Talk:Nolan Higdon

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75% of this article has been written by WP:SPAs 24.4.117.226 and Wowochoo123. The latter's account was only created on 29 November and immediately went to work adding large amounts of WP:SPS and WP:PROMO content from the article subject's substack. Longhornsg (talk) 08:13, 30 November 2023 (UTC)

Similar selfpromo on other articles from Wowochoo123, 2601:648:8880:C40:0:0:0:0/64 (block range · block log (global) · WHOIS (partial)), and 169.233.186.42 (talk · contribs · IP contribs · WHOIS) - MrOllie (talk) 19:49, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

I have reinstated the COI tag after it was removed in this edit by IP user 169.233.214.36 (talk · contribs · IP contribs · WHOIS). I will note that this IP address geolocates to University of California Santa Cruz, and that other IPs in this range have edited this page. There is also 192.235.5.198 (talk · contribs · IP contribs · WHOIS) and other similar IPs, which geolocate to Diablo Valley College, another university where Higdon teaches. Perhaps Professor Higdon is so beloved by his students that they have a vested interest in the article about him, in which case I hope they will exercise restraint and understand that COI editing is strongly discouraged. Truthnope (talk) 20:00, 8 February 2025 (UTC)

I think the box can be removed from the top of this page. The content from one of the major contributors 'contributions has been removed. It looks like the remainder of the article is a fair amount of different editors. As long as one editor does not make major edits again, I think this page is fine, and the box can/should be removed. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 192.235.5.198 (talk) 22:39, 24 January 2024 (UTC)

I agree. The math seems off. I would remove the box unless those editors return. There is a diversity of editors, more than many pages I've reviewed. 169.233.130.17 (talk) 18:35, 27 February 2024 (UTC)

I have restored the COI tag, in agreement with Longhornsg and MrOllie. The tag should remain until there is a consensus among editors that the issue has been addressed. Elspea756 (talk) 02:06, 28 February 2024 (UTC)

169.233.130.17 and 192.235.5.198 are correct that the box has out lived its purpose. There has been numerous updates and the removal of content from different users. The math makes less sense now than the previously. 149.137.159.106 (talk) 21:29, 12 May 2025 (UTC)

Persistent COI template removal- June 2025

To summarize the conversation above, four editors with longstanding histories supported having a COI template in November 2023, December 2023, February 2024, and February 2025. Three single-purpose IP editors supported removing the COI template in January 2024, February 2024, and May 2025.

Recently, an array of IP editors have tried to remove the COI maintenance template (I'm seeing six in the last year). None of these editors have made any changes to the article besides removing the template, but the most recent removal argued that "as multiple users confirmed, the reason for its justification no longer applies. At this point, anybody advocating for it on the previous logic is motivated by a personal disdain for the subject not the facts noted by other users. This is clear by the lack of engagement or defense with the original justification."

The ongoing, highly suspicious removal pattern by users who have made no effort to improve the article and seem only interested in removing the template is, itself, a pattern of COI behavior (in addition to nature of the edits that @Truthnope highlighted above). Additionally, there has been significant removal of perceived biased content following the January 2024 and February 2024 posts supporting template removal, suggesting that editors at that time still did not consider the article have the neutral tone expected of non-COI written articles. Assumption that this is due to personal disdain and not an interest in upholding Wikipedia standards suggests an over-investment in the article's subject (i.e. other editors to not have the personal biases that you do). Vegantics (talk) 14:13, 13 June 2025 (UTC)

Since the edit summary by @73.15.72.108 cast WP:Aspersions on every user who has reinstated the COI tag, as I have, I'll throw in my own two cents and note that the argument made by that user (and many other WP:SPA IPs) that the tag no longer applies because of the number of editors is not good reasoning. Looking at the page statistics, most of the article has been written by three users, @24.4.117.226, @Bamboozled1900, and @Carindemor89 (@Diannaa has one large edit, which seems to have been just removing copyrighted material). All three of these users have had COI issues raised on their talk pages, they have not responded, and their accounts are all inactive. The issues with what appears to be COI violations has not been resolved, there has only been some work done to remove the most egregious instances of it. Having some variety of users edit an article does not automatically resolve COI issues with it, especially when the bulk of the article is written by a small number of editors. Truthnope (talk) 19:17, 23 June 2025 (UTC)