Talk:Neri Oxman

Complimentary quotes from others?

There are a number of promotional type quotes in the career section. How is this typically handled? What would other editors propose to be done about this to make this article the best it can be? LWu22 (talk) 21:01, 27 October 2023 (UTC)

There is a response to this question on the good article page here: Wikipedia talk:Good article reassessment - Wikipedia

It seems as though the quotes are ok but have to be moved to the correct location in the article.

It was also pointed out that the lead has to be updated to more accurately reflect the contents of the article. I will work on these two points in my upcoming editing sessions. Also sharing it here incase other editors would like to work on it.

Finally, I had some additional questions about best practices which I also asked in my response on that page. Feel free to update per response (there is no response as of right now as I just posed it). LWu22 (talk) 21:25, 29 October 2023 (UTC)

I moved and shortened the obvious ones. It's more common to have quotes from reviews, some of these need more context to be kept. – SJ + 20:16, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

Plagiarism controversy

Is there a reason why accusations of plagerism are included the in the education section rather than in her career or works section like was done for the allegations against Harvard president Claudine Gay?

The topic seems misplaced. Additionally the paragraph says "Oxman subsequently expressed regret and apologized for the errors in her dissertation on the social media platform X" however the prior sentence cites specific plagerism claims which Oxam has not apologized for as her apology was on January 4 2024 while the cited accusations were only published on January 5th 2024. 184.148.234.235 (talk) 04:45, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

It probably needs to be elsewhere and chronological. I also agree. She "apologised" for the first accusation, but the new report shows she plagiarised entire paragraphs from Wikipedia and other sources. Zenomonoz (talk) 05:01, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

Moved to Career at appropriate year and shortened. BLPs needn't cover blow-by-blow updates. – SJ + 09:04, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

Why is it in career, it is concerning her MIT dissertation, shouldnt it be moved back in education? I also included the original two sources of Business Insider. Please stop deleting them. Sashona (talk) 20:19, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

This is a curious case, but we may be seeing more of them. In general I think we should be wary about including third-party allegations (A accusing B on behalf of C), and about contributing to feedback loops of allegations levied for media attentio, especially in BLPs. BI is not generally reliable, and doesn't generally cover academia or architecture. They have published 5 different articles about this in the last few days, presumably because it's popular. We don't need a subsection and four separate BI cites about it. Of those, I left the one explicitly referencing Gay, since that's their claim of notability. – SJ + 19:50, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

Business insider has been quoted by news websites like the New York Times, CNN , WSJ and Fortune. If they are not reliable why quote them. Sashona (talk) 20:21, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

I think it's obvious from the context of the sources that the ony reason BI examined her work for plagiarism and wrote about it was that she was the wife of Bill Ackman, who was using plagiarism accusations to get his adversaries such as Claudine Gay fired, and BI was looking for similar cases of plagiarism in Ackman's personal associates. If we don't include that, as most of the WP:RS do, we're leaving out an important part of the story. Many people quoted in WP:RS describe the plagiarism by Gay and Oxman as trivial violations of the rules, which I think is BI's point. This plagiarism accusation is not a significant reflection on Oxman's ethics, and only came up as a reducto ad absurdum rebuttal to Ackman's charges. Agreed? Nbauman (talk) 00:30, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

I think it's best to wait until the incident has evolved further or even been resolved, to avoid WP:RECENTISM. The subject of this article will likely come under intense scrutiny in the coming weeks/months.

On a related note, plagiarism is plagiarism. We can mention that it got started because of Ackman's accusations against Claudine Gay (and link to that incident in the text, or even use a "See also" template at the start of the subsection), but how it got started doesn't matter in the grand scheme of things. According to this source (Business Insider again), some allegations are more serious: She copied text verbatim without even mentioning the source (usually Wikipedia, Wikimedia Commons, but also textbooks), violating an image license agreement in the process. This goes beyond just missing quotation marks, and also beyond trivial violations of the rules. The institution at which she wrote her thesis (MIT) may start a formal investigation if these turn out to be true, since they might indicate a pattern of behavior. TucanHolmes (talk) 18:24, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

Oxman's husband wrote a 5,100-word series of posts on X on January 6, one hour after BI had asked his spokesman for comment and one hour before BI published the article with the text passages and the image cribbed from WP. Quote: It does not strike me as plagiarism, nor do I think it takes anything away from her work. I added the Washington Post article to the sources but am on the fence on whether mentioning his opinion to the article; haven't found any reports of Oxman herself discussing the matter. BI quote: It's not surprising that Oxman wouldn't credit Wikipedia in her doctoral dissertation: While Wikipedia is generally accurate, anyone can edit it, so teachers regularly tell their students that they should not cite the website as an authority. (snicker, license to copy?) Space4Time3Continuum2x🖖 17:24, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

Using BI seems fine in this case. A recent discussion on the reliable sources noticeboard established that exposes of this sort are reliable, see here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard/Archive_423?wprov=srpw1_0#Business_Insider_on_Lex_Fridman

Zenomonoz (talk) 03:59, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

On a general note on including this thing in the article, please consider WP:PROPORTION, WP:NOTNEWS and WP:NAVELGAZING. Just because it's in the news now (and WP is mentioned) it doesn't necessarily have to be in the article now. We can wait a week or 3. I removed the mention of it from the WP:LEAD, hopefully that is seen as reasonable. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 12:24, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

WP:RECENTISM is an essay, not a WP policy or guideline. It's not a reason to exclude otherwise suitable content from WP. Oxman's plagiarism issue has received extensive coverage from many WP:RS. That meets the WP standards for inclusion. It meets those standards now. BI published the story, Ackman and Oxman gave their response, the facts are not disputed, and many people, including experts in plagiarism, gave their opinions in WP:RS. These are not rumors. There's no reason to expect them to change in 3 weeks. People want to read these facts and responses now. They affect how plagiarism is treated now and in the future. So why shouldn't it go in the entry now? --Nbauman (talk) 20:40, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

WP:PROPORTION and WP:NOTNEWS are policies, though. Those are why this doesn't have to be quickly added to the article, no matter what people may want. Current article content on this is not glaringly awful, though, at least there's not a separate section. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 20:43, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

@Zenomonoz, hi. This article has been here since 2013. The story under discussion is a few days old. Per WP:LEAD, it is not "any prominent controversies." See also the note at the end of that sentence, which says "Do not violate WP:Neutral point of view by giving undue attention to less important controversies in the lead section." My view is that that is what you are doing here:[1]. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 21:37, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

I don’t think this is ‘unique attention’ to a “less important” controversy. That might be the case if it were trivial. If Claudine Gay’s accusations can be mentioned in the lead, it is appropriate here too. Zenomonoz (talk) 21:57, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

@Gråbergs Gråa Sång, hi. This story has been subject to an extreme level of censorship in the popular press. In my view, Wikipedia is not a PR service, and as @Zenomonoz specified, no such care is being taken for e.g. Claudine Gay. I have reverted your undo. Lcdrovers (talk) 00:21, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

Cheers, definitely don't see why it being a few days old excludes it from the lead. That isn't a guideline at all. 'There is no rush' only concerns when there isn't yet enough reliable sourcing. There is in this case. Zenomonoz (talk) 01:14, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

Extreme censorship? Really? Oh well, consensus will be what it will be. My view remains that this thing fails the lead per WP:LEAD, WP:PROPORTION and WP:NOTNEWS. Possibly there is also some WP-hype because WP is mentioned, and a potential Gaza-war-ish connection, but that's speculation on my part. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 07:25, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

Please note, Gråbergs Gråa Sång, that the first words of WP:NOTNEWS are Editors are encouraged to include current and up-to-date information within its coverage. What NOTNEWS excludes is dramatically different than this content. It excludes original reporting, routine news, who's who, and celebrity gossip. Nothing else. Cullen328 (talk) 09:35, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

And it goes on to say "Also, while including information on recent developments is sometimes appropriate, breaking news should not be emphasized or otherwise treated differently from other information." So, is putting this thing in the WP:LEAD of this WP:GA WP:BLP "emphasized" or not in your opinion? Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 09:51, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

Gråbergs Gråa Sång, I do not think this controversy should go into the lead at this time, but that could change depending on the impact it has on her career. I am just opposed to the use of NOTNEWS to try to exclude content that the policy does not require be excluded. I happen to consider NOTNEWS to be high on our list of misused policy acronyms. Cullen328 (talk) 10:11, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

I agree that that could change, and I think I referred to NOTNEWS (and other acronyms) in a relevant manner. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 10:15, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

In context, Gråbergs I think you have it right. – SJ + 00:29, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

I'm content to see newsworthy plagiarism featured in our articles especially for eacademics (even former ones). But this is not lead-worthy material -- certainly not yet (WP:RECENTISM). Nomoskedasticity (talk) 09:17, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

Jeffrey Epstein association

This should be outlined. Where should I put it? 2600:1017:B800:29A1:55BF:929C:91EB:F328 (talk) 17:27, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

Special:Contributions/2600:1017:B800:29A1:55BF:929C:91EB:F328, I'd like to first say that this seems to be a fairly dangerous conversation, in the sense that you could easily get banned for violating WP:BLP if you can not back up what you are hinting at with *facts* from *reliable sources*. That said, if you do have such facts, I suggest that you just list them here with links to the sources. I can then check them out to see if what you are implying here are actually what the sources said. In such a serious case, I'd want to see at least 2 very reliable sources (e.g. NY Times) and would (in my opinion) need to see that you are not synthesizing "facts" and not over-interpreting the sources. I'm sure you can understand why Wikipedia does not want opinions or implications of this type of thing in articles, just straight facts. Doing it this way will save yourself lots of trouble. Smallbones_(smalltalk) 23:54, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

I don't have the time to edit the article appropriately myself but here are some highly reliable sources that should come in handy that corroborate the following facts:

1. Neri Oxman met with Epstein along with a few other media lab faculty at the Media Lab.

2. Neri Oxman's lab subsequently received $125,000 in funding from Jeffrey Epstein

3. According to Oxman, Ito requested that Oxman's lab produce a gift for Epstein which she agreed to do. When a grad student in her lab expressed qualms about making a gift for Jeffrey Epstein, she reassured them that she was aware and that she would discuss this in person.

The Boston Globe piece is the most thorough on the topic but as @Smallbones has emphasized the importance of multiple reliable sources, there's also the fact finding report MIT commissioned from Goodwin and Procter as well as a series of other articles which mention these events in more or less detail.

https://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2019/09/13/meeting-with-epstein-led-gift-and-now-regrets/0SPYm0hSg8iNh3JdDwPICP/story.html

https://factfindingjan2020.mit.edu/files/MIT-report.pdf?200117

https://www.axios.com/2019/09/14/joi-jeffrey-epstein-ties-mit-media-lab-professor

https://www.artnews.com/art-news/news/neri-oxman-jeffrey-epstein-13236/

https://www.timesofisrael.com/renowned-israeli-designer-caught-in-epstein-donations-scandal/

https://www.dezeen.com/2019/09/16/neri-oxman-mit-donations-jeffrey-epstein-news/

https://www.axios.com/2019/09/12/reid-hoffman-jeffrey-epstein-mit-donations

https://www.theguardian.com/education/2024/jan/06/neri-oxman-bill-ackman-plagiarism-accusations 2600:4040:278C:CA00:4909:5185:BC31:7604 (talk) 06:47, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

I also am pressed for time this week, but a quick view of the above looks good to me, and might justify at least a full paragraph in this article. I'll request that somebody else includes this. Late last night I saw the new article from the Guardian. That in itself would be almost enough of an RS for me. I'd also seen before the MIT 51 page official fact finding report, but didn't realize that Oxman was mentioned 10 times in it. Note that I've reported in The Signpost an Epstein story using that report as evidence. See the next to last section at Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2020-03-29/In focus My Signpost article doesn't name Oxman, but the MIT report is definitely authoritative. The only other source I've checked from the above list is the Art News one (because I thought it might be the weakest for this Wikiarticle). It's fine by me, since they are reporting an art based story (their strength) about Oxman making a piece of art for Epstein. If nobody else wants to include it, please leave any objections below. I'll likely include a full paragraph in a day or 2. Smallbones_(smalltalk) 15:42, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

I'll only be able to come back to this after a long while. I'll be writing an article about Ackman for The Signpost on a somewhat different story and I try to avoid mixing up my efforts as a Wikipedia editor with my efforts as a Signpost reporter. Smallbones_(smalltalk) 03:26, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

This seems undue, especially given the timing. It is already mentioned in the article. – SJ + 00:29, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

Missing mention of motives (ie, antisemitism) of accusers against Oxman

Allegations of plagiarism came after Bill Ackman's support of Israel. Should the article should include details of antisemitism, etc. 76.27.200.197 (talk) 05:56, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

Do you have any reliable sources which argue that? Labelling journalism which revealed the mistakes of a Jewish person as ‘antisemitism’ is pretty strange. It’s more likely the motivation was simply to expose the hypocrisy after Ackman went after Claudine Gay. Zenomonoz (talk) 21:13, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

This WaPo article is a bit more clear. It’s the owner of Business Insider, a company which aligns itself with Israel, who is alleging there might be anti Zionist or semetic motivations. Not sure if this is too trivial to mention here tbh. Zenomonoz (talk) 21:26, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

notably it's a company that requires a loyalty pledge to ... israel ... for it's european media subsidiaries. Yes I'm confused too but Germany is weird.

it was in the news when it acquired politico because they didn't make the employees sign the pledge but did confirm they would enforce it.

For what it's worth, Bill Ackman mentioned Axel Springer and KKR (the majority shareholder of Axel Springer) in one of his first tweets addressing Business Insider so that likely has something to do with their investigation.

Sources:

https://www.timesofisrael.com/new-owners-wont-make-politico-employees-sign-pro-israel-pledge/

https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/2021-10-17/ty-article/new-politico-owner-says-will-enforce-pro-israel-policy/0000017f-f763-d47e-a37f-ff7f63b90000

https://twitter.com/BillAckman/status/1743792226591723914 2600:4040:278C:CA00:6D54:33B7:ECD1:36FD (talk) 00:01, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

Lead edit war - Mentioning plagarism

There seems to be a edit war in the lead over the plagarism allegations. I'm not involved in it, and I'd encourage others not to be either. The debate seems to be over mentioning the plagarism stuff in the lead. If you have feelings on this topic, you should discuss here on the talk page. My personal feeling is that I oppose mentioning the plagarism in the lead, b/c that would seem like WP:RECENTISM to me. That coverage belongs in the body. Not the lead. NickCT (talk) 14:23, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

agree, and oppose as well. This is all way too recent, and is in no way so definitive of the subject of this article that it warrants inclusion in the lead, see WP:WEIGHT. TucanHolmes (talk) 17:57, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

It’s a significant controversy. Seems worth including as it is in Claudine Gay’s lead. Zenomonoz (talk) 20:17, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

More comments on this in the Talk:Neri_Oxman#Plagiarism_controversy thread. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 19:40, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

Maybe, but WP:LEAD WP:MOS/LEAD suggests for the inclusion of ‘significant controversies’. Based on the media coverage, this surely is. It seems strange to include it in Claudine Gay’s lead, but not Neri Oxman’s. Zenomonoz (talk) 20:16, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

Also I undid Matza Pizza’s removal because their reasoning is faulty. Wikivoice doesn’t claimed it’s ‘proven’, it says she is ‘accused/alleged’. Wikipedia includes mentions of allegations against Donald Trump in the lead too. Zenomonoz (talk) 20:19, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

Allows for, but content doesn't get extra lead-points for being called a controversy. There is some differences in the details, afaik there's no Congressional committee or resignation here yet, and WP:OTHERCONTENT applies (that essay is an essay). Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 20:22, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

Yes but WP:RECENTISM is also an essay and users here are citing it to justify the removal. Did Claudine gay go before a congressional committee for plagiarism? No, it was accusations of anti-semitism on campus. So you’re blurring lines to make a rather questionable argument. Zenomonoz (talk) 20:26, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

I see what you mean on Gay having 2 controversies in that lead, they do seem a bit bundled up though: "In response to the allegations, the Congressional committee that held the hearing on antisemitism said it would examine Gay's work". But I stand corrected, she did not go before a congressional committee for plagiarism. Yet, anyway. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 20:36, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

There is a considerable amount of information in high quality publications about this event that is currently not in the article. If the section on the subject were further fleshed out, mention in the lead would be justified per WP:LEAD. Thriley (talk) 20:38, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

That is a possibility, but WP:PROPORTION still applies below the lead. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 20:44, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

In response to Oxman’s alleged plagiarism, her husband, an influential billionaire, has said he is funding a plagiarism review of the entire MIT faculty’s work. Some mention of this event certainly seems like the kind of thing that would be mentioned in the lead assuming the details were fleshed out in the body. Thriley (talk) 20:51, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

Yes, the comments on BLPN seem to suggest that further expansion and mention in the lead is fine. Zenomonoz (talk) 21:44, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

Agreed w/ NickCT. Lead inclusion is questionable in Gay's case, but it was linked to her stepping down, a tenure change that does usually get mentioned in a lead. No similar significance here, making it clearly unsuited for the lead. Recent edits by Zenomonoz seem like clear BLP violations. Comments by or about Ackman seem likewise out of place unless directly related to Oxman's career. – SJ + 00:13, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

Sj - why did you remove the Epstein donation? That’s explicitly referring to Neri and the content was already on the article? Huh? Zenomonoz (talk) 00:34, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

I mean it’s discussed in a WP:RS and the quotes were taken from an MIT report. Why delete it? Not sure how that qualifies as a BLP violation. As for location, ‘Works’ is obviously not the correct location for it. It’s a part of ‘career’, and her communication with her students about the donation et al. is in an RS and thus worthy of inclusion. Zenomonoz (talk) 00:37, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

We can’t lump together the coverage on the alleged plagiarism with the Epstein association. The two subjects must be debated separately as they have nothing to do with each other. Thriley (talk) 00:57, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

Yeah okay — but SJ+ did remove them at the same time and then said I’m engaging in BLP vios so wanted an explanation on that. Cheers. Zenomonoz (talk) 01:03, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

@Zenomonoz: - There's a pretty obvious difference between Gay and Oxman in relation to this controversy. Gay is primarily notable as having been president of Harvard. Therefore, the reason for her resignation from that position is pretty key to her notability. Oxman is notable for a whole bunch of stuff that is in no way related this controversy. She played, at best, a peripheral role in the controversy. That's why the controversy is WP:DUE in Gay's lead, but not WP:DUE in Oxman's. NickCT (talk) 04:12, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

It is way too soon to say if it is due or not. This all started a week ago. Thriley (talk) 04:15, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

Seems pretty strange given Oxman plagiarised in several peer reviewed papers, and has been on the cover of magazines for her art and academic career. Harvard also *cleared* Claudine on charges of plagiarism and her resignation was unrelated to it. But sure. Zenomonoz (talk) 10:19, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

Having sections devoted to criticism is generally not appropriate for BLPs. – SJ + 14:10, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

Look, I don't really think Gay plagarized and I agree with Harvard "clearing" her. That said, if you think her resignation was "unrelated" to the plagarism stuff, I think you've lost the plot. There was clearly pressure campaign to have Gay removed, and the plagarism charges were obviously part of that campaign. NickCT (talk) 14:23, 10 January 2024 (UTC)