Talk:Wilsonville, Oregon/Archive 1

Chamber of Commerce links?

I'm not sure that I understand the distinction between having a chamber of commerce listing under Wilsonville and another business directory, WilsonvilleOregon.net, that also has business listings, and why this would be considered taboo as "listing spam"? anonymous comment added by Logion 07:58, June 26, 2006

Personally, I question the inclusion links to Chamber of Commerce websites in Wikipedia articles, but I suppose it can be argued that they: "contain neutral and accurate material not already in the article. Ideally this content should be integrated into the Wikipedia article, then the link would remain as a reference, but in some cases this is not possible for copyright reasons or because the site has a level of detail which is inappropriate for the Wikipedia article." (See here.) In addition, these links have usually been added by members of the Wikipedia community and not the owner of the link. I also believe that CoCs meet the criteria for inclusion since they are organizations rather than business entities themselves.

In any case, I chose to remove your link because your Wikipedia contributions seem to be limited to adding this link to articles, and it looks like you own the site, judging by the fact that your user name matches the company that publishes the site, thus violating this policy: "Links to normally avoid:

A website that you own or maintain, even if the guidelines above imply that it should be linked to. This is because of neutrality and point-of-view concerns; neutrality is an important objective at Wikipedia, and a difficult one. If it is relevant and informative, mention it on the talk page and let other — neutral — Wikipedia editors decide whether to add the link."

If you wish to contribute to Wikipedia, it is always better to add content, not links.

In the meantime, I'm going to check with other members of WikiProject: Oregon about the inclusion of CoC sites. Thanks. Katr67 15:52, 26 June 2006 (UTC)

Inza R. Wood Middle School

The article on Wood Middle School was turned into a redirect to Wilsonville as a result of an AfD. For whatever reason, it appears that no effort was made to save any of the information and merge it. I dug out most of the content from history and added it here. (I hope that the vandals don't follow.)--Hjal 08:35, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

Wilsonvilleoregon.info

Once again the question becomes...why would a site like wilsonvilleoregon.info be considered spam in the external links section? My web site has been up for a year or more and I am now updating all of the content. The site will be updated every Friday and on other ocassions throughout each week as local school sports and entertainment information become available. This site has more information than the "city" or "chamber" web sites. It is also neutral! It will only host information about the city of Wilsonville and is a rock solid local contribution to the community as a whole. I was looking forward to having Wikipedia as a resource and link, but it seems that once again, something cool on the internet has been hijacked by those who feel editing others contributions is their right. I just don't get it.

<<email address removed>> Tscott25 7 March 2007 19:39:55 PST

When you edit an article, a note at the bottom of the edit page says:

If you don't want your writing to be edited mercilessly or redistributed by others, do not submit it.

That's how Wikipedia works—it's nothing personal. Katr67 posted a pretty good explanation (above) why external links might be suspect. Yours might be okay, but it is suspicious. Those of us who watch for and fight spam on thousands of articles might be a bit itchy on the trigger finger.

Looking carefully at the contents of the main pages http://www.wilsonvilleoregon.info/ and http://www.ci.wilsonville.or.us/, it's unclear what the purpose of either is. Also, you labeled the former "official site" and someone labeled the other "city website". That, too, is confusing. Better labels would be along the lines of "Wilsonville Chamber of Commerce" and "Wilsonville City Government".

The article could use development work. How about adding some content, and citing your site as a reference? —EncMstr 04:03, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

EncMstr is right--labeling your site (I assume you are the anonymous editor who added the link today?) as the "official" website, as well as adding your link to the top of the list and changing the city's website (though the layout isn't particularly slick, it is the city's official website, as any "www.ci.cityname.statename.us" would be) to simply read "city website" makes you look like a spammer. Plus, if you look at Wikipedia:Spam#How not to be a spammer, Wikipedia:External links#Links normally to be avoided, as well as the standardized {{spam}} warning on the anon's talk page, you can see additional reasons why I reverted the addition of your link as spam. An occasional link to a community website such as yours is valid in Wikipedia, but please note that the foremost rule here is that one should not be adding links to one's own website. Again, like EncMstr said, we prefer people add content, not links. You may have good intentions, and look forward to using Wikipedia as a resource and link, but Wikipedia isn't here to provide a place to link your website. I read your FAQ, and honestly I can see why you would be frustrated with the city website (you'd think they'd have a budget for a nicer site), but that does not mean you can bill your site as the official one. If another editor decides your link is a worthwhile addition to the article, perhaps with a title like "Wilsonville Community Portal (unofficial community website)", that would be fine with me, but please don't add it again yourself. Thanks, and I hope you will take up our invitation to contribute content to Wikipedia! Katr67 05:26, 8 March 2007 (UTC)