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Confessions of a Living Person

By Frank Sanello, Living Person and subject of a Wikipedia biographical article


Editor’s note: Ladies and gentlemen, the story you are about to read is true. Only the names have been changed (to WikiPseudonyms) to protect the guilty.

One of the many arenas of battle at Wikipedia is the question of “notability” of public figures; are they sufficiently “notable” (i.e., have they attracted enough media coverage) to merit the glorious distinction of a Wikipedia biographical article? There have been many puerile debates at Wikipedia over whether to “keep” or “delete” such articles.

This guest post by a Wikipedia biography subject provides an insight into how the Wikipedia sausage is made. Opinions expressed are those of the author.
 

.

In 2011,  Wikipedia editor Bonadea nominated my bio on Wikipedia for deletion because it was only a stub. I got my college boyfriend, now 64 and terminally ill with pancreatic cancer, to use his Wiki username to cut and paste my Wiki article that makes me sound like a Nobel laureate! The decision in 2011, after I pumped up my bio via my dying friend, was KEEP.

It says that at the top of my Wiki bio! But a week or so ago, Mlpearc, a high school dropout and blue-collar worker, nominated my Wiki bio for “speedy deletion” despite the fact that once the decision to KEEP has been made, the article can no longer be nominated for speedy deletion.

Mlpearc obviously didn’t bother to read the 2011 post about the KEEP decision when he (re)nominated my Wiki bio for deletion. I contacted one of my few allies/Wiki editors, REVENT.

I went into the help chat room and hysterically begged REVENT to stop my speedy deletion. He “talked me down” by informing me that Mlpearc had removed his speedy delete nomination 2 minutes after posting it…as I recall only after REVENT quickly told him I had been KEPT permanently. 

On my talk page, Mlpearc subtly and with impunity insulted me again. His mistaken reason for speedily deleting my Wiki bio was that I lacked “notability.”

After he removed the deletion request, he posted on my Talk page this indented * insertion:

“I still think I was right about…this,” without mentioning that “this” was his unchanged opinion that I ain’t notable.

That is “disruptive” or rude behavior…if Mlpearc had stated what he implied:

“I still think Frank Sanello is a nobody and should be speedily deleted.”

If I had written that about another person’s lack of notability in an open, not surreptitious way like Mlpearc’s comment, I would have been scolded or blocked.

I’ve discovered you CAN be rude on Talk pages but you have to disguise your insults cleverly by not making them explicit. See Mlpearc’s comment on my Talk page that he still thinks my Wiki bio should get the ax.

I’ve written 19+ books, I’m an internationally recognized Holocaust scholar and historian. (See my Wiki bio, which I wrote 90 percent with the help of my college boyfriend’s Wiki formatting expertise.) 

I have as many insecurities as the next person but my resume/credentials ain’t one of ’em, folks. If a high school dropout/ditch digger considers me a nonentity…I consider the source and then ignore it/him. 

If you type the subject of most of my books http://openlibrary.org/search?q=frank+sanello

into Wikipedia’s internal browser, you will find that my books are cited in Wiki articles about the same subjects my books also deal with. BTW, dear OpenLibrary.org claims I’m the author of 22 books or “results.”

I’ve been meaning to email OpenLibrary and ask them PLEASE please do NOT inflate my resume with info that makes me seem even more prolific than I am. (22 books vs. MY claim of “only” 19 books. I may be a braggart, but I’m an honest braggart. )

See Wiki’s Opium Wars and Knights Templars articles which prove I’m cited/referenced/footnoted all over the WikiUniverse!

That alone should confer notability, I think. Do you agree?

One of the many reasons I’ve been banned/blocked indefinitely – probably permanently – is that uneducated Wiki editors are too lazy to run their edits and “undos” through Spell Check.

If they did, Hitler wouldn’t have been misspelled in my Wiki article numerous times, no typos, no incorrect grammar, poor usage/style, no Frank SanellA misspelled TWICE by formatting-obsessed Nonsenseferret, etc.

Instead, yesterday AM, I found another poison pen email in my AOL in-box, informing me of some changes on my bio or Talk page. I can’t remember which. I’m in the fourth stage of kidney failure (only one more to go, folks!) and have a bit of dementia. I still crank out my books, Mlpearc, but my short-term memory…what was I saying.

The anti-fan (e)mail took me to my Wiki bio where to my horror I found Hitler’s name misspelled and a bunch of other egregious errors.

To her credit, my nemesis and personal Torquemada, GorillaWarfare, fixed ALL the typos within seconds!

I think I thanked her for her speedy undos/edits even though she has made the editing of my repeatedly if “accidentally” vandalized Wiki bio a living hell due to minor formatting and other Wiki guidelines mistakes I inadvertently made because A: I’m computer illiterate and B: I still haven’t mastered Wiki’s primitive, complicated MS-DOS-like computer code.

I’ve asked the following question in various Wiki chat rooms and on my Talk page with no response even after I typed {{help me}} on my Talk page:

QUESTION:

.

Is Wiki’s computer code/software (?) made so difficult to use on purpose? So vandals have a more difficult time editing/vandalizing Wiki pages?

I’d still love to know the answer, although after being spammed by Wiki and insulted on my Talk page and other Wiki pages my curiosity by now is solely of the morbid variety.

A high school dropout says I’m unnotable?!?!

Can you spell preposterous professional jealousy, boys and girls?

I never brag…except during book contract negotiations or when people attack me and/or my credibility. Or when I apply for a 9-5 job, which I haven’t had to do since I was 32 and the film critic for the LA Daily News, per my Wiki bio’s External Links and in-line citation.

My honesty was publicly confirmed by a jury, which determined I had NOT LIED when I quoted William Skrzyniarz gossiping about his law firm’s literally “star” client’s sexual exhibitionism in the restroom at the Beverly Hills Hotel, per my Stone bio, which quotes a real but unidentified source who witnessed Stone fondling Janice Payne then disappearing with Payne inside a toilet stall “to discuss a film project only, nothing more,” per Payne’s libel suit she filed against me. It was an exculpatory publicity stunt to clear her name. “I’m only suing [Sanello] for my children’s history (???),” she said in the Las Vegas Journal when she filed suit against me. She settled out of court in exchange for my publisher’s libel insurer, AIG, paying her legal fees. No damages.

Rosenfeld, Meyer & Susman, the Beverly Hills law firm, also sued me solely to exonerate their firm and the partner, William Skrzyniarz (correct spelling, nonsenseferret!), whom they fired shortly after my Stone bio came out and quoted him dissing Stone! During a pre-trial deposition, which I have on file, he stupidly supplied the reason he gossiped about Stone with her self-acknowledged biographer.

Skrzyniarz said in the witness box, “I didn’t believe [Sanello] when he claimed he had just finished a bio of Sharon Stone and was beginning a bio of Eddie Murphy. There are a lot of wannabes in this town…”

Dictionary.com translation of the above: “I thought the schmuck [~~~~FrankSanello] was delusional or a pathological liar so I didn’t think I’d get into any trouble by gossiping with him about Sharon Stone because he’s a ‘wannabe’ who inflates or invents his resume/credentials…”

Wannabes are indigenous fauna in Hollywood — people who come to El Lay absolutely certain they will become a “star.”

When their acting/directing/whatever goals remain unfulfilled, some often resort to fabricating their “stardom,” claiming they’re making a movie with Steven Spielberg or whomever….I think that’s called wish fulfillment.

Wish fulfillment – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Lots of wish fulfillment going on in Hollywood. But not by me. All of my wishes have been “fulfilled” beyond my wildest career fantasies.

I have wanted to be a self-supporting writer and college professor since I learned to read at the age of six. All those wishes have been fulfilled, although I know that sounds like (and probably is)

bragging sad smiley

BTW, nonsenseferret or some other WikiEditer [sic and sick ] changed (incorrectly) the spelling of attorney William Skrzyniarz’s last name in my Wiki bio several times after I had correctly spelled the name in an early edit I made to my page about the libel suit and Skrzyniarz’s involvement in it.

Instead of undoing nonsenseferret’s typos, I had to go to my Talk page and insert {{help me}}, then type lengthy instructions about fixing nonsenseferret’s typos which took much more time than simply editing my Wiki bio myself.

GorillaWarfare fixed nonsense’s typos almost immediately. I think she LIVES on Wikipedia. She certainly “hovers,” per Wiki’s meaning of the term, over my Wiki bio, another no-no.

But thanks anyway, Gorilla, for your speedy response, although I still hate you.

 

Every AM after reading WikiSpam in my email in-box, I used to find new horrors ALL the time before I blocked WikiHateMail.

Then I had to go through the laborious process of begging an editor to fix the errors I could easily fix myself.

I’m actually glad Wiki banned/blocked me permanently. I should be Kindlizing z-z-z-z my new book, All Blood Runs Red, about Eugene Bullard, America’s first black military pilot. (World War I)

Instead, I’m wasting my time with fruitless arguments with Wikilliterati and other Wiki cops. It’s not a coincidence that GorillaWarfare’s area of specialization is patrolling pages for vandalism. She’s a virtual janitor who cleans up vandalism.

Most real-life cops I’ve known are on a power trip, usually insecure about their intelligence or academic credentials. (Are you reading this, Mlpearc?)

GorillaWarfare, the vandal bounty hunter, is apparently on the same kind of power trip genuine cops are.

She also seems to be one of those “perpetual students.” She says in her “internal” Wiki bio that she’s been a WikiContributor for 10 years, yet she’s still in college or grad school…for 10 years…unless she was editing Wiki articles during high school.

LOL – II: ~~~FrankSanello’s Revenge!

Before I blocked Gorilla’s spammy emails to my AOL account, I received multiple, daily messages informing me of some minor formatting error I made…while nonsenseferret is misspelling my name, Hitler’s (!) and other mind-boggling mistakes.

Don’t WikiEditors run their edits through Spell Check??? I Spell Check EVERYTHING — even personal emails I send!

Like WikiEditors, I’m also anal-retentive but usually, I hope, about important things only, like spelling the most famous tyrant in history’s last name correctly. Ditto my last name, which AIN’T SanellA, are you listening/reading this, nonsenseferret? Paaaaathetic!

Unfortunately, Kindlizing a book I’ve already written does not gratify my addiction to writing as much as 12 hours per day. Emails like this and my flameouts on Wiki’s Talk pages are a poor substitute for getting my daily writer’s “fix.”

 

Image credits — Wikipedia/BrianScott1973,  licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license; Flickr/base2wave, Creative Commons attribution 2.0 Generic.

11 comments to Confessions of a Living Person

  • “…the fact that once the decision to KEEP has been made, the article can no longer be nominated for deletion…” Huh?

  • TungstenCarbide

    @Greg
    blog post fixed; Wikipedia articles can’t be re-nominated for “speedy” deletion.

    Wikipedia has megabytes of rules and volumes of strange vernacular. Any regular person, if they are unlucky enough to have a Wikipedia biography, might find it easier to pull their own teeth than to get problems addressed with their Wikipedia biography.

  • Manganese Oxide

    “I have as many insecurities as the next person but my resume/credentials ain’t one of ‘em, folks.”

    Let others be the judge of that. Wikipedia’s rules on self-promotion are clear and valid, and if you’re as notable as you say you are, then the notability of the article shouldn’t be an issue.

    • Others WERE the judge of my notability, and the decision was to keep in 2011. Then two years later, a high school dropout who didn’t bother to read the decision to keep my profile called for its “speedy deletion.” Others have questioned my notability as well. Fine. I’m defending it.
      I’m self-promoting myself when I fix my misspelled name, correct nonsenseferret’s and others’ typos, like Hitler’s name…???
      Frank Sanello

  • Liz

    I read the entire exchange you had with various editors and admins who tried to help you with your article. You left long (10+ paragraphs), rambling statements, some of which had nothing to do with the editing of your article and were often assertions of your importance. Several times, you became irrationally irate because someone didn’t respond as quickly as you wanted or you were expressing frustration with having to learn how to use the simple mark-up language that Wikipedia uses. You had no interests beyond working on your own biography and didn’t seem interested in contributing to WP because, as you often said, “I get paid for this, I’m not doing this for free.” You finally left in an angry huff after 12 days of people going out of their way to explain how Wikipedia works, the nature of conflict of interest and neutral point of view when one makes the mistake of trying to edit an article about oneself.

    I didn’t see any effort on your part to learn how to write for Wikipedia (which you seem to have little respect for) and quite a number of people who tried to decipher your pages long, stream of consciousness notes you’d leave demanding people fix things. Editors bent over backwards trying to accommodate your requests but you proved to be unwilling to learn basic practices.

    I would think Wikipediocracy would have read over these monologues before publishing this guest post but perhaps they didn’t have the patience to either.

    • Hersch

      Think of it as Cinéma vérité.

    • I only demanded fixes when they wouldn’t let me fix simple typos like my name misspelled TWICE or Hitler’s!

      As for basic practices, GorillaWarfare left emails in my personal email in-box, not Wikipedia, telling me I forgot to add formatting for help me or place a comment on her talk page instead of mine.

      I learned how to write in college. There’s no school to go to to learn Wiki formatting. And Wiki’s help pages are incomprehensible! At least to me.

      Frank Sanello

    • “simple mark-up language that Wikipedia uses” per Liz, who left a nasty comment on my Talk page.
      Simple! It’s worse than MS-DOS. Plus all the acronyms and links to other Wiki pages when you want a simple answer that takes a dozen linked articles to answer???

      TungstenCarbide’s comment above/below also agrees with me:

      “Wikipedia has megabytes of rules and volumes of strange vernacular. Any regular person, if they are unlucky enough to have a Wikipedia biography, might find it easier to pull their own teeth than to get problems addressed with their Wikipedia biography. “– Tungsten Carbide

      And again, Liz, I only made repeated comments about my notabiliyt in RESPONSE to WikiNazis multiple comments I don’t deserve a Wikipedia article AFTER Wiki made the decision KEEP two years ago.

      Check out Liz’s comments with subject WOW at the bottom of FrankSanello’s Talk Page.

  • Eddy Martine

    “But a week or so ago, Mlpearc, a high school dropout and blue-collar worker,”

    “A high school dropout says I’m unnotable?!?!”

    “Can you spell preposterous professional jealousy, boys and girls?”

    “I never brag…except during book contract negotiations or when people attack me and/or my credibility. Or when I apply for a 9-5 job, which I haven’t had to do since I was 32 and the film critic for the LA Daily News,”

    You sound like a complete prick. You think calling someone a blue-collar worker is a clever insult?

    • Calling me a prick isn’t very clever either. I wasn’t trying to be clever when I mentioned Mlpearc’s blue-collar job. I was just pointing out his lack of education and employment which makes him unsuitable to edit Wiki articles for content. You have to go to school for that. Or at least not be so lazy you don’t run your edits or “undos” through SpellCheck so Hitler’s name and mine aren’t misspelled multiple times. Also other typos I had to beg Wiki editors to fix after being blasted for making the fixes myself.
      One editor said it was ok for me to make “minor tweaks” of my own bio. All I did was proofread and correct factual errors about the $30 million libel suit that remains in my Wiki bio after repeated attempts by nonsenseferret to quote an out of date, inaccurate gossip item on the New York Post’s Page Six that appeared before the trial. Nonsenseferret inserted incorrect information that the publisher of my Sharon Stone bio had settled with her lawyers “and left Sanello to defend himself.”
      That egregious error was proved wrong by two footnotes on my bio, articles in the LA Times and NY Post AFTER the jury acquitted both the publisher and me of all charges.”

  • Here’s the comment left on my talk page on August 26, 2013, by Wiki User Universaladdress. It wasn’t removed until Sept. 7, 2013, and only after I complained to GorillaWarfare about the comment on Sept. 7.

    This talk page is absolutely insane
    Frank Sanello, you have had an interesting life but you also have some serious problems. Universaladdress (talk) 03:37, 26 August 2013 (UTC)

    This morning, a mole I know at Wikipedia told me GorillaWarfare had deleted the above comment yesterday (Sept. 7, 2013) after I complained on my talk page about Universaladdress’ comments on “my problems.” I forwarded the commment to Molly White (GorillaWarfare) to prove my point about nasty Wiki editors, and she responded with this:

    Dear Frank,

    We do not tolerate personal attacks on the subjects of our Wikipedia articles, hence why I removed it. I’m not really sure why you’re emailing about this — were you wishing I had allowed it to remain?

    Yours sincerely,
    Molly White (GorillaWarfare)


    Wikipedia – https://en.wikipedia.org/

    Gorilla can’t resist arguing with me and getting the last word. Not this time.