Hello, Ellielancaster, and welcome to Wikipedia! Thank you for your contributions. I hope you like the place and decide to stay. Here are some pages that you might find helpful:
I hope you enjoy editing here and being a Wikipedian! Please sign your name on talk pages using four tildes (~~~~); this will automatically produce your name and the date. If you need help, check out Wikipedia:Questions, ask me on my talk page, or ask your question and then place {{helpme}} after the question on your talk page. Again, welcome! JFW | T@lk13:54, 13 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Please note that editing to promote an organization or an organization's message is not allowed on Wikipedia. Your edits to add the http://www.betteroralhealth.org external link, to promote the use of sugar free gum and to replace mention of another gum makers with a mention of Wrigley's are not appropriate. You may not use Wikipedia for this type of campaigning. If you have any questions please leave a message on my talk page. Thanks. -- Siobhan Hansa13:53, 17 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Please stop adding inappropriate external links to Wikipedia. It is considered spamming and Wikipedia is not a vehicle for advertising or promotion. Since Wikipedia uses nofollow tags, additions of links to Wikipedia will not alter search engine rankings. If you continue spamming, you will be blocked from editing Wikipedia. -- Siobhan Hansa14:01, 18 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Ellie, Thanks for leaving a message on my talk page. What you are talking about is promoting a point of view for which you have an inherent conflict of interest. And you have been using your website (that is run in order to promote that point of view) as a reference. This is promotion, and because of the clear connection between the research and Wrigley's it is also clearly a form of product promotion, albeit a couple of steps removed.
The fact that the information may benefit Wrigley's (or any other company) is not a reason to keep it off Wikipedia. When it comes to making claims about the benefits of chewing gum in our articles we need expert editors who do not have a vested interest in the research to review it and ensure it is added with due weight. We don't republish all facts - only those that are considered significant to the subject. When you cite sources make sure you cite published papers - (many of our editors have access to resources like JSTOR so they will be able to look them up). A convenience link to a paper on your website is often acceptable - but it is the published journal article that is important, not a URL. We would not consider the betteroffhealth.info site to be a reliable source for this sort of information.
When it comes to simply adding betterofhealth.info/org external links to webpages - this is much less appropriate since the site has a distinct purpose that does not fit within our values of a neutral point of view. Our guidelines clearly state that you should not add links to websites you are affiliated with directly to an article page.
The recommended way to have articles consider including your edits when you have a conflict of interest like this is to discuss them with other editors on the article talk pages. And ask uninvolved editors to add it appropriately. We also have a small WikiProject Dentistry where some of our editors with expertise in this area collaborate. They would be good people to discuss this with. You should point out your connection when you open the discussion.
I am glad you have responded to messages left here and are considering how you can move forward. However I note you have also spammed your website onto another article since the last warning. If you continue to add your website to articles I will ask an administrator to block you and may seek to have the website entered on our MediaWiki spam blacklist which is used by all Wikimedia Foundation sites and a large number of unaffiliated sites too. We do not appreciate having the trust we place in all editors abused in this manner. -- Siobhan Hansa12:55, 2 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]
If you can indicate why the subject of this article is not blatant advertising, you may contest the tagging. To do this, please add {{hangon}} on the top of the page and leave a note on the article's talk page explaining your position. Please do not remove the speedy deletion tag yourself, but don't hesitate to add information to the article that would help make it encyclopedic, as well as adding any citations from reliable sources to ensure that the article will be verifiable. Feel free to leave a note on my talk page if you have any questions about this. Siobhan Hansa15:05, 2 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Ellie, you have been adding propaganda, not encyclopedic information. We don't link to or publish everything Wrigley's claim about their gum, because we're an encyclopedia, not a magazine desperate for any content PR people will give it. We also have a clear guideline against anyone adding external links to sites they are affiliated to in some way. Because you have failed, despite many requests, to follow our policy against using Wikipedia for promotion another editor has asked that you be blocked from editing for a short time to prevent further disruption to our articles. -- Siobhan Hansa12:34, 4 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]
If you have a close connection to some of the people, places or things you have written about on Wikipedia, you may have a conflict of interest. In keeping with Wikipedia's neutral point of view policy, edits where there is a conflict of interest, or where such a conflict might reasonably be inferred from the tone of the edit and the proximity of the editor to the subject, are strongly discouraged. If you have a conflict of interest, you should avoid or exercise great caution when:
editing articles related to you, your organization, or its competitors, as well as projects and products they are involved with,
participating in deletion discussions about articles related to your organization or its competitors,
linking to the Wikipedia article or website of your organization in other articles (see Wikipedia:Spam);
Hi Ellielancaster. I will try my best to explain why your edits have been scrutinized or reverted.
First, Wikipedians tend to be skeptical of or scrutinize edits made by persons who appear to have a conflict of interest. I don't know the circumstance exactly, but given the messages on your talk page here, it is apparent that some editors have reason to believe that you might have a conflict of interest, perhaps working for a particular gum company. Editors that persist in editing articles on subjects where they have a conflict of interest could be cautioned from editing those articles, banned from editing those articles, or blocked from editing.
Second, it seems that all of your edits have been in one particular area and in furtherance of one specific idea (i.e., sugar free gum helps teeth). This type of activity is typically indicative of a single purpose account, which also lends credit to the existence of a conflict of interest. It is also possible that such activity encroaches on the "Wikipedia is not a soapbox" policy.
Third, after consulting with the dentists over at WikiProject:Dentistry, it seems that they are wary of placing sugar free gum at or near the same status as brushing or flossing in regard to fighting cavities or improving oral hygiene. Thus, they appear to be implying that doing so would encroach on Wikipedia's undue weight policy. This is even more true if this is done in a large number of articles. I inquired further about this, and they appear to agree that including such information in a few articles, such as gum or sugar free gum, would be acceptable. They noted that chewing sugar free gum has been proven to aid production of saliva. However, they are wary of, for example, placing information in the dental caries or oral hygiene articles that appears to give gum chewing undue weight in relation to brushing or flossing (i.e., implying the same or a similar level of effectiveness).
Finally, if you want to include the information on gum somewhere, my advice is to first post changes like those you have made at the relevant articles' talk pages, though the best option would be to simply avoid subjects on which you have a conflict of interest entirely. Cheers. · jersykotalk14:53, 10 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]
You've previously been warning about spamming and conflict of interest. To be absolutely clear, next time you use Wikipedia for advertising, promotion or PR, you will be blocked.
This is your last warning. The next time you use Wikipedia for advertising, you will be blocked from editing. Jehochman (talk/contrib) 03:09, 15 May 2007 (UTC)