Wikipedia:Identifying PR

This is intended as a guide to identifying content that is likely to be PR, most often undeclared paid editing. But that doesn't mean it always comes from paid editing--many good faith editors write the same way, partly because they see so much of it already in Wikipedia, so they copy it thinking it's what we want, and partly because the wide penetration of PR in our society leads to everyone using that style. Some of the indications are article formatting and development, others are key phrases or a word. Particularly with key words, they are as often an indication of plagiarism or copyvio as of direct PR--someone copied the material from a PR source. And some of it is just bad writing. Attention should also be paid to copyright issues. Firms will often recycle content that is posted elsewhere on the internet. If an article appears to be PR, a copyright check should also be conducted.

For other approaches to this problem, see WP:PEACOCK.

That an article contains PR does not always imply that the article must be deleted--sometimes the PR can be removed without extensive rewriting. But if extensive rewriting is needed, then it almost always does indicate paid or other COI editing. Opinion varies on whether undeclared paid editing must always be deleted, but recent trends at WP:AfD and Wikipedia:Conflict of interest/Noticeboard indicate that it usually will be. One of the reasons is that such editors are almost always sockpuppets, and the material will be subject to deletion on those grounds, even if we have not yet identified the master. The main exception is when some known good faith editor is willing to adopt the article, especially if the subject is so important that removing it entirely would be a disservice to the readers.

Sections

Excessive intricate sectioning giving detail about business operations is a PR indicator. Examples include:

• "Key people"
• "Departments"
• "Operations" followed by a list of geographic locations -- or worse, a table.

In the media

A section similar to the typical "In the news" page on a corporate website, simply listing articles, blogs, etc that mention the company, product, or person.

This is not encyclopedic content. The sources here might be useful to generate encyclopedic content, however.

Awards and accolades

Further information: WP:ORGAWARDS

Also similar to a corporate website, listing awards. If there are sources, they are often only press releases, or the website of the winner or the awarder. May be found in sections with titles like "Awards and recognition" or "Industry recognition".

There may also be a "Philanthropy" (or, even worse Corporate social responsibility) section.

Market and unmet need

There will often be a section explaining the problem being addressed by a product, which will lead the reader to understand that the problem is sizable, and there was no good solution for the problem until this organization produced its innovation; if competitors are mentioned, shortcoming of their products will often be identified. The sources will not mention the specific subject of the article.

These sections are WP:SYN in Wikipedia.

Products

Often a brochure-like recitation of corporate product or service offerings that violates WP:NOTCATALOG. Other section titles include "Offerings", "Features", "Uses" and similar.

Language/vocabulary

Pleonasms

1. first began, first opened, first established — and similar
2. originally began, originally founded — and similar; the worst I've seen is originally born
3. early pioneer
4. greatly expanded

Vagueness

1. usually, often, generally, many, leading, prominent
2. one of the first, one of the early, and especially one of the only

Buzzwords

Corporate buzzwords are a reliable sign of PR writing.

1. bespoke, comprehensive, integrated, turnkey
2. business model, mission statement and other
3. serial entrepreneur instead of businessperson
4. solution or solutions, except in mathematics and chemistry (if a hardware-software combination, best terms are "product" or "system") (see WP:SOLUTION)

Other

1. aspiring, hopeful, future career, promising, up and coming — all of which indicate NOT YET NOTABLE
2. world-wide
3. prestigious
4. superlatives: greatest, leading, most important, key, top

Sourcing

Source padding burnishes a brand and creates comfort and familiarity in the reader's mind for marketing purposes. Press releases are frequently cited by PR-driven articles, likewise churnalism pieces – often multiple versions of the same press release in different seemingly independent sources. Also non-RS blogs (note that experts' blogs may be reliable), interviews of the subject, repeated citations of routine business directories. Note especially WP:NEWSORG which explains how some bona fide publications host non-RS blogs under their domain name.

Sourcing to indexes of the author's contributions to publications, instead of to individual contributions, can indicate PR. (Note however that this is the accepted technique in some other language Wikipedias.)

Sourcing to industry regulations or ministries that ostensibly govern a business's operations, but which do not mention the business specifically, can indicate either reference padding or PR attempting to show it is a "safe" investment, medical device or procedure, etc.

Use of fake news sites and sites with misleadingly similar names to actual news sites has been discovered on WP.

In some regions, local entertainment entities and other businesses may be offered preferential treatment in national media that are otherwise often reliable. Conversely, restrictive libel laws may prevent local media from reporting negative information on otherwise notable companies and individuals.

Other signs of PR

Style

1. Repeating the full name of the company or person or product more than once a section
2. Using a person's full titles more than once an article
3. Repeated use of WP:HONORIFICS especially for business executives
4. FULL CAPS for personal names or products
5. ™ or TM or ®
6. Use of people's first names alone, e.g "Peter was appointed..." — except in popular entertainment or arts
7. Name-dropping / coattail riding
   1. gratuitous mention of better-known artists, companies, reviewers, etc.
   2. lists of distinguished people who were at an opening ceremony or the like.
   3. including picture (or, worse, multiple pictures) of individual with well-known dignitaries, unless it's the only free picture available.
8. emphasis on licensing information, or similar formal routine government record
9. including more than 2 pictures of the same person
10. including more than two "field" or "known for" entries in an infobox
11. including a large number of industries in infobox, often closely related (e.g. "finance, banking, consumer finance and investment management")
12. including in the infobox officers other than the president, CEO, or chairman of the board, or managing director — except for the largest and most famous companies
13. including full addresses of branches or locations
14. including external links or phone numbers or web sites for departments or divisions
15. Giving full names of minor children; we omit this and say "3 children" or the like
16. Extensive mention of children's or spouse's occupations or positions
17. Giving activities or position of parents or other relatives, unless directly relevant
18. listing in-company or in-university awards
19. including long quotes from reviews, instead of just linking to them.
20. including anecdotes about childhood precocity in business or the arts
21. unusual weight on enterprise history
    1. anecdotes or extraneous information about foundation
    2. excessively detailed history, especially when closely following an organization's official sources
    3. lists of firsts, especially when cited to organization's official sources
22. unusual weight on enterprise memberships e.g. in industry and trade groups
23. Crystal ball speculation about future business events, future software releases, future entertainment and media
24. Not giving exact years for degrees or employment
25. Including a list of popular press articles written by the subject, to establish expertise or notability (often accompanied by "has written for" language)
26. listing advertising campaigns, television or film product placement, corporate sponsorships, spokesmodels/spokespeole/brand ambassadors
27. listing inventions and patents; licensing and distribution deals; citing patents as references (see WP:PATENTS)
28. using proprietary terms for generic technologies
29. long lists of properties e.g. of a hotel chain

Format

1. giving current and immediate previous position at the top of the article, and the earlier ones at the bottom (in contrast, an encyclopedic presentation follows a chronological order)
2. Inclusion of only vague information in lede when there is significant bad news later in the article (especially if it is recent)

People

many of the things here need to be distinguished from puffery by the person or their children writing the article themselves

Editing pattern

1. Simultaneously writing articles on an organization and its executive or founder.
2. Simultaneously uploading professional quality images and creating biography, especially when image attributed to same account
   1. Flickrwashing in conjunction with new text content
3. Creation of the article perfectly formatted in one edit
4. Happy-talk, cherry picked positive financial results
5. Reference padding with published works citing themselves, references to corporate or personal homepages, or extraneous/unrelated citations even predating the facts purportedly cited
6. Listing of one-of-a-large-number awards (where large-number is 100, 500, or even 5,000)
7. Listing nominations for awards

Signs of naïvety

1. Linking books to Amazon instead of WorldCat
2. Citing JSTOR instead of the name of the actual journal
3. Contains exact date of birth that is not supported in sources provided.
4. passed away
5. Listing high school activities or offices
6. Repeated citations to same source not using WP:REFNAME
7. Unformatted bare URLs
8. Large galleries

Schools

Some promotional (or naïve) practices are particularly found in school or university articles. Editors here are as likely to be enthusiastic students as PR – it's still COI, but does not necessarily indicate deliberate promotionalism.

1. Listing every teacher
2. Listing every course required for a degree
3. Detailing the fee schedule
4. Detailed department lists
5. Explaining the procedure for obtaining admission
6. Listing transportation lines serving the campus
7. Detailing routine facilities such as laboratory equipment, dining facilities, and exercise/weight rooms
8. Lists of unlinked or redlinked faculty and alumni
9. Lists of all student activities
10. List of student officers
11. Lists of residence facilities

Signs of copyright violations

1. Giving the time of the funeral service
2. Listing all surviving relatives
3. Including reference names in parenthesis without an actual list specifying them. (this essentially amounts to proof of copyvio)
4. Use of first-person or second-person pronouns.
5. Inclusion of content such as places and dates of birth in the article text.
6. Words such as first, newest, most recent, etc.

Signs of false attribution

False attribution indicates that an article was composed offline by another editor and uploaded on their behalf, i.e. meatpuppetry. This constitutes a copyright/licensing issue as well as a potential conflict of interest/advocacy issue.

1. Web access dates that predate creation of the article
2. Slight variation on a prior existing article, such as adding Inc. to the company name

and...

see the list at WP:PEACOCK

See also

• Wikipedia:Identifying blatant advertising