Talk:Carl Freer

Revision

I re-introduced some material about Freer's previous transgressions with law. It had a valid reference to a WIRED article and it has been reverted for no apparent reason by an anonymous user.

I'll reintroduce the text and if it's reverted again it may be an idea to protect this page so it can only be edited by registered users. Gravy 11:16, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

"This article must adhere to the policy on biographies of living persons. Controversial material about living persons that is unsourced or poorly sourced must be removed immediately, especially if potentially libelous. If such material is repeatedly inserted or if there are other concerns relative to this policy, report it on the living persons biographies noticeboard."

So following these stipulated conditions, i'm afraid that the insertion made by Gravy is incorrect as the story about Freer's alleged parent-signature forgery back in 1988 is false, according to a recent publication of the complete C Freer investigation. Apparently there will be alot more publications about the recent vindication of Freer in connection with the Gizmondo story. Furthermore, the reported incident in Germany is factually wrong so in order to avoid any libel, should also therefore not be included. The Wired article was based on hearsay and unconfirmed data. In the spirit of accuracy this should considered.

Having followed the postings and contributions made by the recent "authors", it seems that they are disgruntled former employees / associates of Gizmondo. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Mrblowfeldt (talk • contribs) 05:18, 11 October 2007 (UTC)

First of all can I say I am not a former Gizmondo employee, I just came to this page and was surprised that it currently held little information about Freer's past that any previous authors sourced contributions had been removed by an anonymous poster from the same IP address.

It's hard to take the above seriously, the reason for the removals dependant on a report that no link to has been supplied, no reference to who authored it or for what purpose. It's also hard to take MrBlowFeldt's claims that what I inserted is libelous. This is information from respected publications (WIRED, LA Times) the publication of which have not been met with any action from Freer or other parties for libel.

I'll reinclude the stuff with some clarification that this is what WIRED and the LA Times have alleged. If Mrblowfeldt has more specific information about the "Complete Carl Freer Investigation" exonerating him from any wrong doing then it should be included here. I STRONGLY suspect that this Freer editing his own wikipedia entry. Anyone know how this sort of thing is usually resolved?

Gravy 11:55, 11 October 2007 (UTC)

I am not Carl Freer. I am however privy to information that might not yet be public and i should have included a formal reference. For that i apologize. However, I'm sorry to say that it seems that you have some personal vendetta against Freer judging by how you formulated your reply. Ironically, i am acutely aware of a libel action filed against atleast three different publications in connection with articles published 2005 - 2006. I will include the reference. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Mrblowfeldt (talk • contribs) 17:21, 15 October 2007 (UTC)

Dubious

According to this article, Mr Freer's promised donation of 7 million kroner to Nordens Ark was lost in the collapse of Gizmondo. He did later make a smaller donation, but it does not seem enough to be notable, so I am removing the mention of Nordens Ark from this bio. Now that Mrblowfeldt has removed all the information surrounding Mr Freer's alleged criminal past and his links with known criminal Stefan Eriksson, there doesn't appear to be much left. --Fugu Alienking 01:39, 1 November 2007 (UTC)

Any reason why this was reverted without adding supporting references Mrblowfeldt? Your contributions to this page and others read suspiciously like those of someone constructing a false personal history with which to commit fraud, something Mr Freer has been accused of in the past with claims made concerning VXtreme and the Kings Medical Research Trust. --Fugu Alienking 15:25, 2 November 2007 (UTC)

As referred to in Nordens Ark's annual report of 2005, http://www.nordensark.se the personal donation made by Carl Freer made him the largest ever private donator to the foundation. Freer was furthermore appointed as trustee of Kings Medical Research Trust. http://kingmedicalhistory.googlepages.com/home He did however resign following the slander campaign made against him for the association with Stefan Eriksson, concerned that it might taint the foundation. Tiger Telematics 10K filing of 2005 deals with the VXtreme misunderstanding made by a San Jose journalist. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Mrblowfeldt (talk • contribs) 00:54, 4 November 2007 (UTC)

Hi. I have no opinion on this person. All I'm saying is, if someone asks for a citation, and you can provide one, then do so. Read WP:CITE to learn how to add citations to articles. Do you understand what I am asking for now? If not, feel free to ask for help, either here or on my talk page. --Dreaded Walrus ^{t c} 01:26, 4 November 2007 (UTC)

I removed this line: You CAN'T structure sentences based on "in part" references. Its a joke...its either true or its not.

In November 2007, Mr. Freer provided his recount of the Gizmondo events, in part confirming many of the peculiar details, including going by the false name Eric Jonsson. [4][5][6] (Note: Veckans Affärer's title "Svindlande Affärer" is ambiguous; it means both dizzying business and swindling business.) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Truthmaker1 (talk • contribs) 17:35, 6 December 2007 (UTC)

Rather than removing poorly worded sentences and their accompanying references, please try to improve them. --Fugu Alienking (talk) 13:57, 7 December 2007 (UTC)

To improve them they must be based on truthful accounts not simply place them back into the profile. This point was pulled out of context of the article and refers to an event that was prior to Gizmondo. I have placed it in the "Other Facts" portion and "improved" it to relate to the factual truth.

Additionally, I have removed all references to Stefan Ericcson. They are not revelant to Freer (regardless whether they had a personal relationship or not) and should not appear in this listing. The only other place they should potentially appear is in the Gizmondo listing.

Finally, I removed the Huffington reference. It contains personal contact information to Mr Freer and is not appropriate to be posted here.

Truthwriter1

In addition to the improvements you describe above, you also removed a large amount of referenced material about circumstances surrounding Freer's resignation from Gizmondo. Perhaps this was what you mean by removing all references to Stefan Eriksson, but most of the material related to Freer himself, and the brief mention of Eriksson is appropriate given the business relationship and Eriksson's involvement in the circumstances that led to both mens' resignations. --Fugu Alienking (talk) 23:27, 7 December 2007 (UTC)

Indeed. If people have a reasonable link between them, then there is no reason why they should not be mentioned. So while it would be silly to have extended mention of, say, David Blaine in the article on Tony Blair, there is no reason why the latter article could not go into detail on his relationship with Gordon Brown. Likewise, this article can mention Eriksson, as it appears to be related. Dreaded Walrus ^{t c} 23:46, 7 December 2007 (UTC)

I removed the name of Ericsson from the bio again as the cite does not even include the mention of ericsson by name and it is not reasonable to assume he should be mentioned. As he is not mentioned in the cite, it is not appropriate for him to be included in the bio. This feels like a glorified attempt to link the 2 people together. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Truthmaker1 (talk • contribs) 07:48, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

I moved the cite for the DN article down to the Other News. The reading before was confusing and sounded like Freer resigned because of the article. I haven't seen anything that would prove one item was linked to the other. It is not therefore reasonable to assume the publication of the article led to the resignation.

Additionally, what was the result of the allegations? Fugu can you update the post to include a listing of the charges filed as a result of the investigation? If no charges were filed, you should "improve" your listings to include reference that no charges were ultimately filed. Thanks —Preceding unsigned comment added by Truthmaker1 (talk • contribs) 07:56, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

One last change...I have removed the sentence involving the reporting of a roughly $380M loss for Tiger Telematics. The cite used did not go anywhere. Thanks! —Preceding unsigned comment added by Truthmaker1 (talk • contribs) 08:02, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

I have again removed the copy relating to Stefan Ericcson. It is not applicable to this bio entry. You are reaching here. The fact that the 2 men were involved with the same company is immaterial unless you plan on adding all of the managements names.

I also removed your attempt to tie Freers' resignation to the publication of articles. You have NOT established a revelant premise that defines the reason for putting them there. I could draw the same assumption by saying that Freer resigned after getting a haircut. The 2 events are not revelant to each other. Just as the association of Freers resignation and association with Ericcson or the publication of the articles.

If you have a copy of his resignation letter with a reference to either...produce it and I will accept that, otherwise, stop creating extra work and continually pushing your agenda. Wiki entries should be based on facts, not half-truths...

Truthwriter1 —Preceding unsigned comment added by Truthmaker1 (talk • contribs) 23:41, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

You clearly have an interest here in keeping Eriksson's relationship with Freer hidden from public view. The noteworthiness of the relationship is well documented in the extensive references which you keep removing. --Fugu Alienking (talk) 00:13, 9 December 2007 (UTC)

I don't have as much interest as you apparently have in trying to tie the 2 together. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Truthmaker1 (talk • contribs) 01:37, 9 December 2007 (UTC)

In November 2007, a Swedish newspaper published an interview with Mr. Freer, giving his version of Gizmondo's history and other previously reported events such as an explanation of why he used an alias "Eric Jonsson" while working as a second hand car salesman in the 1990's

I have removed the above comment from the Other Facts section. This is obviously someones idea of a joke...

No, it is what is reported in the reference given, but I'll revert it to the previous wording if you like. --Fugu Alienking (talk) 00:16, 9 December 2007 (UTC)

Fugu, dude you have quite a suspicious nature regarding Freer. You always seem bent on the negative regarding this bio. I've edited out the conjecture in the Other Facts entries. It doesn't matter that 2 journalists didn't see the "proof" that Freer was in the Kings Medical trust. All that matters is the facts. He once was a trustee and now isn't. Simple... --Truthmaker1 —Preceding unsigned comment added by Truthmaker1 (talk • contribs) 15:42, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

Yes, I am suspicious regarding Freer, as most people would be having read the background reports about his past activities. Two independent investigative journalists working for respected publications have come to the conclusion that the claim was false. The current public records show that he certainly is not a trustee now, and the only evidence you have are some PDF files posted on google pages, which could have been constructed by anyone. I don't think this can be presented as fact, but I think it is appropriate to include it if the references to the journalists' counterclaims are left in. --Fugu Alienking (talk) 15:52, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

Well thats your issue to work out. Its not appropriate to include the journalist in the section. Neither offered any solid proof simply conjecture as to his "non-involvement" I do however believe it is fair to say he is not currently involved (provided by your link). Additionally, I have removed the reference to the lawsuit in Wisconsin. first of all, who is to know what Carl Freer that is. Do you have first hand knowledge?? I find it interesting that you included an amount in the suit. I could not find the amount from the link you posted. You must have inside information on Mr Freers' or Mr Mohammeds affairs to be privy to such information. The suit is immaterial to this entry. This is a bio about Mr Freer not a "news" article on him. Are you going to begin to pass judgement on Mr Freer or perhaps you already have? Or are you working for Mr Mohammed?? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Truthmaker1 (talk • contribs) 20:36, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

If it is not appropriate to include the results of investigations by two independent journalists from respected publications, then nor is it appropriate to include self-hosted PDF files. Either both sides of this need to be presented, or neither. Neutrality is not negotiable here. The other option would be to get Kings Medical Research Trust to make a public statement, which would end the dispute. Presumably if Freer was once a trustee there, they would agree to clear his name? --Fugu Alienking (talk) 01:13, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

DN (news of the day) reported allegations that Freer had a 1988 Swedish fraud-related court conviction involving the prominent business bank Skandinaviska Enskilda Banken I did some research and this event springs from a student loan that Freer signed when he was 17 (he was born in 1970). Apparently his father was unavailable to sign the note and denied signing it when the bank called to question it. The matter was settled out of court. Truthmaker1 (talk) 06:27, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

Fair use rationale for Image:Carl Freer.jpg

Image:Carl Freer.jpg is being used on this article. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is no explanation or rationale as to why its use in Wikipedia articles constitutes fair use. In addition to the boilerplate fair use template, you must also write out on the image description page a specific explanation or rationale for why using this image in each article is consistent with fair use.

Please go to the image description page and edit it to include a fair use rationale. Using one of the templates at Wikipedia:Fair use rationale guideline is an easy way to insure that your image is in compliance with Wikipedia policy, but remember that you must complete the template. Do not simply insert a blank template on an image page.

If there is other other fair use media, consider checking that you have specified the fair use rationale on the other images used on this page. Note that any fair use images uploaded after 4 May, 2006, and lacking such an explanation will be deleted one week after they have been uploaded, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. If you have any questions please ask them at the Media copyright questions page. Thank you.BetacommandBot 06:09, 2 June 2007 (UTC)

Slander

The facts about Mr. Freer and Gizmondo are true and indisputable. It is not slander, because slander requires a statements to be untrue. Mr. Freer even admits himself in the realtid.se interview that he has been convicted twice, once in Sweden and once in Germany. The fact that Gizmondo lost $382.5 million is relevant, even though Mr. Freer was not convicted of any crime. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Novelist (talk • contribs) 05:18, 21 November 2007 (UTC)

Repeated Deletions

Extensive deletions by 75.47.237.75, 66.214.86.36, and Mrblowfeldt deletes nearly everything in this article except for Mr. Freers donations, whether they happened or not discussed below. The article, as-is, is factual, and the events are confirmed in the November 2007 interview by Mr. Freer in person, the same articles referred to as true by the deleting trio. These recent articles further provides recent pictures of Mr. Freer in a New York street setting. This article needs protection from editing by non-registered users.

After Mr. Freer was on the first page of Veckans Affärer, with the headline "Swindling business", he is well known in Sweden. It's like being on the front page of the Wall Street Journal, it's just not forgotten easily. There is plenty of fraud-related anecdotes around Mr. Freer but apparently no more than two convictions. I find it amazing how much disclosure was provided by the Swedish police in regards to their futile fraud investigations of Mr. Freer, conveniently absent. However, the most significant accomplishment beyond his family is how he spent $382.5 million of innocent investor's money. Convicted or not, these people lost their money, and that is a fact of public interest.

It is also interesting how MrBlowfelt claims to not be Carl Freer, whose latest venture apparently is called blowfishworks. Felt or Feldt is a not uncommon latter half of a Swedish surname. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Novelist (talk • contribs) 21:22, 21 November 2007 (UTC)

I just noticed that is IS Mrblowfeldt using the most common Swedish spelling. For not being Mr. Freer, he sure has a remarkable insight into Carl Freer's actions 20 years ago —Preceding unsigned comment added by Novelist (talk • contribs) 21:32, 21 November 2007 (UTC)

Speculation about the identities of Wikipedia editors has no place here, or in the edit summaries. However it appears that there are two very different points of view being pushed here, so I have requested that the page be reviewed for NPOV compliance. Hopefully an editor with no prior knowledge of Mr Freer's business dealings can read through the references provided (including those deleted by Mrblowfeldt and 66.214.86.36's most recent edits) and find a balance. Alternatively, they could reconsider my earlier suggestion of speedy deletion of this promotional bio for a non-notable living person. —Fugu Alienking (talk) 12:18, 23 November 2007 (UTC)

I agree that the article is quite POV. However, I feel that the current version is much better than the one that Mrblowfeldt and the IP editors are using (which removes valid references, cited material, categories, e.t.c.).

I also agree that revealing personal information about editors (as in one of User:66.214.86.36's recent edit summaries) is one of the worst offences there is. I'm considering a request for oversight on the matter. I'm also considering a request for comment on the whole thing, as attempts at starting discussion on this talk page with Mrblowfeldt and co are not being met, and reverts are instead taking place without discussion. --Dreaded Walrus ^{t c} 15:28, 23 November 2007 (UTC)

alienking

Where is the proof Alienking.com is tied to Carl Freer??? This should be removed immediately.. 22:13, 29 November 2007 (UTC)

Looks like the reference was updated recently, probably to remove his name. If noone can find a better one, perhaps an admin should delete that (the page seems to be uneditable by us mere mortals) --83.67.23.108 14:29, 30 November 2007 (UTC)

Xero Mobile

I removed this section, because the reference (Xero Mobile's corporate site) does not support a connection, and after checking for better references, I found only rumours and a denial by Freer himself of any involvement. If reference to Xero is added back in, the references should be to a news article or other reference that supports his involvement, and if the reference is not definitive, the uncertainty of this fact should be noted. Also, the catogorization under company names makes this bio look like a resume, more so when the blowfish works section consisted of a single sentence. In my opinion, Carl Freer is noteworthy only for the rise and fall of Gizmondo, anything else belongs under the Other Facts section, but that of course is open to debate here. --Fugu Alienking (talk) 12:11, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

I added the reference. Thanks for pointing that out. - Truthmaker1 —Preceding unsigned comment added by Truthmaker1 (talk • contribs) 15:34, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

Fugs.....hey, you just can't remove things because you don't like what they say. And I don't appreciate you removing my cites as well. The Newsweek article is appropriate for this bio since it highlights Freer. I have an original scan of the complete article that I can email to you if you like. Also, enough with the Xero Mobile removals. Freer founded and was involved with the company. So stop removing all the source material from it. I can provide at least another half dozen cites on this topic. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Truthmaker1 (talk • contribs) 18:41, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

I removed the section on Xero Mobile, not because I don't like what it says, but because the reference given to support Freer's involvement states only that there are rumors about him being involved in fundraising, but Freer himself denies any involvement with the company. The reference clearly does not support the inclusion of this section. If you have other references, then why don't you use them instead??! The other material was removed because it related to Gizmondo, not Freer. I see you have reworded them now to link them in to Freer, which is good. There is another point which you keep changing back, which is the word "claims" in reference to Freer's claim to have been exhonorated from any wrongdoing in the downfall of Gizmondo. The reference is to an interview with Freer, and there do not appear to be any other references to support this, therefore the word claims is appropriate and necessary here. It appears out of context now anyway, since you have removed all the facts about suspect business dealings and nepotism that were previously documented there, so I am inclined to remove the claim entirely. --Fugu Alienking (talk) 09:49, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

Exhonoration

As the only reference to his exhonoration is an interview with Freer himself, please refrain from removing the wording "Freer claims" from this claim. If you know of a published reference that is not from Freer himself, then please provide it when removing the word "claims". --Fugu Alienking (talk) 21:57, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

False claims

Warning to fellow editors: A number of dubious claims regarding Freer's history have appeared in Tiger Telematics SEC filings and in newspaper and magazine articles about Carl Freer in the past. Many of them (both positive and negative) have made it into this article where they were subsequently disputed and removed. Please take extra care when checking references, and if there are conflicting reports where one cannot be judged as more authoritative than the other, it is probably best left out of this article. I have just removed the claim about Freer winning Swedish Entrepreneur of the Year in 1997, which originated in a Moneyweek article about him. The 1997 Swedish winner of the well known award is listed on Ernst and Young's website as Claes-Göran Österlund of Hotell Ekoxen. --Fugu Alienking (talk) 17:34, 18 March 2008 (UTC)

ATTN: Carl Freer commited no wrongdoing while working at TGTL —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.54.163.168 (talk) 14:32, 3 May 2008 (UTC)

New info

I am submitting several new updates to this profile as much new information has been published on Freer. I have included valid references for each of the new entries. There are many more to come. -Truthmaker —Preceding unsigned comment added by Truthmaker1 (talk • contribs) 17:22, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

You can't remove copy I've submitted simply because you don't like what it says..Truthmaker1 —Preceding comment was added at 11:03, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

It is you who is removing copy, which a number of editors now have restored to the page after checking that the references are reliable, and that the article text matches the facts laid out in the references. In one edit summary, you mentioned that the authors of the references had "been indicted", and I asked you to discuss that here with references to the indictment, so that other editors have a chance to review your reasoning and decide whether you have a valid point. Until then, it is the word of a single pseudonymous wikipedia editor against two journalists from a respected UK newspaper. The fact that you have not taken up that offer, and continue to blank certain parts of the article without proper explanation, makes your edits look like vandalism. --Fugu Alienking (talk) 15:40, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

I have reverted the content again and will continue to do so. The authors of the article you are citing are under indictment for perjury and slander. There is NO basis to the reference other than the article. If Freer was arrested, produce a link to the arrest record, otherwise DROP it... Truthmaker1 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Further references have been provided, authored by different journalists, some predating that story so certainly not basing their claims on the work of those two journalists. Note that none of these stories contains a retraction notice, as would be expected if your allegations about the journalists were true. --Fugu Alienking (talk) 22:21, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Where are the "other" journalists?? In prison as well?? We know you are biased AGAINST Freer, so your opinion is pointless. Regardless of the facts, you will ALWAYS believe Freer is a villain (as you have said before). I will NOT allow the integrity of this entry be compromised because you have a personal axe to grind regarding Freer. Truthmaker1 (talk) 14:00, 6 June 2008 (UTC)Truthmaker1

Wider discussion

Is multiply sourced content about Carl Freer's alias and past crimes appropriate for this biography? See the talk above and AfD discussion for previous discussion. Also see recent page history (early June 2008) for content in question.

• RFC response. I've carefully read this talk page as well as the English-language articles on the article page. I think the second paragraph belongs in the article but in a somewhat modified format and not in the lead. The problem with these two sentences is that two of the citations are in Swedish, so there is little or no way for English-speaking Wikipedians to assess the reliability or verifiability of the source. The Sunday Times appears to be a good quality, broad-sheet (as opposed to tabloid) newspaper so is a good source and it does mention the incident(s) raised in these sentences. However, my objection to these sentences, especially the second, is it seems a bit misleading in that Freer gave a response that he thought the checks were stolen (why was only one portion of the article referenced and not this?). Also, for exceptional claims you really need a couple of high quality sources that say the same thing. I did a Google news search and could only come up with recent articles that did not mention these incidents. (As an aside, regarding other sources, The Register is of questionable journalistic quality given its reputation as a satirical paper. The Atlanta Business Chronicle appears to be a good quality paper.)

So, first, I suggest labeling a section called "Controversies" and placing the second paragraph there. Second, I suggest rewriting this section to include the mentioned past misdeeds (i.e., only those where convictions were reported; not those where there were just allegations or hearsay) and only if additional quality sources can be found to support the statements. Third, the rest of the article also needs additional quality sources (not on-line satirical papers, tabloids).

I will try a Lexis Nexis search to see if I can come up with anything as well. Renee (talk) 16:03, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

Thanks, good suggestions. It used to be in a separate section, but during AfD discussion the article was heavily edited and everything ended up in one section, with the Gizmondo and Media Power sections being broken out again since. I've labelled the new section 'Legal Problems' to avoid confusion of the meaning of "controversies" leading to material inappropriate for a BLP being added to the new section, or allegations that the whole section is inappropriate based merely on the section title. I've also merged the other two short sections into one dealing with 'Business Activities'. If more material is added, it can always be split again, but the sections seemed too short on their own. --Fugu Alienking (talk) 16:44, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

Fugu Alienking is NOT an objective source for this article. See post on the Truthmaker1 discussion page from Fugu_alienking: He says "I villanize him because he is a villain. I don't like to see a valuable resource such as Wikipedia used to fabricate a squeaky clean resume-like profile in order to convince more investors to give their money to this fraudster. " This is HARDLY the discussion from an objective source. Truthmaker1 (talk) 00:51, 8 June 2008 (UTC)Truthmaker1

I wasn't using Fugu as a source; I was using The Sunday Times as a source. Also, I think the LA Times is a good source. I don't think you can get away from certain facts about Freer and moving them away from the lead and using good sources is about as good as you can do given they're published in reliable, verifiable sources. I wouldn't object to you inserting Freer's side of the story as I mentioned above (i.e., that he thought his checks were stolen) in the controversy section. I do think the Swedish language newspapers are a problem and should be deleted. I ran a Google news search on the name Carl Freer and there were loads of references.

Instead of deleting the controversies section (and you have to admit, there have been some), why don't you add some sections for balance like "History" and other things you think might make him notable? Renee (talk) 01:04, 8 June 2008 (UTC)

First of all you cant use Swedish sources. No one can understand whats in them. Second of all, the liquiadtors report is out and cleared Freer of ALL the charges, hence the LA times article has been proven inaccurate and you can not use that. I am trying to install the truth here and you cannot continue to ignore it. Truthmaker1 (talk) 16:14, 8 June 2008 (UTC)Truthmaker1

I'm not quite sure I understand what you're saying? Are you saying that Freer was cleared of the the teen fraud conviction and for the 2005 German conviction? (these are what The Sunday Times and The Los Angeles Times sources are being used for, nothing else) Here is the direct quotation from The Sunday Times (for example):

While still in his teens, Freer was convicted of fraud after forging his parents’ signature to get a loan.And a German court last year fined him €200,000 (£135,000) for writing bouncing cheques while working as a car dealer in the 1990s — a time when he sometimes used a second name, Erik Jonsson. Freer claims he cancelled a cheque after he thought he was being sold stolen cars."

• Can you please provide recent sources that say these two events did not occur?

You can't prove something didn't happen..you assertion here is absurd. Your source here is corrupt hence it should not be included.—Preceding unsigned comment added by Truthmaker1 (talk • contribs) 06:18, 10 June 2008

In the meantime, I've rewritten the lines slightly to include both accusations and the defense for NPOV. I agree the Swedish sources should go.

Friendly suggestion -> there is so much more unsavory things written about Freer in these two sources that I would suggest just letting it go; these things happened long ago and I think most people reading this article will see that. Renee (talk) 18:22, 8 June 2008 (UTC)

I can appreciate the attempt but in the end the content is just wrong to include...if you follow through on your threat and post more "unsavory" things, I will double my effort (and recruit more like me). This is about maintaining the integrity of Wiki by not allowing others to use this entry for their own personal agendas. Truthmaker1 (talk) 06:16, 10 June 2008 (UTC)Truthmaker1

Perhaps you need to step back and appreciate the attempt a little more. There are at least four journalists from respected English language broadsheets reporting these convictions, and one previously cited in Swedish (I'm sure if you look there are more, as the story of Gizmondo's demise was covered by a number of Swedish publications). These stories have slightly different facts in them, so they are not just copies of each other. And there have been no retractions from the publications involved. Your claim that the two journalists from the Sunday Times are under indictment would not seem to be relevant, even if it is true, as there are multiple independent sources saying the same thing. --Fugu Alienking (talk) 08:06, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

Truthmaker, do you have any reliable sources that A) say that these two journalists are under indictment, and B) say that the claims made by the other publications are incorrect? For the second one there, an actual retraction by any of the publications involved would be doubly useful. On Wikipedia we go by verifiability. If something cannot be verified by reliable sources, then it should not be included.

As it stands, your scope of edits means your account comes dangerously close to being a single-purpose account. In addition, you are edit warring to a version of the article that at least four editors disagree with to one extent or another, despite already having been blocked for edit warring, with your block running out just three days ago (with your first mainspace edit after the block being yet another revert on this page). And now you say, that seeing as the numbers are stacked against you, in order to balance out the numbers you will engage in meatpuppetry? Dreaded Walrus ^{t c} 08:44, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

We are being asked to weigh up a credibly sourced report of a conviction, against the word of one editor that they are under indictment, and further that this indictment affects the reliability of the reporting of the conviction. It is clear to me that we have no good faith basis to doubt the sources given. Truthmaker, to be blunt, needs to put up or shut up. Either show evidence to give us reason to doubt the reports, or accept that the article is verified reliably. Kevin (talk) 05:33, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

BLP noticeboard

I've posted questions about the "legal problems" section on the BLP noticeboard here. It's my understanding that if statements are well-sourced then they are not BLP violations, but lets let the experts give their feedback. IMO, the section does not violate BLP as no sources have been provided to say that the conviction and fine have been rescinded and the sources are excellent. Renee (talk) 17:32, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

Yep. I too welcome the widest possible input on this issue. I'll leave a message on the noticeboard referring specifically to the talk page section above this one, so that people responding can get further information. Dreaded Walrus ^{t c} 17:36, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

Potential sockpuppets

With regards to Media Power, Mikael Ljungman, and Carl Freer, please note that User:Riverside blue, User:Truthmaker1, and User:Needlepinch appear to be either the same editor, or working in concert. Additionally, all three are single-purpose accounts as they have only contributed to these articles. --Ckatz^chat_spy 17:23, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

Another addition to this list of single-purpose accounts for whitewashing Carl Freer - User:Pichku has made a number of edits, removing approximately half the article in the process, and changing a few minor details to put a certain false spin on his background. These SPAs seem to pop up whenever Carl Freer moves on to his next round of funding, so I look forward to seeing what scheme he has cooked up next. —Fugu Alienking (contribs) 15:11, 1 August 2017 (UTC)

Is Freer not British/Swedish, he has two passports as far as I know. Why is he listed as Swedish then? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Bjorn I. Clever (talk • contribs) 03:53, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

Business problems?

The websites for several of Freer's various enterprises have been offline for the past few days, for example Media Power and Blowfishworks. Do we know the reason? Have these enterprises met the fate of Gizmondo Europe? Huon (talk) 12:34, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

RICO

I've reworked the entry for the RICO finding to make it more appropriate. I have also removed the aliases. There is no proof Freer ever used those aliases. If there is a criminal docket with use of them, then they can be added. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Bearsfanman (talk • contribs) 15:07, 28 August 2010 (UTC)

The aliases were sourced to newspaper articles, which count as reliable sources. Concerning RICO, the court didn't dismiss all of the charges with prejudice, and it definitely didn't state that they shouldn't have been filed in the first place. I've clarified the reason for dismissal. Huon (talk) 15:22, 28 August 2010 (UTC)

Huon you are inaccurate with your definition as well. I reviewed the order and it accurately reflects the judgment now after Truthmaker edits this morning (apparently). I also saw the deletions on aliases. I agree the information on those aliases are non-material to the bio. The information about them is from secondary knowledge. --Bearsfanman (talk) 18:22, 29 August 2010 (UTC)

Secondary sources are precisely what Wikipedia is supposed to cite. These aliases and the corresponding court cases have been noted by newspapers covering Freer, thus they are material to his biography.

I also find the rewritten RICO coverage non-convincing. On p. 5 pf the Civil Minutes, under "Motion to Dismiss the RICO Claims", the judge says that "the promissory notes Warnock and Davies recieved pursuant to the series of loans they made to Gizmondo are arguably securities", and concerning GetFugu on p. 8:"Plaintiffs allege that Freer and his associates orchestrated the false and inflated valuation of certain intellectual property assets to induce further investment in the company, conduct that is clearly actionable as securities fraud." And this is "accurately reflected" as "the loans the plaintiffs were allegedly "fraudulently induced to make" don't even meet the standards of a security"? That seems quite the opposite of what the judge said. Even worse, if I understand the ruling correctly, the reason why the claims were dismissed is that they were premised upon actionable securities fraud, which fails the so-called PSLRA bar for a RICO claim. Truthmaker1 is either misreading or misrepresenting the entire reason for dismissal.

I also found no basis at all for this sentence: "Additionally, the court found that the plaintiffs are not entitled to bring a securities fraud claim against the parties only SEC can enforce." Where precisely did the court say so? The most similar part of the ruling I found is on p. 8 where the judge says: "However, even if Plaintiffs themselves cannot bring a claim for securities fraud, no RICO action may rest on these predicate acts." If I read that correctly, the judge is saying that the PSLRA bar keeps the plaintiffs from succeeding with a RICO claim if they allege securities fraud, even if they can't bring claims for securities fraud themselves. He doesn't say at all whether they can or can't bring such claims, and the above quote about "conduct that is clearly actionable" suggests to me that they can (and, in the judge's opinion, should have). Thus, I find my own version much closer to the judge's ruling than either yours or Truthmaker1's. Huon (talk) 19:23, 29 August 2010 (UTC)

Huon, you can't just undo changes because you disagree with the findings. The court dismissed the 4 main charges with predijuce, dismissed the state charges without predijuce and left them no room to amend. If you continue to edit this outside of the order, I will complain to an editor and have you locked off the page. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Bearsfanman (talk • contribs) 20:17, 29 August 2010 (UTC)

Could you please explain your reasoning? I quoted the judge's ruling - it explicitly states that the alleged conduct would be securities fraud and that that was the reason for dismissal. How did I misinterpret that? I also asked where the Judge said that the claimants were not entitled to bring a securities fraud claim - could you please answer that specific question instead of just reverting? And while I'm asking for explanations, why did you again remove content supported by reliable sources? Huon (talk) 20:49, 29 August 2010 (UTC)

Sure...there is more to the judgment than 1 line. The reasoning behind the motion and explanation in the judgment is very clear. The precedents used illustrate the depth of the motion. Simply quoting 1 sentence is like using a single line to describe how a car is built. Its impossible and no matter how carefully constructed could never be descriptive enough to tell the whole story. Its like the line that you omitted from this morning. The one that contains Media Power, Tiger Telematics etc. The release of those entities supports the judges findings. Am sure you can see that as well. --Bearsfanman (talk) 23:39, 29 August 2010 (UTC)

No, I can't see that. The Freer article currently doesn't mention Freer's connection to Tiger Telematics. Do you believe we should expand our coverage of that failed company and Freer's connection to it? This article isn't just about the RICO lawsuit, and covering it in one sentence seems adequate. We don't cover Freer's conviction of fraud for forging a cheque in greater detail.

Anyway, you still didn't explain why the judge found that the loans "don't even meet the standards of a security" when he actually said that "the promissory notes [plaintiffs] recieved pursuant to the series of loans [...] are arguably securities", you also didn't explain where the judge said that the claimants were not entitled to bring a securities fraud claim, and you didn't explain your removal of sourced content. I don't mind mentioning that Media Power was also part of the RICO suit, but I'll revert the rest of your changes, and I'd ask for some actual explanation instead of empty phrases. For example, if the judge really said what you claim he said, could you please provide the page number and quote the relevant sentences? And concerning the unexplained removal of sourced content, that is usually called vandalism. Huon (talk) 01:28, 30 August 2010 (UTC)

While I appreciate the effort, the judgment is related to Freer in more than 1 way. The suit covered his personal dealings, involvement in Tiger Telematics, Media Power and GetFugu. It is a major judgment from a US Federal judge (not a minor offense like the questionable signature issue, which his father and mother denies ever happened. You are using this article to settle a personal score with Freer which is highly inappropriate. --Truthmaker1 (talk) 04:03, 30 August 2010 (UTC)

Sorry, that's not a compromise. You removed one sentence that wasn't supported by the source, but reinstated other highly dubious content such as "loans don't even meet the standards of a security" - where does the judge say so? You didn't even bother to correct the awful grammar and fractured sentences, but mangled them even more. And once again you removed sourced content without any explanation. You may consider Freer's past frauds "minor offences" - apparently The Times and the LA Times disagree. Huon (talk) 04:22, 30 August 2010 (UTC)

Pls re-read the judgement. Even the sentence included is covered in the judgement.. --Truthmaker1 (talk) 18:56, 30 August 2010 (UTC)

Could you be a little more specific? I just searched the judgment, and it doesn't contain the phrase "don't even meet" or the word "standards". I provided specific quotations where the Judge explicitly said that the alleged conduct was actionable as securities fraud - see for example the first sentence of the last paragraph on p. 5. The judge doesn't discuss whether the loans themselves are securities (which they probably are not), but he gives various other examples of securities involved, for example the last sentence of p. 7: "Therefore, by their own allegations, there is a direct connection between the fraudulent inducement of Plaintiffs’ loans and a securities transaction." And that's actually good for Freer, because that connection was the reason for dismissal.

And I begin to sound like a broken record, but you still didn't explain the blanket removal of sourced content. Huon (talk) 19:15, 30 August 2010 (UTC)

Since no explanation was forthcoming, I've once again re-added the sourced content and rewritten the RICO part. I hope now it's a little clearer that the judge dismissed the suit because securities fraud is exempt from being part of a RICO action. I've kept the countersuit, but shortened our coverage because that countersuit is hardly central to Freer; he's not even a party himself. I've also removed the Marketwatch source; press releases are not reliable sources. Huon (talk) 00:50, 31 August 2010 (UTC)

Huon, as I have said multiple times, you cannot simply remove content because you are a freer hater. The judgement supports the statements I (and others) have written. Please take your personal feelings elsewhere. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Bearsfanman (talk • contribs) 03:39, 31 August 2010 (UTC)

You keep saying the judgment supports those statements without providing details. Where does the judge say that the loans "don't even meet the standards of a security"? He simply doesn't say so, and your insistence on this point without providing an explicit quote supporting your position (which, of course, you cannot provide because it's not in the judgment) is outright bizarre.

Your unexplained removal of sourced content also is not acceptable. I told you that's considered vandalism, yet you persist.

Finally truthmaker1's newest paragraph on the countersuit suffers several significant defects. Firstly, it's simply badly written and capitalizes far too many words. That's because it's a simple copy&paste job of the abstract of the Marketwire press release, which makes it both based on an unreliable source and a copyright violation. Secondly, when GetFugu sues someone, that's not all that important for our coverage of Freer unless he's a party in the lawsuit (which, to my understanding, he isn't).

Above you threatened to get complain to "an editor". I agree that outside editors looking at our disagreement could help and will try to summon some wider community attention. Huon (talk) 08:12, 31 August 2010 (UTC)

Check the ruling Page 5 &6. The judge is quite clear. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Truthmaker1 (talk • contribs) 21:52, 31 August 2010 (UTC)

Yes, he is. Unfortunately, he doesn't say what you claim he says.

• "In 2006, the Supreme Court reaffirmed that “it is enough that the fraud alleged ‘coincide’ with a securities transaction [...]"
• "[...] even if the purchase or sale of securities was but one component in a larger fraudulent scheme, the scheme was still actionable as securities fraud."
• "Since the fraudulent scheme involved inducing the plaintiffs to invest in a common fund used by Ponzi scheme mastermind Bernie Madoff to purchase securities, the integrated fraudulent scheme constituted actionable, indivisible securities fraud, which could not support a RICO claim under Section 1964(c)."
• "the court found the § 1964(c) exception applicable where the plaintiffs had alleged stock manipulation" (As explained at the top of p. 3, the § 1964(c) exception states that actionable securities fraud cannot be pursued under the RICO act.)

All this recapitulates how conduct actionable as securities fraud cannot be used to bring a RICO claim, including various precedents where RICO claims failed because the alleged conduct was related to securities fraud. The judge continues with this specific RICO claim in section III:

• "The RICO claims in the FAC rely in large part upon alleged conduct that would be actionable as securities fraud, thereby triggering the PSLRA bar. With respect to Claims 1 and 2, the promissory notes Warnock and Davies received pursuant to the series of loans they made to Gizmondo are arguably securities." Here the judge explicitly says that the conduct plaintiffs alleged would be actionable as securities fraud, quite the opposite from what you wrote in the article.
• "[...] we need not ultimately decide whether the notes given to Plaintiffs fall within the nine-month maturity exception, because the fraudulent acts allegedly perpetrated by the Tiger/Gizmondo enterprise were “in connection with the purchase or sale of any security” under Section 10(b)." Here the judge say that he doesn't even have to decide whether the notes are securities (though he argues above that they may well be) because by section 10(b) (and the Supreme Court case cited at the very end of p. 4) the connection with the purchase or sale of any security (other than the notes) is sufficient to make the conduct actionable as securities fraud.

The judge goes on to explain the broad scope of conduct actionable as securities fraud. At the end of p. 6, he rehashes the conduct plaintiffs alleged, in preparation for explaining (on p. 7) how this conduct would be actionable as securities fraud per the precedents he gave on p. 5.

Either I completely misunderstand what you mean when you say that the loans "don't even meet the standards of a security", or it's simply not in p. 5 and p. 6.

And once again you removed content based on reliable sources, re-added an unreliable source, reintroduced bad grammar and a copyright violation, all without explanation. I'm not amused. The part I'm especially little amused by is the re-addition of this gem of a sentence: "Defendants Made Fake Internet Postings With False Claims of Racketeering, FBI and SEC Investigations." Until there's a judgement, that could well be libel. You were so concerned about Wikipedia "slandering" Freer - libeling his opponents is OK? Huon (talk) 22:38, 31 August 2010 (UTC)

First, the securities issue is addressed on those pages.

Second, this is included as a lawsuit not a pronouncement. It is no different than the RICO post living on this profile as a total and complete lie. If I follow your logic, those who posted that gem should also be prosecuted.

Third, there is no copyright violation. Pls explain why you are making this allegation. --Truthmaker1 (talk) 01:25, 1 September 2010 (UTC)

First, yes it is, but not in the way you claim. The judge says that if plaintiffs' allegations are true, Freer's conduct is actionable as securities fraud and thus cannot be used for a RICO claim. He simply doesn't say that anything "doesn't even meet the standards of a security". The closest he comes to that is where he says that even if the promissory notes were not securities (which they arguably are), the alleged conduct would still be actionable as securities fraud.

Second, I'm not sure what you mean by "this", but the RICO suit was reported as precisely that - we reported that Freer and his companies were sued, which certainly was no lie. We didn't claim that plaintiffs' allegations were true. Compare the Courtroom News article - practically every sentence contains a caveat like "allegendly", "according to the complaint", or "Freer says". In contrast, the sentence I quoted above contains no such caveats and basically claims that Freer's countersuit is true. If it is ruled to be so, we'll be able to report that - but right now we cannot.

Third, there's a copyright violation because our last few sentences are an almost word-for-word copy of part of the Marketwire press release, including such details as the capitalization (which is utterly wrong for normal english sentences).

Now on to the questions you haven't adressed:

• The Marketwire press release is not a reliable source and should not be used, especially when a more reliable source is available.
• You removed vast swathes of content sourced to reliable secondary sources, such as The Times or the LA Times. You never gave an explanation for any of those edits, which amount to vandalism. This removal comes much closer to crippling the article than our disagreement over securities fraud. Huon (talk) 09:22, 1 September 2010 (UTC)

Rather than choose one version over the other, I have decided to remove this paragraph from the article for lack of notability, based on the lack of secondary sources, and the fact that the case came to nothing. --Fugu Alienking (talk) 15:15, 5 September 2010 (UTC)

RfC

There's currently a slow-moving revert war going on involving the interpretation of a recent court ruling regarding Freer (unfortunately written in legalese) and whether Freer's past convictions for petty fraud, which were mentioned to The Times and the LA Times, should be mentioned in the article. Huon (talk) 08:26, 31 August 2010 (UTC)

The differences between the preferred versions can be seen in this diff. Huon (talk) 08:55, 31 August 2010 (UTC)

Liquidation not Bankruptcy

Article said "The company went bankrupt in February 2006". That statement is wrong as per http://en.wiki.x.io/wiki/Insolvency_Act_1986. As you can see, only individuals go Bankrupt under The Insolvency Act 1986. Companies go into Liquidation in the UK, and Gizmondo Europe Ltd was a UK Incorporation. Setomorp (talk) 04:46, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

While this is true, I don't see any logic behind your removal of all the Gizmondo references from this page. Freer was Managing Director of Gizmondo (later renamed to Gizmondo Europe when the head office shifted to LA, along with all the company assets, shortly before liquidation) as well as Chairman of the board of its parent company Tiger Telematics. Since Gizmondo was by far the more noteworthy of the two companies, it does not make sense to remove references to it in favour of the lesser known parent company. -- Fugu Alienking (talk) 15:36, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

Caution WP:BLP

Please exercise caution when linking the actions of individuals to negative business performance. If you are going to name individuals as having responsibility for the loss of of substantial amounts of money, and the demise of a company, then your sources need to be impeccable. Naming some individuals, and not others as responsible for negative performance does not seem correct to me. IMHO all or none and be certain that there is a link between the individual and the outcome before your imply one. I don't know anything about the subject of the article however it appears to me that some POV has entered the article. Flat Out let's discuss it 03:29, 20 August 2013 (UTC)

Are you referring to a recent edit, or something old? Here's the net effect of all of the edits this month, and none of them add to that. Jackmcbarn (talk) 04:04, 20 August 2013 (UTC)

I'm referring to the article as it reads now. The article should accurately summarise what is written on the subject by reliable sources. I am not saying that the article is in breach of WP:BLP but to be cautious. Furthermore, there have been a number of edits and reverts of late which might indicate an absence of consensus among editors. Flat Out let's discuss it 04:22, 20 August 2013 (UTC)

Mentioning Freer as a director, liquidation vs. bankruptcy, amount of money lost

I've transferred the below discussion here from my talk page. Jackmcbarn (talk) 12:24, 21 August 2013 (UTC)

Dear Jackmcbarn,

Thank you for your communication to me regarding the recent edit to Carl Freer. You have suggested that I have been less than neutral I therefore take this opportunity to say why you are mistaken in this matter.

Back in 2004/5 I actually knew Carl Freer quite well, I was not a business associate I was an employee. I was thinking of reaching out to Mr. Freer so went to Wikipedia to find out what he was currently up to. I was more than surprised to see the lack of balance and bias on the page. The corrections I have done are completely factual, let me take them in order:

1. Gizmondo Europe Limited could not be declared bankrupt as the insolvency of a company in the United Kingdom is governed an Act of Parliament called the Insolvency Act 1986. It defines the steps an insolvent company can take, it also defines the steps an individual can take when they find themselves in an insolvent position. In the UK under the Insolvency Act 1986 Individuals go bankrupt and companies go into liquidation. Therefore for this page to state it went into bankruptcy is wrong.

2. The compulsory liquidation of Gizmondo Europe Limited was declared in the High Courts in London on 2nd February 2006. This is a factual statement which can be sourced from the London Gazette, a publication that covers the insolvency sector in the UK, it can be sourced directly from the High Courts or alternatively from the joint Liquidators who were appointed to oversee the liquidation and they are Begbies Traynor and David Reubens.

3. The edit on Freer and Ericksson, Gizmondo lost hundreds of millions of dollars. This statement is clearly biased as it was added some time ago. Freer and Ericksson had resigned from Gizmondo Europe and Tiger Telematic in October 2004. If it was to be an accurate statement maybe it should read 'under the Board' or 'under the Directors'. This as it stands is an attempt to smear and therefore biased. Whoever put that statement there is suggesting to the reader that Freer and Ericksson created these losses and that is why it should be replaced.

In addition to the points you have raised there are a number of other matters that I would like to raise with you in the hope that you can either advise or provide guidance as I would like to now edit a number of points on the page.

The Wiki pages are broken down into 4 parts, especially on a living biography, there is the named person, the business activities, legal problems and references. I get no sense of the individual Carl Freer. It doesn't tell me if he is married, has children, enjoys hobbies. It has been edited in such a way that he is denounced as a fraudster on the second line. Even for accuracy's sake shouldn't that be under 'legal problems'?

As for his business partner, why are they not all named? Tiger and Gizmondo had a great many Directors but they are not named as his partners, only one is named and that would seem to be biased as there is an overt attempt to build links only with Stefan Ericksson.

Your opinion and viewpoint would be most welcomed and I am happy to dialogue with you on this matter. I also plan to contact Mr. Freer to ask him for his point of view on this matter.

Whatever the wrongs or rights of Mr. Freer I am by no means an apologist for him and I always believe that I have adopted a neutral position supported by facts. Hopefully my comments above assisted you with your understanding of my thinking and editing and you will put the edits back on the page.

Could I kindly request that you review the edits up until last year as it seems to me there is an attempt by some contributors to build the worst possible picture of Mr. Freer and could I ask when those edits were being done did you make your views known to them?

Regards, Onlinefactcheck (talk) 08:20, 15 August 2013 (UTC)

Dear Jackmcbarn,

I can see from your page that you are busy with other edits. I have left you a message on your talk page explaining my thoughts and the facts to support my edits. I am confident that you will agree with me that they are balanced and not biased. I have put the edits back up as I feel I have answered your concerns. I would be most grateful for your commentary on the other matters I raised.

Regards, Onlinefactcheck (talk) 08:16, 16 August 2013 (UTC)

I've made what I think is a compromise. Let me know what you think. Jackmcbarn (talk) 03:02, 20 August 2013 (UTC)

Sorry I don't think you have compromised. How this sentence reads now is incorrect and seems to focus only on one or two of the Directors, who both resigned in October 2005 before the company went into liquidation in Feb 2006. I feel the sentence should read: Under the control of the Directors, Gizmondo lost tens of millions of pounds before going into compulsory liquidation in February 2006.Onlinefactcheck (talk) 10:28, 20 August 2013 (UTC)

If they weren't the directors, then give the names of who the directors were, and cite a source confirming it. Jackmcbarn (talk) 12:15, 20 August 2013 (UTC)

Open the link below and you will see all the company Directors of Gizmondo Europe Ltd. http://companycheck.co.uk/company/04620348/GIZMONDO-EUROPE-LIMITED/directors-shareholders#peopleOnlinefactcheck (talk) 15:26, 20 August 2013 (UTC)

I've discovered the source of the confusion. The passage is talking about the company before Freer resigned, so it correctly says "Under Freer and Eriksson." Originally, sentences were in the wrong order and it looked like it took place after Freer's resignation. It should be clearer now. Jackmcbarn (talk) 02:58, 21 August 2013 (UTC)

Sorry I have to disagree with you. I will go over the passage to clarify.. "Under Freer and Eriksson" should read "Under the control of the Directors." In 2004 there were a total of 5 Directors so singling out only two of them is incorrect. "Gizmondo lost hundreds of millions of dollars: in 2004" As you know, Gizmondo was a UK registered company, so all of its accounts are in British pounds and not US dollars. Gizmondo did not lose hundreds of million of dollars or pounds in 2004, it reports that in the year ending December 2004 Gizmondo lost £49 million pounds, so should read "Gizmondo lost tens of millions of pounds in 2004" I hope this clarifies everything for you.Onlinefactcheck (talk) 09:16, 21 August 2013 (UTC)

In an article about Gizmondo, you'd be right that "the Directors" would be more appropriate. The article is about Freer, though, so specifically mentioning him and a person who reported directly to him, rather than generically mentioning the directors, is correct. I'm okay with talking about pounds instead of dollars, but you'd need to convert all the values and make sure they're sourced. Also, "hundreds of millions of dollars" refers to the entire time, not just 2004. Jackmcbarn (talk) 12:20, 21 August 2013 (UTC)

I have changed the word "dollars" to "pounds". As you know Gizmondo was a UK registered company and has only ever dealt in pounds, so you shouldn't have a problem with this change.Onlinefactcheck (talk) 14:19, 23 August 2013 (UTC)

I don't have a problem with that, but you should convert all of the usages to be pounds if you want to do that, because it's worse for an article to be inconsistent than it is for it to use the "wrong" currency consistently. Jackmcbarn (talk) 15:11, 23 August 2013 (UTC)

You say.. "but you should convert all of the usages to be pounds if you want to do that" What else needs to be change ?Onlinefactcheck (talk) 15:33, 23 August 2013 (UTC)

Find a reliable source that says what the amounts were in pounds, and use the numbers it gives. Jackmcbarn (talk) 15:35, 23 August 2013 (UTC)

I thank you, Jackmcbarn, for moderating here. I am the user who added much of the content that has been altered and reverted. All of the content is meticulously sourced; the sources are all well-regarded secondary sources found all over Wikipedia on good articles; they are available online for anyone to use to check the facts in the Wikipedia article. Most of the edits being proposed by this new editor do not conform to the sources cited. I would add that some of the new edits have as their rationale that, in the couple of months intervening between Freer's departure and filing with the court, the company lost all, or even a substantial portion, of the money it lost overall. In fact, it lost most of that money before Freer's departure, while he was still in his leadership position, as the sources made clear. I am dreadfully suspicious of a newly-registered editor with a stated personal bias whose only edits are to Freer's article and to this talk page. As you can see in the history of Freer's pages and the pages of Freer's associates, there are a noticeable number of throwaway accounts and single-use anonymous IPs making edits to remove material. Thank you again. Universaladdress (talk) 04:54, 3 September 2013 (UTC)

BLP violation and neutral point of view

Come back from Christmas break and see that 2 of the 3 articles I nominated for deletion have been deleted. The 3rd that was not deleted, this article, was recommended for deletion and although there were not any policy reasons left by those voting to keep the article, it appears to have been kept. I also see that the discussion was closed early which is puzzling. Anyways, I did not realize this page was so contentious until reading the talk history here. Doesn’t appear that anyone wants to do anything to improve the biography, so I am taking the liberty to clean this up. This article is a major BLP violation as it contains original research and seems to slant everything negative towards this guy which is not neutral. There is also another article related to a member of the former company Stefan Eriksson which will need cleaned up as well. The sources in this article are poor at best with the exception of the LA Time and The Sunday Times. It talks about a failed gaming device and how it was the worse seller of all time, yet there is an article for the game where this information she be listed. I would advise anyone coming to edit this article take a look at WP:NPOV and WP:UNDUE. --JakenBox (talk) 18:30, 17 January 2014 (UTC)

And it seems like edits were reversed, citing that the information in the article is “approved.” Not sure who approved them. Regardless, the content was reverted back so that it is less of the BLP violation that it is and reported to the BLP noticeboard. Hope this will help get this article corrected as well as the one for Eriksson, Tiger Telematics, and Gizmondo. --JakenBox (talk) 03:21, 23 January 2014 (UTC)

The keep justification is publicly available here for anyone to read: [1], as is the discussion where the specific policy reasons, as you put it, were addressed. I would urge you not to strip referenced content from this article during your attempts to improve it. As the keep decision was in part due to the improvement of the article with secondary sources, those improvements will likely be kept. Universaladdress (talk) 20:11, 29 January 2014 (UTC)

Except Wikipedia is governed by consensus and guidelines that are established based on consensus. Please do not parse words by stating the article was “kept” 2 times before. The 1st time it was kept by default as there was no consensus reached. The 2nd time it was closed early after the discussion was extended and a few half-hearted keep votes were left without giving any policy or guideline reason to keep it. As such, I asked that the discussion be re-opened for further discussion. In the meantime, I would again suggest that you do not add unsourced information into the article or information that is not in the source provided as this is a violation of guidelines for BLP articles. If you have an issue with the guidelines for BLP articles, please discuss it at the BLP noticeboard. I previously notified you of this, but you seem to want to take a different route. Please refer to the noticeboard, the edit comments of the article, and your own talk page as I am trying to work this out with you, but it seems form the edit history of this article that you are determined to violate BLP guidelines in order to create an attack page for this guy. While you are at it, maybe take a look at the articles for Stefan Eriksson, Tiger Telematics, and Gizmundo as well. This looks like an orchestrated play to discredit these companies and former directors by creating Wikipedia pages as attack pages. --JakenBox (talk) 16:29, 30 January 2014 (UTC)

Seems this issue has been solved through confirmed versions in a way with which I am absolutely satisfied and conforms exactly to the rationale behind the two "keep" decisions I mentioned. Good deal. Universaladdress (talk) 07:18, 23 February 2014 (UTC)

Again, and not to beat the horse even more, but the “keep” discussions were as follows: The first was A NO CONSENSUS. This means that it was NOT a keep, it was closed without a consensus being reached. Big difference. The second one was kept with only 1 vote providing rationale. Your “vote” did not really state a reason other than it meets WP:CRIME. Unfortunately, I still do not think it does. So, not sure how “the issue has been resolved.”--JakenBox (talk) 18:19, 24 February 2014 (UTC)

Can we close this ancient dispute? The editor who raised it seems to have vanished from Wikipedia completely, immediately after his last failed attempt to get this page deleted. No one else has raised any objection of which I am aware. Universaladdress (talk) 02:42, 18 August 2014 (UTC)

Not exactly. Can you point out the policy that states that a dispute is closed in favor of an editor if the other editor makes no more changes for 6 months? Searched everywhere but could not find it. I am actually waiting for 6 months to send the page back to AfD. I requested it be sent back earlier, but was advised by an admin to wait which I agreed as I did not want to disrupt Wikipedia to prove a point. You know as well as I do that this is an attack page, set up to make Mr. Free and Mr. Erickson look like criminals. Unfortunately, Wikipedia is not a place for you to air your disapproval of these guys or their failed company. --JakenBox (talk) 19:41, 25 August 2014 (UTC)

AfD isn't so that you can re-nominate every 6 months until you get your way. By the way, I support all of Universaladdress's recent changes. Jackmcbarn (talk) 20:23, 25 August 2014 (UTC)

The article has been whitewashed quite a bit over the years. Where did the mention of Freer's "co-pilot" Mikael Ljungman go? If anything, it's a POV piece in Freer's favor, not something defaming him. {{POV}} should not be added without pointing out specific concerns, which JakenBox has not done. It should be removed. Huon (talk) 21:48, 25 August 2014 (UTC)

I expect a good-faith effort to conclude this discussion within the coming weeks. Hit-and-run is not a tactic that Wikipedia's discussion guidelines are designed to reward. If objections remain, raise them. If not, let's close this discussion. Universaladdress (talk) 21:10, 13 September 2014 (UTC)

Two weeks have now passed with no objections raised beyond those already addressed through multiple avenues at this point. Closing this discussion and removing the template. Further good faith efforts to discuss must take this discussion into account; re-adding the template will require raising new and specific objections on the talk page first. Universaladdress (talk) 01:08, 27 September 2014 (UTC)

Starting new section as a forum

There appears to be one editor, UA, that came back after I spent considerable time doing a fix up job here, as I have elsewhere. I'm starting this section as a forum for others to specifically communicate what should be on this page.DavidWestT (talk) 23:10, 11 December 2014 (UTC)

Welcome to Wikipedia. This is not a place for forums, and it is not a place to try to exert Wikipedia:Ownership_of_articles Fugu Alienking (talk) 15:47, 17 March 2015 (UTC)

Forbes List

The Forbes List lists all billionaires. In 2005, the year which was claimed in some versions of this page that Carl Freer was number 698, the total number was 691, which you can still see at the link given even if you cannot see the names. It is somewhat convenient that the list appears to be broken, as it misleads the reader into thinking the 691 figure is part of the brokenness. It isn't, here is another page making it clear that the list really only went up to 691: http://www.forbes.com/2005/03/09/bill05land.html Fugu Alienking (talk) 16:18, 17 March 2015 (UTC)

Tiger Telematics TGTL had a market cap of $2,7BN in 2005. Freer owned 44% excluding other holdings in various investments. Freer was also the largest private investor. See SEC EDGAR filings for 2003/4 private sale purchase. TGTL — Preceding unsigned comment added by 101.127.119.19 (talk • contribs) 10:17, March 29, 2015 (UTC)

That sounds like synthesis to me. If there's a source calling Freer a billionaire, please present it. Huon (talk) 11:29, 29 March 2015 (UTC)

As there don't appear to be any reliable references backing this up, I followed up with some original research on the SEC filings that might support the synthesis posed above. Based on a share price that appeared to peak in April 2005 at around $17, and 1,212,000 shares declared to be under control of Carl Freer and his immediate family members at the time, the actual figures look more like $20M, which while an impressive amount of money (before the company collapsed and the share certificates all became worthless pieces of paper) is a long way from making the Forbes list. 180.75.159.118 (talk) 15:08, 1 April 2015 (UTC)

You don't even need synthesis. I have a 2005 Forbes edition. It's now scanned. I am looking for any method to submit it here. I can't simply "copy and paste" to the talk page, otherwise we'd all have it in front of us by now.DavidWestT (talk) 05:27, 2 April 2015 (UTC)

Publishing that scan would be problematic on grounds of copyright. Please instead provide bibliographical information so we can look up the magazine ourselves. What publication date, what issue, what page? Huon (talk) 23:15, 2 April 2015 (UTC)

The assembly of the data is what's protected since data isn't protected by US copyright law. It is a printscreen of the online mag.

The data shows:

[page 30]

Forbes richest people

Marion Sandler

Edward Roski Jr

Joaquim Neto

Ahmet Zorlu

Yeoh Tiong Lay & Family

Jesse Robinson

Nelson Peltz

Richard Peery

Robert Naify

Carl Freer

Kenneth Langone

All show a "tied" rank of #698.

Citizenship column shows, respectively:

United States

United States

Brazil

Turkey

Malaysia

United States

United States

United States

United States

Sweden

United States

Net Worth ($ BIL)

All show "1.1"

Residence column, respectively:

United States

United States

Brazil

Turkey

Malaysia

United States

United States

United States

United States

United States

United States

Age column shows, again respectively:

75

67

40

61

76

82

63

65

84

35

70

DavidWestT (talk) 18:50, 4 April 2015 (UTC)

If that's available online, please provide a link to the page. What Forbes actually says is, "The collective net worth of the world’s 691 billionaires is $2.2 trillion [...]" - there were only 691 billionaires on the 2005 list, not 698. A mirror of the full list is here, and there's no Carl Freer on that list. To make doubly sure, I checked the 2006 list (which indeed shows people tied for rank 698 on page 30) and the 2004 list, and Freer isn't on those, either. While I'm at it, with this edit the statement "which the court found to be true." None of those references supports that statement, and given the problems with verifying your other additions I see no reason to believe it's true. Other parts of your changes were entirely unreferenced. To be blunt, Wikipedia is not the place for promotional lies. I'll revert your changes and would ask you not to add further falsehoods to Wikipedia. Huon (talk) 20:24, 4 April 2015 (UTC)

References

Interesting. 2006 isn't relevant. Is there a way to get you a copy of the scan I have then?DavidWestT (talk) 00:00, 5 April 2015 (UTC)

I don't see what purpose that would serve. We'd have to believe your scan over Forbes.com, and I don't think I'm prepared to do so. I agree with what Fugu Alienking said on your talk page: Your information seems to be an excerpt of the 2006 list, except you reversed the alphabetical order and put Carl Freer (who appears out of order) in the place of Richard Li. Huon (talk) 10:34, 5 April 2015 (UTC)

Even more interesting. I read off the order I have in the scan from top to bottom. I'll cross-check the ages with 2006.67.198.78.84 (talk) 18:54, 7 April 2015 (UTC)

RICO case and subsequent malicious prosecution suit

Some of the information that has been entered into the Legal issues section seems to be from interim decisions in an ongoing case, which are covered by the following disclaimer in the court records: California Rules of Court, rule 8.1115(a), prohibits courts and parties from citing or relying on opinions not certified for publication or ordered published, except as specified by rule 8.1115(b). This opinion has not been certified for publication or ordered published for purposes of rule 8.1115.. There are more recent decisions in the same case which partially contradict what is currently stated in this section, but I do not think it is appropriate to make statements on Wikipedia while the case is ongoing, so have been removing the contradicted statements and replacing them with a statement that the case was filed and is ongoing. However, I do not wish to get into an edit war, and request a third party to decide what is an appropriate course of action here, as DavidWestT seems determined to keep the record reading a specific way. Fugu Alienking 02:54, 28 March 2015 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Fugu Alienking (talk • contribs)

There are no reliable secondary sources for the actual outcome of this case, but from a search of the primary sources, I see it ended in an undisclosed settlement, and that Warnock and Davies are now involved in the management of Aluminaid, while Carl Freer seems to be moving on to other things. The case seems to be notable only for the appeals court decision regarding the limitation of litigation privilege in protecting a law firm from defamation suits under SLAPP legislation. However the notability of this case law does not seem to be particularly related to Carl Freer, and the proportion of this article given to discussing this case seems WP:UNDUE compared to the other Legal Issues that Freer has been involved in which have been covered extensively in mainstream press rather than just in law journals. I would propose finding a relevant legal topic to move the case details into (if the decision is notable enough to be kept on Wikipedia at all) and save the Legal Issues section for what has been covered in mainstream press. I have made a few changes to the text already to fix some WP:SYNTH and WP:POV issues with the text that was there —Fugu Alienking (contribs) 15:20, 24 August 2017 (UTC)

Georgia Tech donation

As Freer has developed a history of exaggerated claims, and money pledged and widely advertised, but never followed through (see Gizmondo's lawsuits with MTV, Jordan racing team and Ogilvy and claims related to Norden's Ark and King's Medical Trust for earlier examples), I think it is important to balance this press release about a donation to Georgia Tech over a 5 year period with the information that the company ceased to exist long before that period was over, and that Georgia Tech no longer lists any information about links to Media Power on their website. I previously added the following passage, but it was quickly reverted by the current defender of Freer's online reputation.

Media Power disappeared without trace shortly after this press release and the donation is no longer referenced on Georgia Tech's website, so it is not clear how much, if any, of this pledged funding was provided.

As there appears to be controversy over this paragraph, I'd like to get some comments here on how it can be improved before re-adding it. —Fugu Alienking (contribs) 16:19, 1 April 2015 (UTC)

My suggestion would be not to re-add that statement (which has WP:SYN issues and whose source does not discuss the donation), but to remove the claim based on a press release without independent verification. Huon (talk) 23:24, 2 April 2015 (UTC)

References

Controversy summary?

I hope this isn't taken as unnecessarily jovial, because I don't mean it that way, but I don't want to step on a landmine here. Can someone give me a short, neutral summary of why this page has been sent up for deletion twice and sent back? ComicsAreJustAllRight (talk) 07:09, 12 April 2015 (UTC)

The short answerr is: Because Freer's notability is not clear-cut either way. He's primarily known for his connection to the failed Gizmondo handheld device and the company behind it that went bankrupt amid allegations of lavish salaries for the executives, including Freer and his associates such as Stefan Eriksson who happened to have a criminal past. The curret "legal issues" section, particularly the coverage of the libel case, should probably be shortened per WP:WEIGHT. That's about the intricacies of US libel law, not about Carl Freer. Huon (talk) 13:10, 12 April 2015 (UTC)

WP:BLP violating edits by Fugu Alienking

Fugu Alienking, your edits are in clear cut violation of WP:BLP, therefore, I am reverting them completely.

You appear to be single purpose account. I checked your editing history on wikipedia [2] and since 2007 you have made negative BLP edits on Carl Freer article maybe with very few positive edits that made article neutral. You have made around 700 edits on wikipedia and out of which 162 are focused on Mikael Ljungman (also negative apparently, I am not of any opinion on that subject anyway as I am not well informed about Ljungman) and all other edits are focused on Carl Freer or closely related articles with minor or no other edits to other topics. Therefore, before giving my comments on the content issue, I request that you disclose the conflict of interest you have with this topic. This will help the debate stay positive and contextual.

Content you inserted in these edits [3] is problematic with multiple issues. You have inserted a purely negative paragraph citing this source [4] (translation). I can not see the name Freer in the original or translated version of the source. It says Carl X. Which hides the surname as X and we can not determine that X is Freer so this is not a credible source or verifiable. Much much more concerning and dire issue is that you are violating a more source policy of WP:BLP. The policy states Exercise extreme caution in using primary sources. Do not use trial transcripts and other court records, or other public documents, to support assertions about a living person. Your source is primary and exactly of that definition. Instead of exercising extreme caution, you are adding the source to back up a whole paragraph to edit war with negative edits after I only crossed this article and decided to edit a few things having played a few games that relate to the article. Your other edits are problematic too. Please do not reinsert such clear violations. --Pichku (talk) 11:47, 17 August 2017 (UTC)

There were two sources for the text that I added. It is permissible to use a primary source to reinforce other sources, and since personal details such as Carl X's surname had been redacted from the primary source record, it did not appear to trigger the concern over private details being disclosed in court records. However, I will not edit war over this, and instead I have restored the text referring to the related case in Germany that was well referenced already with reliable secondary sources, having been mentioned in LA Times, Wired, Moneyweek and other well respected publications. I find your continued insertion of unsourced puffery about charitable foundations which appear from a web search to be unrelated to Freer troubling, especially at a time that he is seeking investors for his next company. Wikipedia is not here to puff up his public image. —Fugu Alienking (contribs) 17:02, 17 August 2017 (UTC)

As the surname and any thing that makes any connection was redacted, its not verifiable and that the records were about same person as I said. So the source not credible even more so. The policies were still violated even with a secondary source which was not clear and was single source. The policy still italicizes "maybe". So please avoid using content that are extreme violations as they may get you in trouble with wikipedia. What I am saying is that you are not exercising extreme caution as advised in policy. Please be careful about this. I thank you for agreeing not to editwar but you have editwarred again by reverting everything back without consensus and discussing further. You have not discussed any of edits on talkpage and just reverted, that is edit war. I am reverting to the last standing version before you came with the latest edits so that you can first discuss what it is that you need to change?

I noticed that you disclosed on your user page that you met Carl Freer only once in a lift? Which has lead you to follow their article and make WP:BLP violations on it from 2007 to 2017. I think you are not fully disclosing your interest in the topic. I would advise that you disclose fully your conflict of interest so that you can fairly discuss your views here with volunteers. I have no personal interest in any kind of puffery. I am merely discussing references and want to understand why you are removing content out right and adding negative content. From what I read on wiki policies, WP:BLP is an important thing to consider and then we have to carefully consider that we are neutrally writing the article. If you want to amend the article, WP:CONSENSUS is needed. Discuss first please so that I dont mistake your edits with negativity because a simple google search connects Carl Freer to Family Tree Foundation by many sources (no charitable puffery is mentioned in article, only the org is mentioned just by name). --Pichku (talk) 11:48, 22 August 2017 (UTC)

• Without editwar, please disclose your fully conflict of interest, list things you want to change in the article on this page, and discuss. Then we can edit the article together :)

Please do not mistake a computer student and a video game enthusiast like me with an opponent. We are all friends here trying to improve topics like these. I am new to wikipedia, but you being old should follow rules better. I am not opposed to you, only trying to understand why this article was so haphazard, and not following policies. Understanding what connection you have to the topic will put me in context. :) --Pichku (talk) 11:52, 22 August 2017 (UTC)

Please read WP:OWN. Continually reverting good faith changes by other editors back to your own last edit is not considered acceptable on Wikipedia. Claiming that changes by others must be approved here before being made is also a little odd when none of your own removals of sourced content have had any discussion. I have reverted part of your last change for the following reasons: 1. removal of reliably sourced content. 2. addition of claims that fail verification after review of the sources offered to support them. If you feel I am not being neutral here, I suggest you seek a third opinion or post to a noticeboard requesting administrative assistance rather than continuing to edit war. —Fugu Alienking (contribs) 16:25, 22 August 2017 (UTC)

Have you even read WP:OWN (which says No one, no matter how skilled, or how high-standing in the community, has the right to act as though they are the owner of a particular page.)? I am just new to this article and do not claim it to be my work and I am not a major contributor here only minor one and recent one. You are a major contributor and the one having WP:OWN issues because you are behaving like you own the article for 10 years your editing history shows how many people you have reverted. For now, let us put that aside and discuss the content you want to insert and not the people and editors so that there can be some kind of merit here? You can take your time and disclose conflict of interest properly but that is a separate problem. But obtain WP:CONSENSUS before chaning the article. 3rd-opinion is useful but 3rd-opinion page says there has to be discussion between first two people before you ask for third opinion. So will you like to discuss the changes with me? You explain what you want in amend with merit of references. --Pichku (talk) 11:04, 23 August 2017 (UTC)

My changes yesterday did not introduce any new content to the page. Everything I added back had been on this page for at least a year before you started removing it, or has been routine corrections by bots and administrators that got caught up in your reversions to your preferred version. Clearly we cannot reach consensus with only two of us interested in maintaining the quality of this article, so I have recommended this article for administrator attention. The records of previous discussion is above, including the 3 unsuccessful attempts to have this non notable article deleted. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Fugu Alienking (talk • contribs) 11:29, 23 August 2017 (UTC)

You came along and amended a version of the article that was there for a few days. There's no format on wikipedia that gives more credibility to content that is there for years. You have been told by admins to seek dispute resolution. I have invited you for that before that. Can we first discuss your changes here which is the first step of the dispute resolution? Can you mention the edits in break down here so that we have something to show any third opinion person that we have discussed a bit among ourselves first? The matter of the fact is that article is now as it shows, you want to include content, which, why? References? How they support them without creating BLP issues? --Pichku (talk) 11:39, 23 August 2017 (UTC)

Fresh discussion on edits after 11:17, 23 August 2017‎

Let's discuss edits from above version (which is current) so that edit war is stopped right where we are? Please answer above questions. --Pichku (talk) 11:42, 23 August 2017 (UTC)

Please explain why you found it necessary to twice revert the change on 08:25, 10 August 2017 by Jon Kolbert (updated reference link from using http to https) —Fugu Alienking (contribs) 14:06, 23 August 2017 (UTC)

Please explain why you find it necessary to mention Family Tree Foundation in this article, having added it back in at least 3 times, yet not once providing a reliable source for the claim, even after it has been so obviously disputed. The Google Search mentioned above is not a reliable source, but also turns up a "Family Tree Foundation" which is a legal entity in Louisville Kentucky, and which Carl Freer does not appear to play a notable role in. This appears to be similar to the Kings Medical Trust and VXtreme claims mentioned in some of the reliable sources of this article, which I would recommend you study. —Fugu Alienking (contribs) 14:17, 23 August 2017 (UTC)

Please explain why you do not feel that the well sourced content that you removed in your edit of 20:50, 8 July 2017 is WP:DUE. This was one of the most well referenced sections of the article, and I would think that coverage in Wired Magazine, LA Times, The Times, and Danish National Television when so much else in this article is based on press releases, tabloid journalism and hearsay makes this section very much WP:DUE. —Fugu Alienking (contribs) 14:22, 23 August 2017 (UTC)

The sources for your last edit appear to be press releases (one in a publication which Carl Freer writes for, and the article referenced seems to be the only one not ascribed to a named author, so it may in fact be self-published). The language used seems to be implying that IBM is actively working with Carl Freer, but unless there is a reliable source stating this, then I think it is best to avoid such an implication. I hope you can accept the edit that I made to that language. —Fugu Alienking (contribs) 14:32, 23 August 2017 (UTC)

I find it curious that you keep adding in the language " and author of several patents." when none of the sources mention that. Would you care to explain where you are getting this information from, as you have declared that you have no interest in the article's subject? —Fugu Alienking (contribs) 14:44, 23 August 2017 (UTC)

• Before answering, I reverted you because I saw your original BLP issues. I believe there are more issues too and you are reverting and removing edits without merit. You have not given consideration to why they are there.
• I do not dispute http/https. I reverted your BLP violations and that minor edit got removed. I would fix it now myself by it looks to be corrected by Jon.
• Why are you removing Family Tree Foundation? I did not say that google search is reliable source. What I said is google search shows reliable sources. You have failed to do due diligence and just removed it. Some references that are shown include [5] (also talks about patents) and [6] (this is apparently his own website but own websites are most reliable for facts like dates, figures and mentions like companies he owns). There is no puffery, only mentioning that this is one of the organizations he founded. Crunchbase shows it as his org [7]. This one [8] looks like PR but I am only fact checking. I would not use this source but it does fact check that FTF actually exists as his org. I dont see any reason to remove all existence and mention of it. I think there are more than one Family Tree Foundations in different countries, different orgs, please do not confuse with Freers Family Tree Foundation. This reference shows this is a different org [9]. Two more that clearly tell he is the founder/chairman of FTF [10] [11]. These two are third party references. Just got to do some more google search but for something this small, you seem to be unreasonable to remove a mention of the organization.
• You need to understand WP:DUE better because Carl Freer as I see in this article and in sources is known as an entrepreneur, not as criminal. This article is about an entrepreneur which makes other things, one time events undue and even BLP violations in the way you had tried to include some. This is a major reason of disputing your edits. You can discuss this more First clear the burden of proof why they should be included.
• Last edit, self published sources by a person can be reliable source of information about them, but on this edit they do not look like selfpublished at all unless you think carl freer owns the national.ae and sbr.com.sg? This reference [12] clearly calls watstock an application developed in collaboration with IBM Watson. The other reference implies it and backs it up. Both are reliable, not self published and I found them yesterday studying the subject more to get a better understanding. Why a problem with this edit which has nothing to do with the rest of the dispute? By amending/undoing part of it instead of discussing [13] you have continued your edit war and remember that admins are watching now! I suggest that you self revert and continue discussion here. --Pichku (talk) 10:20, 24 August 2017 (UTC)

WP:DUE means that the article should give weight proportional to coverage in reliable secondary sources of each subtopic covered. I am not sure what meaning you have in mind, as you have not highlighted specifically what about the well sourced content that you blanked was undue. It would help considerably if you refrained from hard reverts through several versions of the article back to your preferred version, and instead put some effort into singling out just the content that you have an issue with and improve it to a point where we can come to a consensus, and leaving the other valuable contributions to the article intact. We shouldn't need to discuss every single change proposed here, if all editors act in good faith and assume that of others the natural way is to reach an editing consensus. —Fugu Alienking (contribs) 14:01, 24 August 2017 (UTC)

Only mention of trivia like his dates, orgs he founded are WP:DUE in biography about him as entrepreneur. Simple. I agree with not reverting you should too and stop reverting. Discuss the last version. I agree with getting consensus and both of us improving it together. It will mean that we hold on to version we are discussing in this section that is stop editwar where we stand. Not restore any of our preference version. Just stop editing and discuss at current version. B - u - t, consensus does mean that every change is discussed until dispute is over. Dont just assume I agree, good faith is discussion. --Pichku (talk) 07:52, 25 August 2017 (UTC)

As I have explained I want to clarify that my main purpose of revert was not to include content. I am new on this article and I only reverted to previous versions. After editing this, I got more interesting in improving the article too. You are the one including content or removing what was already there if I remember your edits correctly. And oh, I am getting info from sources I find on google. Where are you researching ? Above points are my preliminary search just to show that you are removing without considering and at same time including without giving due weight. So I think you have to do the explaining and I have to argue. But I find it better that as we started this discussion on edits after 11:17, 23 August 2017, can you tell me what you want now from 11:17, 23 August 2017 revision onward changed? So we get consensus or a revision which is neutrally worded without BLP violations? What do you want to include/exclude? Are you going to suggest revision you want to make now? What do to edit in current revision? --Pichku (talk) 10:24, 24 August 2017 (UTC)

The purpose of editing articles Wikipedia is not to revert to previous versions. The purpose is to improve on articles collaboratively. Constant reversion of well sourced material such as you have been doing could be interpreted by those less charitable as vandalism. I have patiently explained every one of my edits in the change comments. As you are new here, please read the previous discussions above regarding WP:BLP and other issues that have arisen in the past. WP:BLP does not mean that we must only put positive things about the subject into the article. It means that what we do put must be well supported by reliable sources. You are removing content which is supported by in depth articles in LA Times, Sunday Times, Wired, Moneyweek and other reputable publications. Meanwhile the information you want to add to the article in its place is supported only by blogs, press releases and similar self published websites. The Singapore Business Review link you posted quite clearly says at the bottom that they accept paid placements, and other articles can be found that are written by Carl Freer. The other source appears to be a similar type of publication. While I don't have a problem using that as a source for trivia such as Carl Freer working on a new company called Watstock, I think that to make the claim that IBM is working with him on that, we would need a more reliable secondary source with some journalistic fact checking behind it, or a press release that could be verified as coming from IBM themselves. Carl Freer's past record regarding VXtreme, Kings Medical Trust, Swedish Entrepreneur of the Year, Forbes List and others places the reputation of Wikipedia at great risk if we accept his word on things like this. The same goes for Family Tree Foundation and the alleged patents. —Fugu Alienking (contribs) 13:07, 24 August 2017 (UTC)

You know admins are watching this page so now you should remain civil and stop making accusations when I am not making any accusations? None of my revert is vandalism, it is dispute and you are calling it vandalism. Stop this first as this is offensive and rude. If your explanations are not agreed with, it does not mean that you are free to revert. So let us just continue the discussion in a mannered way. I have read WP:BLP many times over now. I dont care if info is positive or negative, I dont mind if there is negative info. Article already has negative info, legal issues section and what not. My concern with this article started due to BLP issues. It does mean that you have to balance positive and negative info. Info added is backed up with sources. But you are not even discussing sources and info like I did. Raise your concerns here, so that I can give my argument. About watstock, I think two sources I provided are written not by Carl Freer and are reliable enough. For such a simple fact, that is not positive information or negative information just trivia, why do you disagree? Can you explain your concern? I think reputation of wikipedia will be better served if you follow its policies than just worry about it. Why are you asking for a press release from IBM if you have just disagreed with using PRs just like I have disagreed with using them? The source already used is a secondary source not related to IBM or Carl Freer. That is more neutral to use. So what about legal issues heading that you are changing? My understanding is that these are trivia too and trivial coverage that do not relate to his notability as entrepreneur. Negative things are welcome but explain. --Pichku (talk) 07:47, 25 August 2017 (UTC)

I have marked two statements that are without citation and not covered in any of the sources referenced in the article so far. As this page is a WP:BLP, my first reaction to these was to remove them immediately from the article per Wikipedia guidelines, however since that approach seems to be controversial I will allow some time for discussion before doing so again. —Fugu Alienking (contribs) 14:18, 24 August 2017 (UTC)

Reading your new comment and I will reply in some time but why did you revert again after we decided to discuss here instead of editwar? I am restoring the version dated in title of this section so we discuss edits before updates. I will take care not to undo https edit of Jon. --Pichku (talk) 07:33, 25 August 2017 (UTC)

Please forgive me for the slow replies as volunteer work like editing wikipedia is new to me and I have less time in a day but I will reply to your questions as I log in. If you can mutually agree to discuss edits, it will be better and we can move on to editing other wikipedia articles sooner. --Pichku (talk) 08:01, 25 August 2017 (UTC)

Your approach of revert first, read the talk page later does not seem constructive. You accuse me of reverting and edit warring, yet all I did there was add "citation needed" tags to the two statements you have added that are not supported by the references. You also reverted another edit I made to improve the WP:NPOV of some other text that was not a reversion of at all but a fresh edit on text which until now you have shown no interest it. Please discuss in good faith. —Fugu Alienking (contribs) 13:48, 25 August 2017 (UTC)

As Pichku seems no longer interested in participating in this conversation, I will be bold and reinstate the neutral POV improvements I made in my previous edit. —Fugu Alienking (contribs) 04:17, 31 August 2017 (UTC)

I was waiting for your reply on my questions. I did not notice that you sneaked out Family Tree Foundation again. Why are you removing well sourced content? I have showed you sources for it. Any reason? Do not revert while our discussion is on going. As we started in good faith, I have restored the version we are discussing in this section. I suggest that you bullet list your wanted edits here on talk page so that we can debate them. On other hand, IBM Watson is said to have collaborated for watstock. Why do you change this? Do you have a source that they only used APIs and not collaborated which counters my source or is this your WP:SYNTH and WP:OR? This is quote from the source an application developed in collaboration with IBM Watson. --Pichku (talk) 06:07, 31 August 2017 (UTC)

You are WP:BOLD but you dont follow WP:BRD. So you are even violating WP:BOLD by reverting when your bold edit is undone. --Pichku (talk) 06:09, 31 August 2017 (UTC)

@Pichku and Fugu Alienking:. A third opinion has been requested. I have not edited this article, and have no prior known interactions with either of the two editors involved. If you would kindly fill out the following template, because this has gone on for a while and the points have gotten a little muddied, I would appreciate it.

Third opinion

menaechmi (talk · contribs) wants to offer a third opinion. To assist with the process, editors are requested to summarize the dispute in a short sentence below.

Viewpoint by (Fugu Alienking)

A Wikipedia article should contain only well referenced factual content. The majority of mainstream media coverage of this article's subject was published around the 2005-2006 timeframe, and covered the collapse of Gizmondo, and the directors' colorful pasts. There have been some company press releases in business focussed publications since, and these may also warrant a mention, but according to WP:DUE, these should not have more coverage than the information from mainstream press articles. Other editors (the names periodically change, but the pattern of editing behaviour is the same - there is discussion above when past incidents have occurred) seem to be seeking to turn this article into a resume for the subject, and persistently add unverifiable information as well as removing the well sourced information from LA Times, Wired, Moneyweek and other reputable press coverage. As time has passed, interest in the topic has waned, and I feel that the recent behaviour by the most recent "positive POV" editor has crossed a line in controlling the article content by edit warring and insistance on discussion by others, while avoiding the discussion themselves. —Fugu Alienking (contribs) 09:45, 2 September 2017 (UTC)

Viewpoint by (Pichku)

Fugu is unfairly trying to win this dispute ever since I joined wikipedia to and edited this article using attacks on me and instead of discussing content. So far in his view point above, he has relied heavily on attacking me as well. Clearly in the discussion and the debates in above 2 sections, I am the one who started discussion where fugu reverted carelessly. Fugu has not even specifically mentioned what the issue is. In their reverts, they are removing "Family Tree Foundation" from the article under some excuse but the truth is that it is barely mentioned in my sentence. Nothing promotional. If Freer is a founder of the org, why not mention it. I have shown multiple sources saying he is the founder. This doesn't have to go into the intro, only just a mention somewhere in the body. Second problem being fugu is changing "Freer is also the founder of Watstock, a Singapore-based application developed working with IBM Watson," to "Freer is also the founder of Watstock, a Singapore-based application developed using IBM Watson,". The source says an application developed in collaboration with IBM Watson [14]. --Pichku (talk) 17:02, 4 September 2017 (UTC)

Third opinion by menaechmi

First, thank you both for responding, it shows that you are trying to improve the article, not just make/prove your point. I think I have this correct, but if I missed any let met know. The points that you are both contenting are:

1. "and author of several patents"
2. "as well as the Family Tree Foundation"
3. IBM Watson
4. Wording of "The firm followed the lawsuit with a press release..."

As such, I can give an opinion for each in turn.

1. No reliable third-party sources support this. The blufftontoday blog, linked above, is basically a review of a website, and should not be used. That being said, it is clear that Carl Freer has multiple patents [15]. I think, in this case because the patents don't have any independent third-party coverage, following WP:PATENTS, and leaving out the mention is the best path to take.
2. As I've seen it written, it is actually the Freer family Tree Foundation [16], and it seems to have gone defunct, because the website doesn't resolve [freerfamilytreefoundation.com].
3. I think the current IBM Watson mention is great. I would change Artificial Intelligence -> [[artificial intelligence]], and Electronic Machine Learning -> [[machine learning]], but as written it stands well. But, one of the sources included is a press release, and that should be taken into account.
4. This one is difficult. The current version needs work - for example, the ref from the hill is about a separate issue regarding Patton Boggs and mentions neither Carl Freer, GetFugu, nor press releases (the article was updated in May, so it may have been changed to remove those points). But, mention of the dismissal of the case (if that is what happened) is important.

Third opinion discussion

Thanks. I have moved the mention of patents down in the body, I think that is fair. Criteria for mention of trivia is not as high as getting a new article and I think it is verifiable that he is an author of several patents, which makes it ok to add. But to compromise, I have moved it from intro to body. Further agreeing to compromise, I have removed Family Tree Foundation. These things are not a big deal as we are all here to improve this article. I have added wiki links to machine learning and AI. --Pichku (talk) 10:12, 6 September 2017 (UTC)

Thank you for your constructive approach. I would like to discuss the change you made on 6 July. Your comment was "such trivia is not WP:DUE in this BLP", but this trivia was the most well referenced paragraph in the entire article, with mentions in LA Times, Wired, The Sunday Times, and a Danish article about IT Factory. Such mainstream press coverage makes it DUE to mention in Wikipedia, as mentioned in the previous Wider discussion consensus above. So I would like for this text to be restored also. —Fugu Alienking (contribs) 15:28, 6 September 2017 (UTC)

Thank you Menaechmi for offering your opinion. As mentioned above, I think this does not cover 100% of the dispute, but it has led to a start towards moving the page forward again, which is good. I would like to note though that of the two sources for the IBM Watson claim, one mentions "has been developed utilising the technology behind IBM’s extreme learning machine Watson", the other is curiously by "Staff Reporter", while other articles in the same publication are attributed to real authors. This is why I made what I expected to be a non-controversial tweak to the wording on 31 Aug. I do think that without a reliable source for IBM's direct involvement, Wikipedia should avoid any implication of such a relationship. Due to past claims relating to VXtreme, Kings Medical Trust and others, I would be especially careful about any claims that may have originated from Carl Freer himself. —Fugu Alienking (contribs) 15:55, 6 September 2017 (UTC)

I dont think downplaying reliable sources simply because the author is a staff reporter is legit. This infact gives the article even more credibility of the publisher that the publisher's staff reporter was the author of the article. When an article is published by a said publisher, we should see the credibility of the source. Staff reporter writing an article means that the article has gone through even more checks by the publisher and their editorial team. Guest authors who are named are not judged by their personal credibility only as well. The editorial of the publisher is what brings credibility to references. So I request that you do not down play sources to win disputes. Also noting that my edits are not under review here, we have a content dispute when we finally decided to work on the current version. So let us move this point forward. One more thing, you seem to be against adding trivia like The Freer Family Tree Foundation but on other hand you want to add negative but not impartial info on a BLP. This is what lead me to work on this article in the first place. After reading the WP:BLP policies, I have determined that wikipedia articles should not be tilting towards negativity for biographies of living persons. In this case context matters because the event you are asking to add is of zero significance to the person's biography and years of life time in which many things are notable. Focusing on this would be biased. Back to the staff reporter issue, it is clear that Freer does not work as a reporter on the said source or they would have named him as the author, not called him as the "staff reporter". So your logic here is incorrect too. If we are to move forward and form a consensus mutually, you will have to learn to let go and drop the stick after that horse is dead. I have removed FTF mention and the source clearly shows it was "in collaboration with IBM". Unless you have a source saying it was not in collaboration with IBM, you are just giving your personal commentary which can not be a part of wikipedia. So how about consider the above compromise as decided? Pichku (talk) 10:45, 7 September 2017 (UTC)

What you call downplaying, I call a healthy dose of scepticism in light of Carl Freer's past record of making dubious claims in times of fundraising for his next venture (see other discussion above about VXtreme, King's Medical Trust and others, which has now been expunged from the article despite multiple reliable sources highlighting the falseness of these claims). The "Staff Writer" attribution could just as easily be hiding a conflict of interest given that Carl Freer is known to write for the same publication. I am not saying to remove the text completely, only to change one word to err on the side of caution and follow what the other available source is saying rather than trusting this source which has had questions raised as to its reliability. The way you take my suggestions as a personal attack does not fit with your previous declaration that you have no conflict of interest in this article. —Fugu Alienking (contribs) 14:37, 7 September 2017 (UTC)

You have been told before at WP:ANI that this is a content dispute and you will not get around it by accusing me falsely based on your previous life experiences or experiences on this wikipedia page. So how about we cut that chase. I am to erring on the side of caution because this is a BLP, but there is no conflict in sources. The third opinion too said the text was fine as it was so I believe your eyes alone are not the only credible eyes on this article and sources. I dont care what Carl Freer himself claims, wikipedia policies have no interest in that too unless it is significant to his biography overall, I am adding what sources have written in them and read by multiple editors. There's no conflict, its simple, because the other source is less explanatory but *not* negating! Pichku (talk) 06:39, 8 September 2017 (UTC)

I think everyone here should calm down, and maybe go edit some other areas for a little while. If there are still issues, or you'd like to discuss my 3O, I'm willing to explain or discuss as needed, and if we still can't form some kind of consensus, we can all discuss the next steps in the dispute resolution process. For the point above, Watstock itself claims to be in collaboration with IBM Watson [17]. So, regardless of previous performance, if IBM Watson's team were to object to this it would have been removed and Watstock would be in court. I'm sure they use Watson as a series of APIs or the Watson SaaS, but again we go with sources (plus asserting that we should be "on the safe side" assumes there is a negative aspect to being associated with Freer which is a bias not present in any of the sources I've read. Most of the bad press falls to Stefan Eriksson in these matters). menaechmi (talk) 13:49, 8 September 2017 (UTC)