Wikipedia- The Struggle is Real
Time to get the blog going again- no excuses, life is busy, but I need to start blogging again.
Some of you may recall that I made reference to the fact that I've been working on trying to get my career article up on Wikipedia. I made reference to this on the podcast a few weeks back. In fact, I devoted a whole episode to this endeavor. To refresh, I enlisted the aid of a company, Wiki Clutch, to help me to get this article up on Wikipedia. After a year of lies, broken promises, and zero results, not to mention a $4000 financial commitment (yes, you read that right), I finally said enough is enough and turned them loose last month. At the time of our parting of the ways, they were STILL trying to upcharge me another $2-3000 for a "page protection" scam. (Page protection is not a requirement for publication on Wikipedia, in spite of what they tried to make me believe). It was at that point that I decided to try to work on this myself. Through the use of Copilot, I learned a lot about what they were doing and fortunately it educated me on steps to take to not only break away from this company, but steps I could take to accomplish this task myself.
Immediately after terminating Wiki Clutch, I put my nose to the grindstone. I dove right in, working with Copilot every step of the way. I buckled down and worked on this for hours at a time each day. Getting pointers on what Wikipedia is looking for in terms of requirements- encyclopedic entries, neutral in tone, and everything needing to be reinforced with citations. I, along with my wife, spent hours at a time going over things in painstaking detail. We both were determined to leave no stone unturned. We mapped out an article that very much seemed to meet their stringent requirements. So, when we thought we were ready, we triple checked everything and submitted the draft. After about a week, we heard back. Submission declined.
Disappointed, I endeavored to find out what we did wrong and could do better. Wikipedia's main issue was that I had a "notability" issue, meaning that I wasn't well known enough- and that there weren't enough strong supportive third party references to satisfy their criteria for notability. They said I'm probably "not suitable" for a Wikipedia article. They gave feedback- and so I endeavored to improve that issue, by seeking out further articles that could satisfy the notability criterion. I reached out to a colleague of mine who writes for the Lowell Sun. When I took the job at UMass Lowell, he wrote a piece about me in the paper. Strong stuff. I also asked our local paper if they wouldn't mind writing a piece on me to help satisfy my notability issue. With Copilot guiding me every step of the way. Empowered, I made the adjustments and sent them the revised draft.
The result? Declined again, with the same reason given. Worse, they felt it was an "autobiography." To say my confidence in this process was a bit shaken was an understatement. So, the feeling I am experiencing now is one of frustration and fatigue. I am stepping away from the editing process to remove any conflicts of interest. Where this ends up is anybody's guess. Maybe some time away would be helpful. It's impossible not to think at this point that unless you're famous, you're going to have a hard time becoming a part of the Wikipedia universe. Some more conversations will take place with the Wikipedia people. We'll see what happens.
