Talk:Heiner Brau
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[edit] How not to be a spammer
Sometimes, people come to Wikipedia with the intention of spamming -- creating articles which are mere advertisements or self-promotion, or spewing external links to a Web site over many articles.
Some people spam Wikipedia without meaning to. That is, they do things which Wikipedians consider to be spamming, without realizing that their actions are not in line with building an encyclopedia. A new editor who owns a business may see that there are articles about other businesses on Wikipedia, and conclude that it would be appropriate to create his own such article. A Web site operator may see many places in Wikipedia where his or her site would be relevant, and quickly add several dozen links to it.
The following guidelines are intended to suggest how not to be a spammer -- that is, how to mention a Web site, product, business, or other resource without appearing to the Wikipedia community that you are trying to abuse Wikipedia for self-promotion.
- Review your intentions. Wikipedia is not a space for personal promotion or the promotion of products, services, Web sites, fandoms, ideologies, or other memes. If you're here to tell readers how great something is, or to get exposure for an idea or product that nobody's heard of yet, you're in the wrong place. Likewise, if you're here to make sure that the famous Wikipedia cites you as the authority on something (and possibly pull up your sagging PageRank) you'll probably be disappointed.
- Contribute cited text, not bare links. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, not a link farm. If you have a source to contribute, first contribute some facts that you learned from that source, then cite the source. Don't simply direct readers to another site for the useful facts; add useful facts to the article, then cite the site where you found them. You're here to improve Wikipedia -- not just to funnel readers off Wikipedia and onto some other site, right? (If not, see #1 above.)
- The References section is for references. A reference directs the reader to a work that the writer(s) referred to while writing the article. The References section of a Wikipedia article isn't just a list of related works; it is specifically the list of works used as sources. Therefore, it can never be correct to add a link or reference to References sections if nobody editing the text of the article has actually referred to it.
- Don't make a new article for your own product or Web site. Most often, when a person creates a new article describing his or her own work, it's because the work is not yet well-known enough to have attracted anyone else's attention, much less verifiable sources. Articles of this sort are usually deleted. Wikipedia does indeed have articles about popular products and Web sites, but it is not acceptable to use Wikipedia to popularize them.
- Don't gratuitously set off our spam radar. There are certain stylistic behaviors that will say "spam!" loud and clear to anyone who's watching:
- Adding a link to the top of an unordered list. This is an A-number-1, red-flag, hot-button spam sign. It suggests that you want people to look at your link FIRST FIRST FIRST! You wouldn't butt in at the head of a queue; don't put your link first.
- Adding a link that's snazzier than any of the others. If there's a list of products that gives just their names, and you add a product with a short blurb about how great it is, we'll all know why you did it. The same applies to adding a list item that is in a larger or otherwise more prominent font than the other items.
- Adding many links to (or mentions of) the same site or product. Going through an article and adding the name of your product to every paragraph where it seems relevant is just going to attract the revert button.
- Adding the same link to many articles. The first person who notices you doing this will go through all your recent contributions with an itchy trigger finger on the revert button. And that's not much fun.
- If your product is truly relevant to an article, others will agree -- try the talk page. We usually recommend that editors be bold in adding directly to articles. But if the above advice makes you concerned that others will regard your contribution as spam, you can find out without taking that risk: Describe your work on the article's talk page, asking other editors if it is relevant.
- Do not add an external link to your signature. However, external links to Wikimedia projects are acceptable. For example, Talk page. Hope this helps.Shoessss 20:03, 7 May 2007 (UTC)
[edit] Why is this spam?
I have no affiliation whatsoever with the brewery in question. I'm simply a beer connesseur who thought this rapidly growing microbrewery merited an article.
Why is is spam?
What is innaccurate?
What reads like advertising?
How would you fix it? Fish Man 20:14, 7 May 2007 (UTC)
- Yeah, I don't see why this is in any way "blatant advertising" and the spam template doesn't make sense here at all. --Haemo 04:16, 8 May 2007 (UTC)
I don't read this as spam. Appears to be objective information on the brand, its origin, and ownership. The Zea link doesn't appear to be relevant though.--Heavy 15:15, 2 August 2007 (UTC)
The relivence is the Heiner Brau brews all the Zea brand beers, and the link to Zea is a reference citing that fact -Fish Man
