User talk:George Church

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Welcome!

Hello, George Church, and welcome to Wikipedia! Thank you for your contributions. I hope you like the place and decide to stay. If you are stuck, and looking for help, please come to the Wikipedia Boot Camp, where experienced Wikipedians can answer any queries you have! Or, you can just type {{helpme}} on your user page, and someone will show up shortly to answer your questions.

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I hope you enjoy editing here and being a Wikipedian! Please sign your name on talk pages using four tildes (~~~~); this will automatically produce your name and the date. If you have any questions, check out Wikipedia:Where to ask a question or ask me on my talk page. Again, welcome!  -- Longhair 02:35, 29 January 2006 (UTC)

Contents

[edit] Archon X Prize

You recently changed the entry from "no more than one error in every 10,000 bases sequenced" to "no more than one error in every 100,000 bases sequenced". I have changed it back based on the competition guidelines from the [official website]. Maybe the website is wrong? If so, feel free to credit me and Wikipedia for discovering the error. Clerks 16:06, 3 January 2007 (UTC)


  • They had been informed of that error (ironically in the error rate rule) a couple of times already. Their PDF guidelines have been correct. Another editor (Frankatca) seems to refixed the wiki entry back to 100,000. (By the way, I am on the Archon X-prize SAB). Thanks, --George Church 02:59, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] WP:COI concern

If you have a close connection to some of the people, places or things you have written about on Wikipedia, you may have a conflict of interest. In keeping with Wikipedia's neutral point of view policy, edits where there is a conflict of interest, or where such a conflict might reasonably be inferred from the tone of the edit and the proximity of the editor to the subject, are strongly discouraged. If you have a conflict of interest, you should avoid or exercise great caution when:

  1. editing articles related to you, your organization, or its competitors, as well as projects and products they are involved with,
  2. participating in deletion discussions about articles related to your organization or its competitors,
  3. linking to the Wikipedia article or website of your organization in other articles (see Wikipedia:Spam);
    and you must always:
  4. avoid breaching relevant policies and guidelines, especially neutral point of view, attribution, and autobiography.

For more details, please read the Conflict of Interest guideline. Thank you. RJASE1 Talk 13:16, 11 April 2007 (UTC)

  • That page has been moved to the corresponding User page, which seems to be the more appropriate place for it.George Church 02:41, 13 April 2007 (UTC)
Dr. Church, once again I advise you not to edit your own Wikipedia article, please. RJASE1 Talk 12:34, 13 April 2007 (UTC)
  • Back in Jan 2006 I was inattentive to the nuanced distinction between a User:George_Church page and a main George_Church page and seconds later when I did notice this, I couldn't figure out how to move it to the User page (and still can't). When the COI and "poorly sourced" comments went up recently, I did edit the Talk page, but no one has responded there, and it seemed adding "reliable sources" would be very burdensome for anyone else to provide (for such an obscure, accidental page). In summary, I'd be delighted if someone wants edit this and/or to move this page to my User page. I'm not comfortable with the COI banner, since it implies that it was intentional and/or ongoing and that I'm not trying to fix the apparent COI. (Please also see my notes to EdJohnston below). Thanks, --George Church 21:05, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Please propose any changes at Talk:George Church, don't make them yourself

Hello Professor Church. It is best that you leave editing of the article about you to regular editors. If you have new information to provide, please add it at Talk:George Church and wait for someone else to add it to the article for you.

There is also a question about what to do with your User page. There are a number of notable Wikipedians (editors who also famous enough to have articles about themselves), but it is unusual for such a person to have their User page be the same as their article. Please consider changing your User page, User:George Church, to something more brief. Within reason you can put anything on your own User page. (There is a policy at WP:USER).

  • I'd be happy to improve the User page as time permits after we've cleared up the main page issue. --George Church 21:05, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

For an example of a practical way to handle the situation, take a look at User:Felsenst. This is the user page of of the biologist Joe Felsenstein, who also contributes to a number of Wikipedia articles. Your Wikipedia user page can serve a a brief introduction of who you are, and perhaps mention some of the topics you work on (or intend to work on) on Wikipedia.

If you are agreeable to leave the editing to others, someone will probably come along to remove the Conflict of Interest banner from George Church. EdJohnston 17:18, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

  • I am definitely agreeable to that. I'm doubtful, but hopeful that someone will care enough to check/fix the content and remove the COI banner (please see my comments to RJASE1 above). Sorry for the inconvenience. Thanks, --George Church 21:05, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

The answer for how it would ideally be done is: you would create a 'George Church' article as a sub-page of your User page, then invite an experienced editor to come along and evaluate it for submission as an article. I don't have any major objection to how your current article reads, but our protocol is very averse to people editing their own. Since your article was actually listed at our conflict of interest noticeboard you don't have to worry that no-one is paying attention! Leave a message at either User_talk:RJASE1 or User_talk:EdJohnston if you would like a change made. I will report back to the noticeboard and see if anyone has further comments on your article. EdJohnston 22:47, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

  • I will definitely follow that protocol. It sounds very reasonable and increases my confidence in WP (which was already quite high). I have no changes at present and look forward to any improvements and/or removal of the COI banner. Thanks, --George Church 23:09, 13 April 2007 (UTC)
    • Dr. Church, I'm going to leave a note with someone experienced with this sort of thing to review the article for neutrality so we can remove the COI tag as quickly as possible. I really appreciate your cooperation in this, and also appreciate any sources you care to provide on the article's talk page, because we all would like to have a well-written, well-sourced, neutral article on you. Thanks again! RJASE1 Talk 02:06, 14 April 2007 (UTC)
      • Professor Church, thank you for your prompt and cooperative replies to our volunteers. As the investigating administrator I consider your article to be sufficiently neutral and well sourced and have removed the conflict of interest template. I hope you'll help improve more of our site's coverage of genetics. You may wish to inform your colleagues about a new service our site offers: Wikipedia:WikiProject Classroom coordination provides advice and guidance to professional educators who incorporate Wikipedia writing assignments into their syllabi. Regards, DurovaCharge! 02:30, 14 April 2007 (UTC)
      • Professor Church, I have one final favor to ask - would you mind providing a photo of yourself for your article? If you upload it and let me know the image name, I'll be happy to add it myself. RJASE1 Talk 02:50, 14 April 2007 (UTC)
  • photo. Thanks, George Church 23:19, 14 April 2007 (UTC)
Thanks, sir - I added the image and a basic infobox that can be expanded. Thanks again. RJASE1 Talk 00:32, 15 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] James Sherley

Professor Church,

Thank you for your commitment to keeping the James Sherley article updated and accurate. Chicken Wing 21:50, 19 September 2007 (UTC)