Is Conflict of Interest Editing allowed on Wikipedia?
Yes.
Are you breaking guidelines by amending Wikipedia if you have a conflict?
No.
Paid Editing Explained
Paid Wikipedia editing is fast becoming the ideal way for businesses and notable individuals to manage articles about themselves or their organisations. Paid editing has been frowned upon by leading Wikipedians for a number of years.
However Wikipedia as a whole doesn’t seem to agree. The Wikipedia community has had at least 3 polies put forward on whether paid editing should be outlawed on Wikipedia to date, and all 3 were voted against. Instead, Wikipedia have created a list of complex rules, used to manage paid editors and those making paid edits. These rules are advisory and as an ethical company, we always abide by these rules when making live edits on Wikipedia.
We strongly advise that any company considering paid editing uses an ethical paid editing company, such as Wizards of Wiki.
Summary of Wikipedia Paid Editing Rules
Currently the rules on modifying Wikipedia are more advisory than set rules you must follow. The main rules a company or person looking for a paid editor needs to pay attention to is the Conflict of Interest and Neutral Point of View laws.
Conflict on Interest refers to editing a subject the user is connected to (such as an employee or paid editor). Wikipedia rules state sme actions by paid editors are “very strongly discouraged” against making edits on their own work.
Secondly is the Neutral Point of View law. When a user is actively using Wikipedia to promote a subject, it is easy to put a biased article together. By using an experienced paid editor, any neutral point of view problem can be avoided.
Paid Editing Pitfalls
While modifying a Wikipedia page isn’t against the rules, some editors do take exception to it. We’ve known editors have their entire history of work checked over and re-edited, because they have been discovered as a paid editor. This is one of the main drawbacks against using paid editors, especially if they are acting alone (e.g. freelance writers). If they are caught making unethical paid edits, some Wikipedia editors may revisit their previous articles and take a harder view on them. This could happen to articles that have been edited/written a couple of years previously.
As specialists in modifying Wikipedia, we take steps to ensure this will never happen to our clients.