User talk:X. Squire

COI inquiry

I notice you like to post citations to a particular author. Are you associated with that person in some manner? Relevant guidelines include WP:OUTTING which I am trying to not do, and WP:Conflict of interest which I think is in play here. In addition, you have restored text I reverted without even attempting discussion. See WP:EDITWAR and WP:BRD NewsAndEventsGuy (talk) 13:10, 1 June 2018 (UTC)

June 2018

Please stop adding inappropriate external links to Wikipedia, as you did to IUCN Red List. It is considered spamming and Wikipedia is not a vehicle for advertising or promotion. Because Wikipedia uses nofollow tags, additions of links to Wikipedia will not alter search engine rankings. If you continue spamming, you may be blocked from editing Wikipedia. CHRISSYMAD ❯❯❯¯\_(ツ)_/¯ 13:15, 1 June 2018 (UTC)

I think you are unfairly blocking everything that I have been adding to Wikipedia in good faith and making charges about me as a user that are without a legitimate basis in a way that singles me out as a contributor and is essentially working to censor me personally as a contributor. I believe that this is violating my rights to contribute as a member of the Wikipedia community. The changes that I have made are entirely within the mission of Wikipedia to offer bold, sourced expert material for readers that is objective, short, and that readers can find for themselves through links. That is exactly what I have done. I am not a paid editor with a conflict of interest and I am not promoting any commercial interest. I am a scholar and professional acting to cite fellow scholars in my fields of expertise and I expect that other scholar experts will respond on these pages in the same way. I am also looking at pages that Wikipedia itself identifies as self-promotional from organizations, including promotional historical presentations made by country tourist offices agencies that contain biases and are in need of additional sources and opinions. I am doing that in a way that responds to those needs only to find that you are then acting to protect pages with single subjective views while censoring me when I work to improve the pages. Your actions are not those of a fellow professional or scholar or researcher personally familiar and expert on these fields in which I have made changes. You are not offering reasons that are based on any alternative citations or professional disagreements. You are simply making allegations and attacks on my contributions. You are attempting to reverse all of the time I offer freely to Wikipedia as a scholar and professional to improve entries that are in my fields of professional expertise (for more than 30 years) with the goal to improve information for members of the public and for colleagues and students in these fields. I cite the work of colleagues whom I know in the same way that others cite work of others whom they know well from their basis of specific expertise and that is exactly what Wikipedia depends upon -- professionals, experts and scholars who offer expertise from their fields and make contributions using the same standards of professional objectivity that characterize our professional fields. If you are going to attack all of my professional contributions in a way that targets me personally and not allow me the right to work as others do in Wikipedia, I am going to seek dispute resolution and bring this to the larger community because I view what you are doing as an attack against EVERY PROFESSIONAL and EVERY SCHOLARLY CONTRIBUTOR to Wikipedia.X. Squire (talk) 14:00, 5 June 2018 (UTC)

X. Squire Could you please be more concise in your complaint? It's rather hard to follow. If you feel the need to take it to DRN, please do so. But in the mean time, could you please explain why every edit you've made was one person, who appears to be unpublished in reliable sources? Adding some random research from some random person en-masse over wikipedia is considered refspamming. You also need to read WP:CIVILITY. CHRISSYMAD ❯❯❯¯\_(ツ)_/¯ 14:13, 5 June 2018 (UTC)

You may be blocked from editing without further warning the next time you use Wikipedia for soapboxing, promotion or advertising, as you did at History of Thailand. All you've added are links to one persons unsourced work - don't continue doing so. CHRISSYMAD ❯❯❯¯\_(ツ)_/¯ 13:16, 1 June 2018 (UTC)

I find this to be an unwarranted personal threat against me that is essentially a threat against every professional and every scholar who cites a published source to add information. I am not "advertising" any product or profit making concern. I am not offering political statements as a soapbox. I am not promoting any service on Thai history or in any other area where I have made edits. All of these charges are unwarranted general attacks on me personally and on my professionalism and expertise with no substantiation. What I have done is offered my time to make corrections in material on this page and on parts of others where there are NO SOURCES for several incorrect, contradictory, confusing, and badly written statements that you are protecting for no reason other than to attack me as a contributor. On this page, I offered material from two different scholars on the History of Thailand on a short section, on Dvaravati. If you look at the Wikipedia page on Dvaravati itself, you will see that it contradicts material on this page and cites one of my colleagues who apparently referenced several of his works and that page is standing as it is. If you asked the scholar who is cited on your Dvaravati page to referee the changes that I have made to the Dvaravati section of the Thai history page, I believe he would agree with all of the changes that I have made. I could spend hours adding additional cites to make the Dvaravati section consistent with the known history and would gladly see others making those contributions that I have tried to promote by making professional corrections. I do not seem to see any concern from you about the quality of the page or the consistency of material on Wikipedia pages. All I see is a personal attack on me with threats and false claims with the goal of preventing ANY SCHOLAR OR PROFESSIONAL from adding published sources from within the expertise of those contributors. I ask you to reverse all of the changes you have made that have censored my contributions. If you would like to engage in serious queries about SPECIFIC words that you think could be improved or additional sources that you think would help, in the spirit of improving pages rather than censoring sources and professional improvements, please do so in a way that is fair and professional.X. Squire (talk) 14:00, 5 June 2018 (UTC)

Conflict of Interest

I see you were asked about this before but I will ask again: Are you David Lempert or do you have a conflict of interest with David Lempert? You've not responded to my previous request, so I am asking once more before this gets taken to WP:ANI due to your disruptive behavior and persistent addition of poorly sourced material verging on utter nonsense from a single source. Your last edit cites the identical content D. Lempert does in this piece. CHRISSYMAD ❯❯❯¯\_(ツ)_/¯ 15:00, 5 June 2018 (UTC)

Lao History and linkages to history pages on the Gupta Empire and on History of Thailand

I have improved the material on Lao History to resubmit what was removed. The source I relied on meets the requirements for material in Wikipedia. It is from the national government newspaper in Laos which recognizes new information on the history of Laos for presentation in Laos and to the international community. It links the history to Thailand and to the Gupta Empire. It was written by an author who is identified in the article as an expert on the country's history. The article also presents photographic evidence that directly allows anyone to understand the basis of the historical conclusion and to come to a similar conclusion. No other published source following this one has challenged that conclusion. The information contains no conflicts of interest. This source is the most reliable source for information on the Lao government's views of its history and on international scholarly approaches to the history of Laos that are based on historical comparisons rather than on archaeological finds. Any challenges to it in Wikipedia should be on the basis of expertise and specific sources, not on attacks against a contributor. (This is a response to Chrissymad.)--X. Squire (talk) 14:42, 8 June 2018 (UTC)

Stanford University Page

The material that I had added on the Stanford University page is referenced in a published book from a reputable educational publisher and is one of the few published books that contains material on Stanford University history, particularly from the period of the 1970s and 1980s. The book is more than 20 years old and has long been cited in Wikipedia. (The book's cover photograph is of an alternative class that was offered at Stanford in 1985.) The Stanford University page is one that is recognized as largely a promotional page that seems to be written by the university, itself, and is in need of additional material. I have tried to respond to that stated need of Wikipedia's editors. I believe that the removal of this material was the result of a faulty algorithm designed to remove material by contributor experts who are familiar with certain sources and who cite them on multiple pages. That algorithm seems to work incorrectly for material that fits appropriately on a few related pages.X. Squire (talk) 15:25, 8 June 2018 (UTC)

World Justice Project Page

The change that I made to the World Justice Project page is entirely within the scope and mission of Wikipedia for assuring that organizational pages are not self-promotional and that they read like encylopedia entries without conflicts of interest. The page that I corrected described its methodology as "quantitative" which is a false statement contradicting the project's own information on its website. I have added a citation directly to the project's own pages that describe its methodology as questionnaire based using opinions. Opinion data is by definition not quantitative data. The current Wikipedia for "questionnaire" data does not have a discussion on quantitative versus perception data but I have cited a recent source in the same field as the World Justice Project. It is a reputable law school's law journal that is a leader in this field. I have placed this organization in context with others which is the very goal of an encyclopedia -- to help readers understand where the entry fits relative to other entries. Everything I have introduced is factual, professionally based information. I believe that the original objection to my contribution was based on a faulty algorithm designed to eliminate contributions where there are multiple references from small groups of authors. In the area of "rule of law" and human rights measures, there is a very small base of scholarly and professional publication so I am forced to draw from a small pool of published sources. That should not be a reason to eliminate otherwise objective and factual material or to cast aspersions on a contributor. The focus needs to be on the contribution not on the contributor.X. Squire (talk) 15:45, 8 June 2018 (UTC)

Cultural Red Book

The source that I cited on a Red Book for Endangered Cultures meets the test for reputably sourced material not once but TWICE. It is factual context material that is not only entirely appropriate for an encyclopedia but specifically meets the goals of Wikipedia for contextual expert material placed in a web of useful information for professionals, scholars, students and the public. The article that I have cited was published in the leading journal for practicing anthropology in the United States where it was peer reviewed by a panel of experts. The same article in a long form was published in an international human rights law journal in Europe, also in one of the leading publications, where it was also peer reviewed. In contrast to the standard reference in Wikipedia, this material is considered to be a leading source in not one but two different professions and on two continents. It is directly pertinent to material on Red Books because it links existing work to additional fields. The article itself directly explains how it builds on the specific sources that are in Wikipedia pages for the IUCN Red Book, the UNESCO Red Book of Languages and the Red Book on Endangered Cultures of Russia. This is not a new article. It is established in the literature for several years. There is nothing here that suggests promotion of some new project or some kind of fad. The information does not detract from or discredit anything currently on pages for Red Books. In fact, it shows the value of the existing approaches and their continuing impact. Nevertheless, the contribution was inappropriately removed. Apparently, Wikipedia applies an algorithm that focuses on removing specific authors in a way that seems to unfairly attack certain scholarly and professional contributors without a rational evaluation of the quality of the specific contributions. If there are better ways for placing this information on the three pages where it belongs, I would be happy to do so following suggestions. For now, I am adding the information to the pages in ways that seems most in line with existing format and policy of Wikipedia pages. X. Squire (talk) 16:39, 8 June 2018 (UTC)

Blocked

I have blocked this account indefinitely for promotional activities - the vast majority of your edits consist of adding links to material written by David Lampert. You have refused to confirm if you are David, if you're being paid to promote David (directly or indirectly) or if you have some other conflict of interest, so until you clarify the situation and explain why so many of your edits involve placing references to David Lampert's work, I'm afraid you will remain blocked. If you project a satisfactory explanation of your editing history, I or another administrator will remove the block and allow you to return to editing. Nick (talk) 16:40, 8 June 2018 (UTC)

I do have a link to David Lempert and other scholars and professionals whom I cite in a small group of experts in the fields in which I have made contributions. My fields are very narrow and specialized and there is a very limited number of scholars and professionals working and publishing in these areas which is why my contributions come from a narrow group. I have explained very clearly, above, the professional basis for each of the contributions that I have made so that you have a number of examples of this. I do not understand why the relation to specific scholars is the reason for blocking when there is no commercial link or subjective information provided in the content. I do not understand what you mean by "promotion" since I am just reporting professional material, much of it several years old, that is of no direct commercial or career benefit. As I understand it, the anonymity of Wikipedia users is designed specifically to encourage scholars to offer material from their areas of specific expertise including material from their close colleagues as well as their own published material in public sources of their professions. All of the contributions that I have made have added objective material meeting the standards of the professions for each Wikipedia entry in which I have made contributions. Nothing has been libelous or has attacked any other contributor or removed any other contributor's material. Nothing has distorted any information in any way that is unprofessional. Please explain to me the basis for blocking me as a contributor that has departed from the established practices of other contributors. Please explain to me how I would present each contribution differently while allowing me to cite published materials from sources of people I know as colleagues, including my own published work in the way Wikipedia has encouraged for other contributors since its founding.X. Squire (talk) 17:28, 8 June 2018 (UTC)

You'll need to read through Wikipedia:Conflict of interest (perhaps again) but I'm afraid your comments above are incorrect. We permit (and indeed encourage) experts to contribute in their area of expertise but would generally expect them to do so using source material that is not connected to them directly (so would not be their own work and would not come from their department or institution). Where editors do wish/need to use their own work or work closely connected to them, we would encourage them to propose the usage of that material via the article talk page and not to directly add it whilst editing the article. The COI policy is also quite clear on disclosure, you should be declaring precisely what your conflict of interest is (which you've failed to do, despite being asked twice, above). It may be the case that you're sufficiently detached from the people you're citing to be able to directly add material, but until you make a correct and legitimate declaration, we cannot say. It's over to you. I will add, I'm not forcing you to declare your identity to be unblocked, but if you don't explain your connection in some way, I would expect you to agree to stop citing the materials that you have been citing, in order to be unblocked. Nick (talk) 19:52, 8 June 2018 (UTC)

Expers are welcome, if they convince they are here to engage constructively with others (see WP:BRD) to build the encylopedia and not merely to add their curriculum vitae or resume into our articles. The goalpost if you choose to work through this is to demonstrate the opposite of WP:NOTHERE. You might well be successful, but only if you attempt to do so. Should you try that, it is a good idea to WP:Assume good faith and think about whether comments are likely to have the opposite intended effect (see WP:BOOMERANG. If your interest is improving the encylopedia, more power to you! But mainly to toot Dr Lempert's horn? No thanks. NewsAndEventsGuy (talk) 19:23, 9 June 2018 (UTC)

Nomination of Unseen America for deletion

A discussion is taking place as to whether the article Unseen America is suitable for inclusion in Wikipedia according to Wikipedia's policies and guidelines or whether it should be deleted.

The article will be discussed at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Unseen America until a consensus is reached, and anyone is welcome to contribute to the discussion. The nomination will explain the policies and guidelines which are of concern. The discussion focuses on high-quality evidence and our policies and guidelines.

Users may edit the article during the discussion, including to improve the article to address concerns raised in the discussion. However, do not remove the article-for-deletion notice from the top of the article. CHRISSYMAD ❯❯❯¯\_(ツ)_/¯ 16:55, 14 June 2018 (UTC)