ophthalmologists who believe refractive surgeons are overly aggressive in their marketing and that LASIK is not a good idea, and with veterinarians who believe that some surgery specialists are "cowboys" doing procedures that are not really in the client’s or patient’s best interest. - Location (talk) 16:35, 11 May 2015 (UTC) Notices I posted notices of this at the following places. If you post somewhere, please add: Talk:Acupuncture#RfC_on_COI_for_alt-med_practitioners Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Medicine#RfC_on_COI_for_alt-med_practitioners Talk:Alternative_medicine#RfC_on_COI_for_alt-med_practitioners Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard#RfC_on_COI_for_alt_med_practitioners Template:Centralized discussion User_talk:Jimbo_Wales#RfC_on_COI_for_practitioners_of_alternative_medicine Wikipedia:Fringe_theories/Noticeboard#RfC_on_COI_for_alt_med_practitioners Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Countering_systemic_bias#RfC_on_COI_for_alt_med_practioners -- Jytdog (talk) 17:14, 10 May 2015 (UTC) Less clear See Special:Diff/661606832. QuackGuru (talk) 22:31, 10 May 2015 (UTC) I restored " where those external relationships could reasonably be said to undermine your ability to remain neutral." and it was reverted. I'll look as to when it was originally added. --Ronz (talk) 00:39, 11 May 2015 (UTC) 03:39, 26 October 2012. Given that, I think we need to have a strong case for its removal. --Ronz (talk) 00:42, 11 May 2015 (UTC) Given how it ties this guideline to a pillar policy, npov, and that ultimately the problems with conflicts of interest are npov problems, I think it should remain. Is it too redundant maybe? I don't understand the edit summary on removal: it wasn't a change and I don't understand how it makes this guideline less objective in a way that matters. --Ronz (talk) 00:46, 11 May 2015 (UTC) My problem is that the language that you added (reinstated?) made COI a subjective condition and not an objective state, which was evident from the much clearer language that User:SlimVirgin utilized a few days ago. I haven't checked to ascertain whose is the the more settled version, but if hers is then it needs to be reinstated. Otherwise we need to get that changed, as it is clearly superior. Every person who edits in violation of COI feels that he is working to improve the NPOV of an article. We don't leave it up to the editor. Simple. If you have a COI, don't edit. Coretheapple (talk) 14:49, 11 May 2015 (UTC)