Slashdot Mirror
Wikipedia Entries 'Cleaned' By Political Staffers
worb writes "According to the Lowell Sun, U.S. Rep Marty Meehan's staff has been heavily editing his Wikipedia bio, among other things removing criticisms. In total, more than one thousand Wikipedia edits in various articles have been traced back to congressional staffers at the U.S. House of Representatives in the past six months."
they've been busy http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:143.231.249.141
But you do know who used it last, and what specifically they changed. It's extremely easy to compare different versions of the same article. You can even be shown exactly what text differs between the two, for instance.
So rather than suggesting it's a flaw that anyone can change the most recent copy of the information, we need to realize that it's beneficial that we can see past edits, and who performed them.
Indeed, if we see a trend of certain information being edited out of articles about Republicans, it could be quite safe to assume the information that was removed is completely valid, and is being removed because it is the unfortunate truth. The same would go for the Democrats, or basically any other group, for instance. At least, however, we can see what was changed, and what it was changed from. That's just as beneficial as the information itself.
Cyric Zndovzny at your service.
What's so awesome about wikipedia is that even after editing, the original information is still available. That being the case, part of one's research (especially when dealing with people of the political persuasion), should include past versions. At least this way, those seeking information can get the whole story, regardless of any sanitizing efforts by those in office.
I really wish Wikipedia could be used as an academic reference.
Why would you want to do that?! Encyclopedias in general are not good academic references becuase they don't represent original work, but rather a collection and summary of information from other sources. If you find yourself citing Encyclopedia Britannica frequently in academic papers, you might want to consider improving your research methods.
It could be done. The current system is just too open for the kind of abuse described in the article.
Sure, it could be made more reliable, but you'd have to make some fundamental changes. First, you could only accept writing by experts who can prove their credentials. Second, you'd have to have a formalized peer review and editing process. This would cause a big delay between writing and publishing the articles. It would also limit the scope of the encyclopedia, and would greatly increase its cost. In other words, it would become a traditional encyclopedia. That niche has already been filled.
The strengths of Wikipedia are that it is more complete, it is up to date, and it represents a wide variety of viewpoints of many subjects. It's a great way to find a review of some subject and find references on that subject. Sure, it's not authoratative, but who really expects it to be? In my opinion, the best thing that could be done for it is to put a disclaimer prominantly displayed at the top of each page saying that it can be edited by anybody, changes are not reviewed before becoming visible, and no garauntee is made on the accuracy of the content. In other words, things you and I already know, but which the average joe might not. I don't think this will happen, because the people who control it seem to be too proud to admit that it might be inferior in any way to other encyclopedias.
If you can read this sig, you're too close.
After seeing the article running in The Lowell Sun, I was the one who combed through the entire history of wikipedia contributions. I was surprised to see that there were hundreds (pretty close to 1000 entries).
Though I was pleased to see that there were a fair amount of edits updating dates and facts to be current (everyone switching from the 108th to the 109th Congress), I was shocked to see that there was a large propaganda and misinformation campaign as well.
Some were personal attacks saying things like "He is generally not a good person," and childish things like adding Scott Mclellan (Bush's press secretary) to the entry for Douche; other were of a much more serious nature. The entry for Ralph Neas (Director of a the liberal People for the American Way) was edited to say he was a Socialist, and the more subtle but equally effective changing the description of MoveOn (a progressive political organization) to be categorized as "left-wing."
Many Congressional offices were removing any negative inormation or simply replacing the entire article with their official House bio. Emily Lawrimore (Communications Director Congressman Joe Wilson, emily.lawrimore@mail.house.gov) posted, on the discussion page for her boss "I work for Congressman Joe Wilson (listed as Addison Graves Wilson). Could you update his bio with information from the following official bio too?"
Some political officials like Congressman Jim Ramstad (R-MN 3rd) just wanted to remove any references to the word "liberal". The articles for Congressman Trent Franks (R-AZ 2nd), and Rick Renzi (R-AZ 1st) were completely erased and replaced with official House biographies.
Getting even worse Congressman Richard Pombo (R-CA 11th) and Governor Bob Taft (R-OH) removed references to their ties with Jack Abramoff (who in a recent Washington scandal pled guilty to three felony counts, conspiracy, fraud, and tax evasion). Congressman Mark Green (R-WI 8th) removed any mention of his ties with the recently indicted Tom DeLay and generally removed any unflattering or scandal related information. A full list of the effected articles is available.
The possible most egregious entry was editing the article "2003 Invasion of Iraq." Erasing legitimate information, adding knowingly false information and generally purporting that there were links between Iraq and al Qaeda.
This appears to be a somewhat serious problem as this is one IP address of who knows how many. See the discussion page for this IP address at Wikipedia to see some of the known staffers who have been editing articles.
I am a Wikipedia editor and am personally going through all edits that have come through the U.S. Congress IP range. It's mildly entertaining, like a made-for-TV horror comedy, as I look through these. The government is spreading propaganda into Wikipedia. There are edits that seem to be useful, and true, but there is a majority of vandalism that disturbs me. Edits range from articles to articles like the ones on the Superfriends and the Pope, to inserting the name of the White House press secretary in odd places, and what appears to be an extremely puerile form of libel against certain senators.
http://www.brookesnews.com/theresa_heinz_kerry.htm l
http://www.dailyhowler.com/dh112404.shtml
The second one cites the AP and Washington Post and I can't attest to their standards.