[WikiEN-l] Username blocks on companies

Mon Jun 19 21:13:06 UTC 2006

On 6/18/06, Alphax (Wikipedia email) <alphasigmax at gmail.com> wrote:
> People identifying the company they work for shouldn't be editing the
> article on that company, per [[WP:AUTO]] and [[WP:CORP]].

If that's what those articles currently say, they're wrongheaded.
WP:AUTO, last I looked, discouraged (but did not ban) editing an
article on oneself.

One should exercise caution when editing articles on subjects one has
a personal stake in, yes.  Newbies should be discouraged from doing
so, although not too forcibly.  There are many problems with editing
such an article, of which POV-pushing is the least of it.  More of a
problem is verifiability: if you work at a company, you are likely to
write using non-public sources about it, including personal
experience.

An experienced editor familiar with sourcing can do good work on an
article on a subject they are associated with.

-Matt