Clear, Verifiable, Unbiased Information

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Wikinvest is an investing resource that aims to provide users with clear, verifiable, and unbiased information about companies, trends, and concepts, and encourages users to contribute to its quality and depth of coverage.

See also:

Appropriate Points of View

Style Guidelines

Content Guidelines

[edit] Verifiability

A verifiable statement or article is one whose basic content (especially any dates, quotations, statistics, and other numerical data) has already been published by a reliable source. Non-verifiable content will be removed from Wikinvest. (See below for original research.)

Why is verifiability so important? As an "open wiki" or user-edited site, Wikinvest gains a great deal from the collective knowledge of its contributers. But the openness of Wikinvest also makes it easy for incorrect or inaccurate information to slip by unnoticed. The best way of ensuring that Wikinvest delivers only accurate information is to let others--book editors, magazines, newspapers--do the fact-checking for us, before the new content appears on the site. By using verifiable information, you also boost your own credibility as a writer.

[edit] What is a reliable source?

In general, a reliable source is professionally related to the topic at hand, reputable, and objectively defensible. This includes most books, newspapers, magazines, newsletters, and formal/professional reports. This also includes news websites, company websites, and websites of well-known organizations. Unsourced blog material does not count.

Wikipedia usually counts as "reputable," unless the information is contested by other non-Wikipedia sources. When using Wikipedia, stick to information that is externally sourced.

Don't violate copyright--remember to stick to reliable sources in the public domain!

[edit] Shared Ownership of Articles

Let others make changes to "your" work! Wikinvest is a collaborative effort, and just as you have the right to edit the writing of others, so do others have the right to edit yours. It is great to take a special interest in an article, but don't overdo it. If you think an edit was incorrect, let it sit for a few days before reapproaching it to see if you do want to change things back.

Do not sign articles that you have contributed to--signing is only for discussion and messages. Wikinvest's version of a byline appears in the "Top Contributors" box and in the article's History, where everyone can see who made what change.

[edit] Things to avoid doing and saying

Scenarios

• Minor edits concerning layout, image use, and wording are disputed on a daily basis by one contributor. Contributor states or implies that changes must be reviewed by him/her before they can be added to the article. (This does not include egregious formatting errors.)
• Contributor reverts article changes by others for an extended period of time to protect a certain version. (This does not include removing vandalism.)
• A contributor communicates with other contributors to discourage them from making additional contributions.

Comments

• "Are you qualified to edit this article?"
• "Revert. You're editing too much. Can you slow down?"
• "This is interesting, but you obviously have no real experience with ____."
• "Do not make such changes or comments until you have significantly edited or written work of this quality."
• "I/he/we/ created this article."

[edit] Vandalism

Vandalism is a change made to content that deliberately obstructs Wikinvest's goal of presenting clear, verifiable, unbiased information, and it is absolutely prohibited on Wikinvest. The most common types of vandalism include spam, addition of obscenities to pages, page blanking (deleting all the page's content), or the insertion of inappropriate content (including both good and bad jokes--sorry). Vandalism is usually easy to spot.

Any good-faith effort to improve Wikinvest, even if misguided or ill-considered, is not vandalism. For example, adding a personal opinion once is not vandalism--it's just not helpful, and should be removed or restated.

Committing blatant vandalism is a violation of Wikinvest policy, and users will be dealt with accordingly. Wikinvest reserves the right to deny site or editing access to users who vandalize.

Thanks to Wikipedia and its contributors for sharing their help section and policies with us, from which portions of this article are drawn. This help content is licensed under the GNU GFDL