Talk:GreenFacts

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[edit] GreenFacts Usernames

Wikipedia usernames used by GreenFacts staff: 194.183.227.97, StephanieM, PatVanHove

Address: M-Brussels Village, 44 rue des Palais, B-1030 Brussels

IP range: 194.183.227.96 - 194.183.227.111

Cacycle 14:02, 23 Mar 2005 (UTC)

[edit] GreenFacts: a non-advocacy organization

Please note that many elements posted in this article are based on somebody's perceptions and on one single source. Other articles on GreenFacts are available at http://www.greenfactsfoundation.org/main/press-book/index.htm

Moreover, this article does not reflect the actual goals or activities of GreenFacts. An example of sentence which is particularly inaccurate and not substantiated is: "Recently, Green Facts has moved beyond summarising documents, and is now actively engaging in the policy debate. Its main target has been the European Union's Environment and Health process."

GreenFacts is not engaging and does not intend to engage in any lobbying activity. See for instance: http://www.greenfactsfoundation.org/main/about/non-advocacy.htm

Moreover, a major objective of the GreenFacts organization is the independence and impartiality of its publications. http://www.greenfactsfoundation.org/main/about/independence.htm

GreenFacts has always aimed to diversify its funding. The corporate sector was indeed the first to provide the financial means for its activities. Currently, GreenFacts is increasingly receiving funding from public institutions, private donors and foundations, as detailed in the fundraising figures: http://www.greenfactsfoundation.org/main/funding/figures.htm

In conclusion, there is no justification to present GreenFacts in an encyclopedia as “an industry lobbying group”. Therefore, I would kindly ask any such references to be removed from Wikipedia articles.StephanieM 16:38, 24 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Stephanie Mantell, GreenFacts Publication Manager

I have added some material on the work of GreenFacts, the economic interests of the funding companies (more to come), and the role of GreenFacts in an industry "sound science" strategy. GreenFacts is now characerized as a "lobbying-related industry front group" which is more accurate than the former "industry lobbying group". I would suggest to keep the short form "industry lobbying group" in articles for clarity. Cacycle 16:14, 30 Mar 2005 (UTC)

This characerization as a "lobbying-related industry front group" does not reflect reality at all and is based on a very judgmental and biased article from Sourcewatch.
It is not because you receive funding from a particular group that you therefore automatically defend their interests, but you need money to do your work properly (see information above).
The summaries have never been criticized as industry biased. Even the recent comments on Mercury suggested that we may be overstating not understating the effects of mercury, which would clearly not serve the interest of the industry.
Both the UN and the WHO acknowledge our work by linking directly to our latest popularized version of the Synthesis Report Ecosystem Millennium Assessment (http://www.millenniumassessment.org & http://www.who.int/globalchange/publications/masynthesis/en/). The Climate Action Network makes direct reference to our climate change study (http://www.climnet.org/resources/faq.htm) etc. This proves that our work is of interest to very different stakeholders which is precisely our aim.
If you cannot accept these arguments, please explain why.StephanieM 10:07, 31 Mar 2005 (UTC)
Moreover, links to GreenFacts summaries in other articles are now posted as "A summary (...) by the industry lobbying group GreenFacts."
The GreenFacts staff is not in the best position to correct this article because it concerns our own organization.
We perceive it as a disregard to our commitment to convey accurate scientific information on the environment and health.
Therefore, I would like to open this article for comment. StephanieM 08:37, 4 Apr 2005 (UTC)

The article does not question the accuracy of your summaries, so your responses are slightly off the target.

Indeed, industry-funding alone is not an indicator that your organization is a lobbying group. More significant are the following points:

  • You are obviously missing neutrality in the chosen topics.
  • Your contacts are mainly with industry and government and not with stakeholders of environmental NGOs.
  • You are engaged in EU legislation.
  • You are trying to hide your real interests (which can also nicely be seen in your replies above).

The characerization as a "lobbying-related industry front group" is a pretty obvious conclusion from the facts presented in the article. In short words: You are involved in bringing environmental activists down from the chimney at the round table to talk about facts. [1] That might be not a bad idea, but it is called lobbying if you are paid for it. Cacycle 17:35, 4 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Could we agree to simply keep the links as they are now, but without any comment on GreenFacts other than a link to this page :
  • A link to the original study,
  • A link saying: "A summary of the above document, by GreenFacts"
--PatVanHove 13:16, 7 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] From RFC

I haven't fully absorbed everything from this particular debate yet. However, on first glance, the article as it stands (considering what this particular organization does) is way too long. It needs to be pruned significantly. Secondly, I think using the phrase "front group" is unfair; it's loaded language and needs to be changed. However, it is true that this particular group was formed with industry seed money and continues to be funded primarily by industry, and that needs to be mentioned prominently in the article. People who are reading can make their own decisions from there about whether they'd want to trust this organization's facts. The fact that it has come under criticism for its ties to industry as well as some endorsements of the concept of "sound science" also needs to be highlighted in the article, again so people can make their own decisions. I would just point out that though creating an article about yourself or your company is not prohibited by Wikipedia policies, it is not really encouraged either because staying neutral is difficult. I'm on deadline now but will come back when I can and make some more specific recommendations. Katefan0 18:52, Apr 5, 2005 (UTC)

Please note that this page was not created by GreenFacts, and one of the reasons it has been put up for discussion is that GreenFacts itself of course isn't neutral in editing an article about themselves, and that they think that the article could benefit from an outside eye.--PatVanHove 06:55, 6 Apr 2005 (UTC)
The above comment is the first edit by PatVanHove. GreenFacts lists a Patrick Van Hove as staff. [2] Cacycle 08:14, 6 Apr 2005 (UTC)
Yes, sorry for not making myself clear, I am part of the GreenFacts staff, I just wanted to clarify what seemed like a misunderstanding about the initial authorship of this article. --PatVanHove 08:20, 6 Apr 2005 (UTC)
StephanieM: I support your efforts to get some "peer review" for this article (even if Wikipedia:Help desk and Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment might not be the right place for it). The first step in resolving disputes here at Wikipedia is to talk together on Talk pages and User_talk pages (see Wikipedia:Dispute_resolution). However, the best way would be to start to improve the article. Sure, you are not neutral, but as long as you don't hide this (hint), the article would certainly benefit from your knowledge. See Wikipedia:Neutral point of view for how we deal with different point of views at Wikipedia.
Katefan0: I agree that the article could need some editing (even some deletions) and I would appreciate the help of others in doing so. I have started this article about two weeks ago after GreenFacts has put their links anonymously into the external references sections of a couple of articles (see User_talk:Darrien). Cacycle 08:58, 6 Apr 2005 (UTC)
  • Katefan0: I have previously attempted to edit the article by removing sentences which I considered innacurate (clearly stating who I was and why I was making the change). However, these and further statements about GreenFacts which appear inaccurate to me have been immediately added in again by Cacycle who had written the original text. In order to avoid back and forth changes I would prefer to receive some more input from other users.StephanieM 10:50, 6 Apr 2005 (UTC)
  • Cacycle: The only reason these additions were anonymous is because I had not yet registered as a user. StephanieM 10:50, 6 Apr 2005 (UTC)
  • While GreenFacts staff may not have created the article initially (I stand corrected), the spirit of what I said about the difficulty in maintaining neutrality is still valid. By the same token, it's also difficult for someone with an axe to grind on a topic to stay neutral (I am not pointing any fingers, so please don't get offended.) Okay, let's all take a step back and see if we can sorta cool some of the rhetoric. GreenFacts has a place at Wikipedia and an article on it should be treated fairly -- it also should not whitewash criticisms. I'm sure there is a way to make everybody satisfied. Also, please don't be offended by folks noting who has contributed when anon or unsigned editors make comments. It's just a way of keeping everything straight. When people don't sign their comments or make comments from an anon IP, it makes communication difficult. (People also tend to give their comments less weight because there is less accountability.) Katefan0 16:01, Apr 6, 2005 (UTC)
  • By way of kickstarting things, how would everyone feel about copying the current page and creating a dummy somewhere where we can all work on it together? Katefan0 16:21, Apr 6, 2005 (UTC)
  • All right, well, I've done it. I created a dummy, pasted in the text of the page as it stands now, then edited it to what I think is a fair treatment. You can find it here. Open to any comments. Katefan0 20:29, Apr 6, 2005 (UTC)]
  • Thanks Katefan0 for your effort, your version seems a lot more balanced than what the long article was. I have taken the liberty of deleting links that I feel were not relevant:
  • -The 'sound science under George W.Bush' link was not relevant since we mostly deal with EU and International matters.
  • -The Sourcewatch link on Front Groups is duplicating the other Sourcewatch link which also refers to us as a front group, with ample ressources for anyone who wants to know more about front groups. I kept the first Sourcewatch link since it is our main source of criticism, and that it needs to be kept there if it is to be a balanced view.
  • -The REACH lobbying link was not relevant since GreenFacts was not involved with it. REACH is a european policy project concerned with communicating risks associated with various chemicals, and as such is of some interest to GreenFacts, but our organization was not involved in it's creation.
Other than the links, I think the rest of it is essentially OK, short, to the point.--PatVanHove 08:47, 7 Apr 2005 (UTC)
  • Pat, thanks for the lookover. I don't have a problem with deleting the REACH or link to "front groups" links at all, but I do think readers would be well-served by a link to an article about the debate over "sound science," since it is mentioned in the article. I think this is particularly important since Wikipedia does not have its own article on the debate over "sound science," otherwise a wiki link to that would suffice. Let me see if I can find a couple of analyses that can be linked to that don't directly reference Bush. Katefan0 17:33, Apr 7, 2005 (UTC)
  • Katefan0, I tried looking a bit for something on 'Sound Science' that is relatively neutral, but haven't found anything outside of editorials, news items and blogs, maybe a Wiki entry on 'Sound Science' should be started. --PatVanHove 19:26, 7 Apr 2005 (UTC)
Probably, but nobody here's going to do it, so for now I think some links here on the subject are warranted. If it's impossible to find a totally "neutral" treatment, then editorials from both sides would do. As it happens, I found two scholarly articles on the subject and included them in the links. Katefan0 20:32, Apr 7, 2005 (UTC)
  • Katefan0: Those links seem OK, I've only read them diagonnaly, but they seem a good introduction to the 'Sound Science' debate. --PatVanHove 09:59, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)
I just read a little deeper in the documents, very interesting, but mostly about the US. I understand that this is in part because it is where the debate originated and where it is the most intense, so I'm not sure if better documents could be found.--PatVanHove 12:10, 9 Apr 2005 (UTC)
If you feel you can find some, I'm all ears; it would be welcome. But really, is there truly a fundamental difference between the debate here and the debate there? If so, what are those differences? Maybe I'm showing my cynical side, but you seem a bit overfocused on reasons to exclude information on the debate over sound science. If I'm mistaken, I apologize in advance, but that's the way it's beginning to seem from here. Also, do you publicize your reports to organizations or journalists in the US? Katefan0 12:19, Apr 9, 2005 (UTC)
Sorry If I've given this impression, it was not my intent. Our work is mostly from international concesus reports which usually of course have an american contribution, and we try to give information that will be of interest to the widest possible public, americans included. Those two documents are interesting, as I've said, but they talk a lot about US policies. Something more overarching of talking about the way different governments handle the debate : Something like this perhaps? . This one is not perfect either, and is a student paper, but seems to cover the issue outside of the US as well. Now, this discussion about sound science links is not critical to the GreenFacts article, it is just nitpicking on my part. As I've already said, your version of the article is mostly fine. Your links about 'sound science' can stay, and I'm just waiting to hear more from Cacycle about what he considers should be added to it. --PatVanHove 15:13, 9 Apr 2005 (UTC)
Katefan0: I appreciate your help in this dispute. Your article is well formulated. However, it lacks several important facts that have been collected for the main article. I also do not want the intro repeating the organization's self-portrayal and the "criticism" restricted to a later paragraph. Different POVs should be clearly stated - also in the intro section. For these reasons I would like to use the existing article as a starting point for improvements and the discussion of this process on this page. External links, like the 'see also' sections, are also for closely related information. The REACH links are closely related. The sound science part should become an article on its own. Cacycle 22:07, 7 Apr 2005 (UTC)
  • It's a good point about the intro -- I don't have a problem with adding a sentence in the intro paragraph stating that the organization is controversial in some fashion. But which important facts does it lack? I think this is a faithful summary of the points you raised in the earlier article. An encyclopedia article should not be a clearinghouse of ALL information available (pro or con), it should be essentially a thumbnail (Wikipedia is not a general knowledge base). Also I would gently remind everyone that Wikipedia is not a soapbox (this applies both ways -- it is neither a soapbox nor a press release). That said, I'd still like to hear what -- specifically -- you think should be added back in. Katefan0 22:33, Apr 7, 2005 (UTC)

I've tried to re-write the first section of the dummy page so that the controversy about GreenFacts funding is stated. I've also tried to make the first section a little better, by trying to be clearer about the what and why of GreenFacts publications. I've also changed the 'other funding' link from sourcewatch to the GreenFacts foundation page where all the partners are listed, since it is the most up to date information about the funding sources. --PatVanHove 06:56, 10 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I have made some small changes to the text on GreenFactsdummy User:Katefan0/GreenFactsdummy and added a direct link to the figures that are quoted in the text. In your view, can the dummy page now be considered balanced enough to replace the current GreenFacts article? StephanieM 09:45, 11 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Recent edits

Thanks for your work. I have changed several things in the article with my most recent edit. First, I appreciate your intro, but it was not strong enough. I have changed it to reflect the real criticism of GreenFacts, which is its continued industry funding and the link to that funding that some feel could influence the information you produce. I also have indicated several questions. I've trimmed and copyedited some of your language. I also integrated the criticisms section into the body of the text so we don't have glowing information about GreenFacts all up top and the criticisms all down below. I added the link to the paper you referenced and cleaned up the links' text a bit. As for whether it's ready to go live, I would prefer to let Cacycle weigh in first, but what I'm going to do in the meantime is put an NPOV tag on the main article so folks know it's under debate. · Katefan0(scribble) 17:57, Apr 11, 2005 (UTC)

Katefan0: Thank you for putting an NPOV tag on the main article. I will try to clarify the bit that you have left in capitals.
1) "popularised?? (I DON'T KNOW WHAT THIS WORD IS TRYING TO CONVEY) summaries".
Popularize is used in the sense "make accessible to the general public" (www.cogsci.princeton.edu/cgi-bin/webwn). Maybe it would be clearer to say simply "in a language that is clear and accessible to the non-specialist". Greenfacts only makes summaries no reviews - that is not so clear in the current wording.
2) "These summaries are subjected to peer review for faithfulness to the original document under the control of a board of twenty scientists (DO THESE SCIENTISTS ACTUALLY DO THE REVIEWS? "UNDER THE CONTROL OF" IS ODD LANGUAGE. IF THEY DON'T, THIS NEEDS TO BE CHANGED.)"
For each summary a Member of the Scientific Board coordinates the peer review [3] and asks at least 3 experts in the particular field to review the content. The Scientific Board checks if all the comments by those experts are adequatly addressed and if yes it gives the final approval to the publication . The Panel of experts lists persons who have either participated in the peer review or provided other advice [4]
I will try to clarify this in the text. StephanieM 08:23, 12 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Cacycle: Over the past week a series of edits have been made to GreenFactsdummy User:Katefan0/GreenFactsdummy in order to improve the article while taking into account your comments. Would you like to comment further on the dummy page as it is now? StephanieM 13:35, 14 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Dummy status

Hi all, sorry it's taken me a bit to get back to this. I made just a few clarifying language changes and I think at this point it's ready to replace what's on the GreenFacts page. I personally think it's a fair treatment... Cacycle hasn't been back to weigh in and I think it's been enough time for him to do so. If you think the current version is acceptable, go ahead and paste it into GreenFacts. · Katefan0(scribble) 19:03, Apr 28, 2005 (UTC)

  • Hi Katefan0, I just pasted in the dummy, it's still not perfect, but it's at least an improvement on the previous version of the page. For now let's see what Cacycle has to say, and I'll look again at the GreenFacts page at the beginning of next week to see what can be further improved. Thanks a lot for your help so far. --PatVanHove 16:46, 29 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] ok...

...you two at GreenFacts, you've just made a ton of changes, many of which water down the critical information presented as part of my dummy. Wikipedia demands that we assume good faith, but I'm not sure what I'm tom ake of this -- if you were inclined to change things so significantly, why didn't you do it to the dummy article before it was moved, so we could continue to work toward a consensus? I thought you agreed with my version for the most part. Clearly you did not. You should've said so and we then could have worked on the dummy article. As it stands, I am tempted to revert to my dummy. Particularly egregious is removing the sentence on criticism in the first paragraph. Sorry, but it's not adequate to mention the criticism down in the 4th of 5th paragraph. I will be making changes. · Katefan0(scribble) 15:45, May 9, 2005 (UTC)

  • After looking more carefully through your changes, I disagree with most of them, so I have reverted to the dummy. Please discuss your specific issues with the current version here so we can reach a consensus before changing the article. · Katefan0(scribble) 15:51, May 9, 2005 (UTC)

Hi Katefano: Apparently I did not save correctly the entry I made into this talk page yesterday. I had not proposed these changes earlier on the dummy page as the discussion had with Catacycle had completly stalled. I do think the dummy version was a clear improvement from the previous article, yet as mentionned previously it could still benefit from some further improvements.

My changes were mainly structural with some rewording. For instance, I separated the External links that discuss GreenFacts from the links on "Sound Science" that do not address GreenFacts. I think this distinction is important as this is an article on GreenFacts. It also appears to me important to mention what GreenFacts publishes, before criticizing its "publications". If the first paragraph is to remain as it is, possibly an additional sentence could be inserted there with the main objective of GreenFacts, even if this creates some redondancies later on. I reworded the examples of financial supporters as "businesses" because listing "carrefour", a supermarket chain, as an industry did not seem correct.

I made reference to the links that had been made by international bodies to the summaries of the source documents they had issued, such as: http://www.millenniumassessment.org, http://www.chem.unep.ch/mercury/Report/Final%20Assessment%20report.htm, http://europa.eu.int/comm/research/endocrine/background_links_en.html, http://www.who.int/globalchange/publications/masynthesis/en/

I understand that you may not agree with some of the changes, but I hope you will find some of them appropriate and an improvement. StephanieM 08:22, 10 May 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Separate links that discuss GreenFacts from those that discuss Sound Science

I would like to insist once again on the following change: separating the External links that discuss GreenFacts from the links on the concept of "Sound Science" that do not address GreenFacts. I think this distinction is important as this is an article on GreenFacts. StephanieM 8 July 2005 14:57 (UTC)

Katefan0: Actually, I just realised that you have created an article on the concept of sound science which contains the above mentionned and other links specifically on sound science. Since Wikipedia now has its own article on the debate over sound science, I hope you agree that a wiki link to that would suffice. I therefore propose to add a link from the "GreenFacts" article to the "sound science" one and remove the external links not directly related to GreenFacts. StephanieM 14:40, 12 July 2005 (UTC)

[edit] wiki links to GreenFacts

In accordance with the content of this article, I propose to shorten wiki-links from other articles to this one and to drop the reference to "the industry lobbying group" GreenFacts.

The wiki-link to the GreenFacts article gives the readers the opportunity to make up their own mind as it contains information on objectives, funding as well as critism expressed by sourcewatch.StephanieM 15:20, 12 July 2005 (UTC)

Stephanie, thanks. I hadn't realized that sound science itself now has its own wiki article; since folks can click on that for a thumbnail explainer I agree that the sound science links off of the GreenFacts page are no longer needed. Cheers · Katefan0(scribble) 15:33, July 12, 2005 (UTC)

[edit] What links here

Hello,

I'm rather worried by all the links that point towards Greenfacts, or even, to the links that do not point here, but go directly to the Green Facts summaries, and therefore do not warn people of the possible bias which is being given through GF's summaries. What's wikipedia's past way forward in this? One of the problems, is that GreenFacts is a professional organisation which can spend more time and effort altering 'their' articles, than wikipedia volunteers.

And something else, GreenFacts staff above claim that WHO and other organisations have links to GreenFacts summaries. I once worked for an environmental NGO, and we were offered a 1000€ to review a GreenFacts toxins study. We refused as we didnt want to get involved in their web of references. But a less alert organisation might just cash the 1000 € and link back, as on first sight, why not? --145.99.202.92 13:30, 22 April 2006 (UTC)

I'm not sure what you'd prefer. The article already contains criticism of GreenFacts. · Katefan0(scribble)/poll 03:20, 23 April 2006 (UTC)
I'm slowly replacing all "summaries by GreenFacte foundation for non specialists" in "unauthorized summary for...", as the compilers of many summarized reports have nothing to do with GF, allright? --145.99.202.92 10:59, 14 May 2006 (UTC)
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