User talk:Dobuy

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[edit] Sensibilities

Dobuy, please don't get defensive. The material I removed from the article was not information of the type Wikipedia should provide (and I excised only very little from the article anyway). These were commercial sites (i.e. websites whose main use or one of their main uses is selling a product service etc...). Such sites are discouraged on Wikipedia - see amongst other guidelines: Wikipedia:External_links#Links_normally_to_be_avoided. We remove such links from Wikipedia for two main reasons - first to ensure a more neutral article, and second, to prevent articles from getting spammed with links (as soon as we allow one joghurt manufacturer to place a link on the joghurt article, we would have to allow all - my usual example for these cases). See also WP:NOT.

The above certainly applies to Skydive Waiheke, and some would have simply kicked out the mention totally, and maybe simply noted that there was skydiving available there, but I found that a little too much like overkill.

Note that certainly there ARE links to commercial website on Wikipedia. Ignoring those which exist but shouldn't, these fall in two groups - links to a commercial website that provides information important to the article (if we talk about a car type, we would obviously link to the manufacturer where he gives detailed info) and the external link to the company on the article about the company itself.

In total, I feel that my edits were justified, and I hope that you have a better understanding of why now. I apologize for the not explaining it correctly part - my mention re newbies on my user page mostly refers to cases when somebody adds something to an article one is already watchlisting. If you come across an article that you have never seen before, it is often very difficult to find out who added a certain section. Cheers, happy editing, and please don't be put off. Ingolfson 14:57, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

PS - the more generic tourism websites were removed because they are too, commercial websites (correct me if that was a wrong assessment) with the fact that multiple or many different companies and operators advertise their services there not making it neutral - not as long as money is charged for it. That said, such tourism link-lists and directories are a bit of a grey area, and are sometimes accepted. Even then, they should be restricted to, in this case, Waiheke Island article at best, and not on others. Hope that gave a little bit of added explanation. Hope to see you around, editing. Ingolfson 15:04, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

Hi Ingolfson, thanks for the reply, no argument about the skydive phone numbers, my only excuse is that I am a noob. I will try and find some content on tourism on the island that does not have links to advertisements, funnily enough I think I got my original tourism links from the Waiheke Island wiki entry, albeit they are gone now!

I had a look at the Waiheke Island site and I noted that the airfield is down as a 'private' strip, this is perhaps a misrepresentation, as it is privately owned, but is accessible to the public and the only real restriction is that prior permission to land is required, partly because it gets tricky wind conditions and there has been a couple of associated incidents. I would like to re-word the entry to reflect that it is not just a private strip, but not quite sure how. Any thanks again for the reply Dobuy 06:51, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

I think generally, even if links to a certain activity are OK in a specific context, phone numbers are discouraged (maybe because they can be too easily pranked to a wrong number?). As for the aerodrome, it would not matter if it was privately owned - as long as 'anyone' can land there, it has plenty notability to be on here. Just call it 'privately owned' or maybe 'privately operated'? I am not really an expert (even though I have flown aircraft), but I feel that the usual pilot would know that privately owned does not mean its closed to the public. Ingolfson 13:04, 4 August 2007 (UTC)
As for 'finding info that does not have advertisements', remember that if the source is commercial, but provides an important reference, then it is certainly acceptable. Lets for example assume that Waiheke Skydive had a section on their website giving a history of Skydiving on Waiheke (have no clue whether that would exist anywhere, or whether it would contain enough useful and interesting info for an article - but let us assume so for this example) - then the Waiheke Aerodrome article might include some of the main points from that section, and as a reference, link to their website. THAT would be one of the contexts in which such a link would be acceptable. IF however, later on, Auckland University writes a scholarly paper about Skydiving on Waiheke (okay, I am kidding now ;-), then it would be best to replace the first link with one to the university one, because that would be a less commercial source. I hope this slightly confusing what-if gave you a better idea of when and what references and links you can use. Cheers Ingolfson 13:13, 4 August 2007 (UTC)