Wikipedia

User:Rhododendrites/Chaney

< User:Rhododendrites

Page to make sense of the Warren Chaney walled garden. Thanks to Permstrump, Tokyogirl79, CactusWriter, Dbrodbeck, and others for all the work you've been doing on this. I put this page in my userspace for the sake of putting it somewhere but I'd be fine if people wanted to move it elsewhere. One thing, though: if anyone decides to use this page, let's have conversations on the talk page (rather than here) to make this page an easy organizing point.

Update 24 December 2015: This has grown substantially since we created this page, and the Magic Mansion article was even picked up by Gawker (The 10 Best Articles Wikipedia Deleted This Week).

As a sort of high-level summary: At this point while we have Photoshopped images, dubious claims, poor sources, poor verifiability, sock puppetry, promotion, and general fishiness, we also have scraps of evidence. Most of the pages have been deleted. Most or all of the images will likely be deleted soon.

In an effort to make this page readable/usable, I've been collapsing sections as they become resolved ("resolved" in the sense of their Wikipedia article, for the most part). You can still click "[show]" on the right of each box to see the contents.

There is an in-process page to develop a more narrative presentation of this story at User:Tokyogirl79/Warren Chaney.

Overview of issues edit

  • the primary authors of the Chaney-related articles have been blocked as sock puppets
  • There are few-to-none. The articles were largely built on user-generated content and primary sources
  • Photoshopped images
  • Several of the images purported to document works were clearly Photoshopped (note: this applies primarily to Magic Mansion)
  • Existence of works
  • Verifiability has been a challenge with every title. At least some definitely exist, but with others we rely only on user-generated content and primary sources for verification of their existence. In a couple cases there are short clips on YouTube, but no trace of a finished product, no record of release... just claims that it was broadcast or released, with accolades but no actual information about where it was broadcast/released.
  • Existence of other names
  • It's difficult to find any reliable record of many of the titles, publications, and organizations.
  • Concentration of dates
  • The articles on Wikipedia were largely created in April 2011.
  • Americamovie.com was registered in April 2011 and added to Wikipedia just a couple hours after registration
  • On imdb, there is a sole reviewer for Behind the Mask, Y2K, and Haunted. All glowing reviews. All April 2011.
  • Note that this could easily be explained by e.g. hiring someone to build an online presence
  • Dubious credits
  • Several of the credits listed at, for example, Chaney's Superb Speakers profile are problematic (some relevant to Wikipedia, others relevant to walled garden as a whole).

Disclaimer: It is not necessarily the case that Chaney himself created the profile, nor is it necessarily the case that Chaney is behind these claims and activities at all. Please keep this in mind. Though there are clearly Photoshopped images and disproven claims, it's also possible that these are just small or limited-release productions for which there just aren't good records available on the Internet.

Major article/talk contributors (only listing SPAs) edit

Sinclairindex, Buzzsawyer, Neverland1 CheckUser confirmed socks. LawStClaire stale
  • Sinclairindex
    • claims to know Chaney
    • uploaded a large number of images of Chaney, associates, or, perhaps, taken from Chaney's films
    • created most of the problematic articles
  • Buzzsawyer
    • edited Chaney-related articles as well as neuroscience articles
    • several talk page edits on Chaney productions just to praise the film/show and make superficial comments about the article
    • added a number of Amazon referral links (e.g. [1] [2] [3] [4])
  • Neverland1 - edits Chaney/Winters-related articles and neuroscience articles
    • Adding mentions of America: A Call to Action on many actor pages, sourced to the film's website
  • LawStClaire

Update 10 December 2015: Checkuser confirmed that these accounts are sock puppets (omitting LawStClaire as stale). Now blocked. See Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Sinclairindex.

Relevant discussions edit

General
AfDs
SPI
Misc

Outline of poor sources edit

A list of the user-generated content, primary sources, etc. which have now been removed

All of the Chaney-related articles contain[ed] an extraordinary amount of poor sources. Most commonly, these include Imdb and other user-generated content, database/catalog listings (either scraped from or based on user-generated content), primary sources published by Chaney and/or his affiliated companies, low quality blogs (often with only a handful of posts)...

Note that where a source is specific to one title/article, it should be listed in the analysis of those articles towards the bottom of this page. The sources below either apply broadly to Chaney-related topics or are used in multiple articles. (This is just an attempt to keep things organized -- interpret that and rearrange as you wish).

User-generated content, databases edit

Very low quality sources/sites edit

Chaney-related websites edit

  • Americamovie.com
    • Official site for America: A Call to Greatness
    • Domain name is registered to someone with a yournewmind.com email address.
    • Article for America was created on 11 April 2011. At first it used a bogus domain name for its official website (http://www.america_a_call_to_greatness.com/ -- underscores are not valid in hostnames). The domain americamovie.org was registered on 18 April 2011, to someone with a Mynewmind.com email address, at 22:46:30. At 00:38 19 April 2011 Sinclairindex updated the URLs in the article. (if ICANN uses UTC as well, that means less than 2 hours had gone by)
  • Dynamicmediainc.com ((2002 archived version))
    • Site for a production company run by Chaney and others. Talks about a number of productions seen on Chaney's SuperbSpeakers profile.
    • Has America: A Call to Greatness for sale on DVD
    • Earliest archived version is 1999.
    • Dynamic Media, Inc. based in Ellicott City, Maryland as of 1999. In 2000, address is in Hanover, MD. founded in 1995. Other contacts include Duane Tucker, Michael Poole. Collaborated with AlphaDVD
    • "selected by the U.S. Army Recruiting Command in Fort Knox, Kentucky, to provide DVD and other media related services" (press release)
    • Based on this, it looks like the DVD company, "DMI", though holding the domani name dynamicmediainc.com, is a subsidiary of "Dynamic Media Inc." at dimg.com.
  • Mindtechinstitute.net (archived version)
    • promotional site for Dynamic Mind workshops
  • Your New Mind - yournewmind.blogspot.com, yournewmind.com

Primary sources in works that don't look to belong to Chaney edit

  • Marquis Who's Who's in Health Care 1977: Bio provided by listed individuals for publication. Some information on Chaney conflicts with information on Chaney's BLP and Chaney-related websites. (E.g. Who's Who says he received his MBA in 1970, but other sources say 1968.)

Chaney-related topics with connections to Wikipedia articles edit

Some of these topics clearly exist. Others are hard to find. Not included here are the people/articles/companies that have had Wikipedia articles. This are tangential, considered for their relationship to the topics covered on Wikipedia.

Authorship credits edit

  • "Using Neuroplasticity to Achieve Cognitive Change", an article in the Journal of Applied Cognitive-Behavioral Science
    • Google returns no hits for either the title or the journal.

Companies edit

  • Dynamic Media, Inc.
    • dynamicmediainc.com and dimg.com
    • Earliest archived version is 1999.
    • Site for a production company run by Chaney and others. Talks about a number of productions seen on Chaney's SuperbSpeakers profile.
    • Has America: A Call to Greatness for sale on DVD
    • Dynamic Media, Inc. based in Ellicott City, Maryland as of 1999. In 2000, address is in Hanover, MD. founded in 1995. Other contacts include Duane Tucker, Michael Poole. Collaborated with AlphaDVD
    • "selected by the U.S. Army Recruiting Command in Fort Knox, Kentucky, to provide DVD and other media related services" (press release)
    • Based on this, it looks like as of 2000 the DVD company, "DMI", though holding the domain name dynamicmediainc.com, is a subsidiary of "Dynamic Media Inc." at dimg.com.
    • Dimg.com includes Quicktv.net (archive)
    • "DMI" looks to be the "Multimedia Production Division" or Dynamic Media, Inc. (see archive from 2001).
    • NASDAQ has a record of Dynamic Media, Inc. from 2001 (looks like it signed up and withdrew within the span of a few months?)
      • It's the same company. See this SEC document.
        • "We were formerly known as Dynamic Imaging Systems Corporation and before that as Brickell Foreclosure Properties, Inc., and were organized under the laws of the state of Florida in 1996. Our Common Stock is currently listed Over the Counter (OTC) under the trading symbol "DYMI"."
        • "Our clients include the Fox Broadcasting Company and all its' subsidiaries, Paramount Pictures, the US Army, Lockheed-Martin, Spelling Entertainment, Briggs and Stratton, Pax TV, Lions Gate Entertainment, the Los Angeles Lakers, Footlocker, Burger King, and many others."
        • "Dynamic Media, Inc. began in 1996 by creating projects for the National Security Agency of the United States."
        • There are sections on the major productions, including "America: A Call to Greatness", but doesn't have any additional information beyond the promotional content that was already on their website. Elsewhere in the document it talks about acquiring "all of the original footage from the production, which includes over 60 hours of never before seen broadcast footage from across the United States"
        • Mentions an agreement in May 2001 with Chaney, A director of the Company, for acquisition of Behind the Mask
        • Teaming agreement with Leading Edge Design and Systems, Inc.
        • Ian D. Jones, President. VPs: Duane Tucker (CTO), Sidney J. Pine (CTO), Michael Benchoff, Kevin Beck, Craig Hope, Vanessa Fields, Warren Chaney (New Content Development). Secretary: Theresa Corrado. Other directors: Dominic Castaldo, Myron Yanoff, Tom DeLuca.
        • biggest stockholder is Advanced Corporate Technology, Inc. (12.35%).
  • Jack Watts & Associates, Inc. - listed as a company some of the titles were "produced for"
    • the SuperbSpeakers profile is the only Google hit for this company with the "Inc".
    • "Jack Watts & Associates" connects to this blog, which in turn points to himynameisjack.net (gone but archived) - neither mentions any films.
    • Ad Age also points to a Jack Watts & Associates based in Sydney.
  • Leading Edge Design and Systems, Inc.
    • Hanover, Maryland corporation with a "teaming agreement" with Dynamic Media as of 2001 (see this)
  • Millennial Entertainment, Inc. is credited as a production company on many of the films. The best record I could find of its existence is this logo design on a site where you pay for inexpensive logo designs.
    • I received an email back from "SRO Productions" (see logo), which was not around at the time of America and is not familiar with these productions. They indicate there may be other SRO Productions, though, so take this with a grain of salt.

Productions edit

  • AMERICA CALLS: Mine Eyes Have Seen The Glory - "(a three hour network special) produced for Broadman-Holman, Publishers and Jack Watts & Associates, Inc., Atlanta, Georgia, 1996."
    • the SuperbSpeakers profile is the only Google hit for the title

Full list of relevant articles edit

We may want to ensure all relevant articles are listed and then make a note upon reviewing each of them.

Note: Deleted articles are collapsed to save space. Feel free to uncollapse or move the notes contained in their respective sections elsewhere. I imagine some of it (e.g. the lengthy notes under America: A Call to Greatness or the Warren Chaney article might be useful).

People edit

Warren Chaney edit

AfD closed as delete 13 December 2015
  • Notes/information:
    • Sinclairindex removed blacklist links and a comment about failing to find the ISBN
  • Reliable sources/verification:
    • Kentucky New Era: In the top 15% of Kentucky seniors who took the college qualification tests, graduated HS in 1960
    • The North Texan: Article in UNT school newspaper about a project Chaney led as a professor (unknown rank) at UNT in 1973
    • UNT Digital Library: Dissertation for doctor of philosophy (management) at UNT in 1974
  • Questionable/minor sources:
    • NY Times Books has a first chapter of a book by Wade Cook which features a testimonial letter from Chaney about his success in the stock market after attending Cook's Wall Street Workshop. (still primary, of course)
    • San Antonio Express 2 Apr 1968 p. 4 just mentions he's a ventriloquist/magician, master of ceremonies for the crowning of "Miss Brooke Army Medical Center 1967"...
    • Galveston Daily News 8 Dec 1996 p. 9 just interesting - playing the role of Sherlock Holmes (he also has a movie about Holmes)

Deborah Winters edit

Movies/tv edit

America: A Call to Greatness edit

AfD closed as delete 13 December 2015
  • Notes/information:
    • Orangemike noted problems back in 2011. Sinclairindex replied and later removed the discussion.
    • Buzzsawyer comments only to say he/she's seen the movie, praising it
    • There are clips on YouTube. One is uploaded by user Xanaduwhc, which has an image of Chaney. The other is uploaded to a channel just called America: A Call to Greatness. As the article says, Charlton Heston and Mickey Rooney are in it and say the name of the film, both in very brief cameos up front. The production value is extremely poor, and many scenes look to be in front of the same greenscreen. Nowhere does anything say where this was broadcast -- just that it was broadcast. Not finding any evidence the movie was even made. The trailers could've been created with the cameos and distributed as though a whole movie existed (unclear).
    • Article was created on 11 April 2011. At first it used a bogus domain name for its official website (http://www.america_a_call_to_greatness.com/ -- underscores are not valid in hostnames). The domain americamovie.org was registered on 18 April 2011, to someone with a Mynewmind.com email address, at 22:46:30. At 00:38 19 April 2011 Sinclairindex updated the URLs in the article. (if ICANN uses UTC as well, that means less than 2 hours had gone by)
    • There is an archived version of the dynamicmediainc.com web page for the film which shows it available for purchase on DVD
    • see also information above regarding Dynamic Media Inc., which includes information about this title in one of their SEC documents.
    • There is a book with the same title by John W. Chalfant, which was first published in 1996 (around the same time). Chalfant holds the domain greatness.us to promote the book.
      • Chalfant established "America - A Call to Greatness Inc" as a company in 1991 (or 92) in Fern Park, FL. (lousy ref). The book credits the company as the copyright holder (located in Winter Park, FL).
      • A trademark application was filed in 1992 for the name "America - A Call to Greatness" by America - A Call To Greatness Inc. (Chalfant, but his name isn't mentioned). The goods and services it described included not just books but also video tapes, motion pictures, etc. (that may be standard for such a trademark?). Another TM application was filed in 2011 but classified as abandoned in 2013 (presumably because of Chalfant's?). Chalfant's TM looks to have been renewed for 10 years in 2006.
  • Reliable sources:

Behind the Mask (1992 film) edit

AfD closed as delete 13 December 2015
  • Reliable sources:

The Broken Spur edit

AfD closed as delete 13 December 2015
  • Notes/information:
  • Reliable sources:

Haunted (1991 film) edit

AfD closed as delete 13 December 2015

Reliable sources:

The Hidden Jungle edit

AfD closed as delete 13 December 2015
  • Notes/information:
  • Reliable sources:

Into the Spider's Web edit

AfD closed as delete 13 December 2015
  • Notes/information:
  • Reliable sources:

The Lamp (1986 film) edit

Redirected to The Outing (film)
  • Notes/information:
  • Reliable sources:

Magic Mansion edit

  • Notes/information:
    • Buzzsawyer comments to say he/she watched it, praise it
  • Reliable sources:
  • Analyses of images:

The Outing (film) edit

  • Notes/information:
    • Claims to be a butchered re-release of The Lamp that has 18 minutes cut
  • Reliable sources:

Space Patrol Chronicles edit

AfD closed as delete 13 December 2015
Sources
  1. Amazon. Merchant sources cannot show notability and are inappropriate to add to an article in general. Unusable
  2. Chaney, Warren. Space Patrol – The Novel, Edge Publishing. This is, at best, a primary source and cannot show notability. Works do not gain notability by virtue of being published. Unusable
  3. IMDb. This is a listing for the TV series itself. The series might be notable, but the books do not inherit notability. If this is an official work then it might warrant being listed on the series page, but books (official or no) do not automatically inherit notability. This is also ignoring the issues with IMDb as a source as a whole. Unusable
  4. Radio Nouspace. This doesn't seem to actually mention the books at all and I also have to question whether the site would be a reliable source even if it did mention the books. Unusable
  5. Chaney, Warren. Space Patrol Chronicles – Missions of Daring, Books One and Two. Same issues as the other listings of the book - unable to show notability.
  6. Amazon. Same issues as above and is actually the same link. Unusable
  7. Science Fiction & The Space Patrol Chronicles, RetroGuideBook Magazine. This might be usable, however I would need to verify that this actually covers the books in question and isn't just mentioning the show or isn't an advert. I also don't like that I really can't find anything about this magazine, which is problematic considering the issues at the other AfD. Unusable until it can be verified.
  8. LA Times. This does not mention the books at all, so it cannot show notability for the works, as notability is WP:NOTINHERITED. Unusable
  9. NY Times. Same issue here. Unusable
  10. Swapsale. This looks like the site was selling the book, which makes it a merchant source, which means it cannot be used to show notability. Unusable.
  11. Pippin, Ed, Books One & Two, Space Patrol Chronicles, Solar Guard, May 6, 2014. This is another source that has no link posted for us to verify what type of article it was - or even if it was an article. Now the other issue is that we have to determine what type of publication Solar Guard is and whether it'd be a RS. I think that it might be this site, which doesn't seem to be usable because it has no actual editorial oversight as far as I can see. It also doesn't help that Chaney has written for the site, so even if it was potential a RS it would be unusable since it'd be in the site's best interests to promote the works of someone who writes for the. I also need to note that although the website is still up, there's no record of the review being written. Unusable
  12. Swapsale. This is a review of the books, however the problem here is that since Swapsale was selling the books during this point in time it makes them a primary source a best. It's well within their best interests to write a review for the books - especially a positive one. It also doesn't help that the reviewer even states that they were sort of involved with the production of the books to some degree or at least knows Chaney. Unusable
  13. Swapsale. This is the sale page, yet it's represented as a review. No sale page will ever be seen as a review of the work because there's an inherent COI, since they want you to spend your money. Unusable.
  14. Pippen, Ed, Book Review-Space Patrol Chronicles, Solar Guard, May 20, 2014. This is another reference to the same review used above. Same issues apply. Unusable
  15. Sanborne, Jeffrey, Book Review, Ravenwood Literary Digest, May 8, 2014, p.11. This is another unverifiable link and a search for "Ravenwood Literary Digest" brings up nothing to show that this even exists. A search for the writer's name brings up nothing as well. It's very suspicious that there's absolutely no trace of either the digest or the writer, as this was supposed to have been written so recently. Unusable until it can be proven legitimate.
  16. Solar Guard. This is used in the reception section, however clicking on the link clearly shows that this is not a review for the book and instead covers Ed Kemmer. The book isn't even mentioned! Unusable
  17. Swapsale. Same COI review, still unusable.
  18. Macken, Jonathan B. The Science and the Fiction in The Space Patrol Chronicles, RetroGuideBook Magazine, April, 2015, p.97-99. This is another article by the same person for RetroGuideBook. The same issue applies: there's no record of this magazine at all. Given that this magazine is presumably still in publication, there should be record of it somewhere... and there's not any that I can find. Unusable until it can be proven legit.
  19. Ames, Dale. Space Patrol Chronicles, The Galaxy Patrol, May 2014. Same issues here. This is presumably a magazine or website, however a search brings up nothing to show that it actually exists. Unusable until it can be proven legit.
  20. Swapsale. Sale page, unusable
  21. Bassior, Jean-Noel, Space Patrol: Missions of Daring in the Name of Early Television. This book pre-dates the publication of this book, so its unusable for notability giving purposes.
  22. Terrace, Vincent. Crime Fighting Heroes, MacFarland & Company. Same issues, also unusable.
  23. Radio Nouspace. This is the same source as above, same issues. Unusable
  • Reliable sources:

Y2K – World in Crisis edit

AfD closed as delete 13 December 2015
  • Reliable sources:

Books/print edit

Dynamic Mind edit

Dynamic Mind - Deleted at AfD 10 December 2015
  • REVIEW:
    • Permstrump's analysis: *:"I don't know if it even matters at this point, but I have doubts that this book even exists. Looking into the book for this AfD was the first thing that tipped me off to the elaborate online presence Chaney has created for himself since 2011, so I spent a lot of time going through all of the citations one-by-one of the ones that were left after OP for this AfD had already deleted a lot. I looked up every single citation. If the source existed (which it often did not), I searched the text and read exactly what was said about Chaney/Dynamic Mind. Of the small number of references that actually existed and mentioned Dynamic Mind, they were mainly self-published academic theses that echoed the same 1-2 sentences and listed the same page numbers in their reference lists. The only source this didn't apply to was an abstract on Research Gate, a social media website that's supposed to be for researchers and academics to share open source articles and data. Oh and by the way, that abstract had Chaney listed at the primary author, but only the second author had been listed in the reference list on Wikipedia. Therefore, I'm pretty certain the only references to Dynamic Mind that didn't come from Chaney (or if it's not him personally, one of his kids), came from lazy students who were quoting each other without going back to the primary source."
    • Permstrump removed several sources "because this book wasn't even mentioned in many of them (Menegatti, Poncin-Lafitte, Kronenberg and Doidge, Adjei). The Johnstone source didn't seem to exist. And the ones that did cite this book (Megarity, Garner, Charlton x2, Luque, Lucin, Hopkins), echoed the same 1-2 sentences that bore no resemblance to the content attributed to them in this article. Virtually none were from peer reviewed journals as they were all WP:SELFPUBLISH, WP:SOCIALMEDIA, WP:PRIMARY, or WP:QUESTIONABLE."
  • Notes/information:
  • Reliable sources:

Companies/organizations edit

Intercontinental Releasing Corporation edit

Deleted via PROD 21 December 2015
  • REVIEW:
    • I'm seeing some reliable sources which speak to the existence of this one, but the article was still chock full of the usual user-generated content and copious references to Americamovie.com (I think that tomorrow I'll submit that to the spam blacklist -- it's in all of these articles) — Rhododendrites talk \\ 06:12, 11 December 2015 (UTC)
    • proposed for deletion
  • Notes/information:
  • Reliable sources:

Outside the Chaneyverse edit

Both sufficiently resolved

Aloha Summer edit

  • Notes:
  • Reliable sources:

Space Patrol (1950 TV series) edit

  • Reliable sources:

Images edit

Note: Several images are proven photoshops, and some pre-photoshop versions have been located. See talk page for details.

Images uploaded by Sinclairindex unless otherwise noted.

Uploaded to or copied to Commons edit

Wikipedia edit

Deleted edit

List of deleted images

Categories edit

Commons edit

Wikidata edit

(Note: The apparently redundant names are needed. The names would otherwise be lost if/when Wikidata deletes or redirects the items.)

Not found on Wikidata (unfound entries may exist)
  • Magic Mansion
  • Dynamic Mind
  • Space Patrol Chronicles
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