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Wikipedia vs Congressional Staffers [Update]
There has been quite a bit of recent reporting on the recent troubles between Wikipedia and certain Congressional staffers. In response, abdulzis mentions that "an RFC, Wikipedia's mediation method to deal with 'disharmonious users', has been opened to take action against US Congressional staffers who repeatedly blank content and engage in revert wars and slanderous or libelous behavior which violates Wikiepdia code. The IP ranges of US Congress have been currently blocked, but only for a week until the issue can be addressed more directly."
And now Congress will vote to make freely-editable online encyclopedias illegal. Freedom of speech loses in a landslide. :D
Or perhaps we can come to an agreement where no one edits other entries for the purpose of skewing information. That would make me smile.
Do we need any further evidence that congress people and their staff have too much time on their hands? I hope in the contentious atmosphere that plagues Washington these days that people from all sides of the political spectrum can agree that Congress is given too many resources to accomplish too little.
Next they'll be wasting all their time on Slashdot.
I'm a big tall mofo.
No, it's called a FOLLOW-UP. This article contains more information than the previous one.
I mean, the editors screw up enough, why call them out even more than we have to?
Well children if you cannot play nice we are just going to have to take this away
Congressional trolls. This idea amuses me deeply.
I wonder if any of the trolls we've got on here are working for Congress.
Perhaps, somehow, Natalie Portman is a matter of national security.
xkcd.com - a webcomic of mathematics, love, and language.
rtfa
I only read the title and short description and knew it wasn't a dupe. More like update.
--[insert congresscritter's name here]
I believe the fact they've blocked the the IP ranges owned by Congress is news. It's nice to see Wikimedia have actively done something to address this issue rather than sitting everyone down and having a nice prozaic meeting about it.
To be fair to the parent poster, the summary, as originally posted, didn't have the link to the previous story. The story was edited and not marked as having been edited about 2 minutes after it went up (for non-subscribers).
Hehehe, looks like Slashdot can do with a merge process too!
Just look at this past entry for "Beaver" (now corrected, but Wikipedia's history allows us to see it in the full glory)
Beaver
"Beavers explosively attack people with their menacing teeth. They are the most deadly animals alive."
Test your net with Netalyzr
Congress acting like children?
nothing new to see here folks
move along
i don't care
I wonder if any of the trolls we've got on here are working for Congress.
That's a pretty outlandish theory you have there! We^H^HThey would never consider monitoring Slashdot, let alone posting comments to it.
In other news, it seems The White House I.P addresses will remain unblocked as users there are still struggling to find wiki. Allegedly there have been unconfirmed reports of a "white out" scandal, where public money has been frivolously spent on white out and computer screens. No one has yet named the culprit.
-- Cheer, Cheer, The Red and the White.
Dirty politicians need to take an ethics course!
And the people who removed that line are trying to suppress the truth about beavers.
William of Ockham had no beard. The most likely explanation is that it was chewed off by squirrels every morning.
so, does this mean the cia will sooner or later deploy botnets for distributed editwars?
wikipedia might end up as the surprisingly unglamorous battleground of the long-awaited "cyberwarfare"... i mean it's such an inviting target for groups who are out to mess with people's opinions and there's no group that fits that description as good as a gouvernment at war.
[i have an opinion and i am not afraid to use it]
Quite honestly, I move to give literacy tests before giving voting privelidges...
Just so long as one doesn't require spelling tests before giving commenting privileges.
I'm a big tall mofo.
DC underlings all hang out together, drink together, live together and brag incessantly to each other about who is the most important. My guess would be that this has nothing to do with the legislators themselves and everything to do with with interns generating ammunition for trash-talking at Lulu's. The Senators themselves aren't organized enough to be doing this in such large numbers, nor do they know what Wikipedia is. It's the 19-year-olds doing it.
What I'm listening to now on Pandora...
"Wikipedia's mediation method to deal with 'disharmonious users', has been opened to take action against US Congressional staffers who repeatedly blank content and engage in revert wars and slanderous or libelous behavior which violates Wikiepdia code."
Are you sure some of the stuff being removed isn't currently libelous, and would Wikipedia rather get sued. Who's to say that the information is acurate to begin with? Why is the person removing the information assumed to be wrong?
I think they're given too many resources and stick their noses into too much. I want them to do less, not more.
In fact, I'd be happy if they all just sat around all day editing each other's Wikipedia entries.
Honestly, how fucking old are these people? This is complete snafu (on a political level ;). Jimmy Wales should just admin-lock every page regarding the US Politics (Okay, maybe thats a bit too much) and tell them to piss off.
I skimmed over the URL provided. What's the point of banning specific IP addresses when they can do it from their home computer?
Time for some lockdown.In Soviet Russia, trolls elect YOU.
*ducks*
I love that "citation needed" note.
In Repressive Burma, it's not just your connection that dies. slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=314547&cid=20819199
Congratulations, you've pointed out an act of vandalism that once happened on Wikipedia. I wonder what happens if you look at the time-stamp of that edit? Oh, 19:06 Jan 26, and it was corrected 3:25 Jan 27... oh noes, a whole ~8 hrs went with that entry present.
I've looked at countless Wikipedia pages, and only ever found vandalized content when I was digging through histories or linked to it. -1, Empirical wank-session.
If other reasons we do lack, we swear no one will die when we attack
http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2005/12/16
The main offending IP in question is no longer blocked as of 30 January, this morning:
06:36, 30 January 2006 Michael Snow unblocked User:143.231.249.141 (Not consistently used by the same person; we shouldn't block people just because they work for Congress, and some people using this IP address are making commendable efforts at complying with our culture and policies)
Really, politics have always been mean dirty and sometimes life threating. I cannot find the reference but there was a US congressman beaten to death on the floor after making an anti-slavery speech, no suprise that it was done by a southern congressman.
And do you think it is just coincidence that in the British House of Commons the government and the opposition sit 2 sword lenghts apart and the Speaker carrys a mace?
We are dealing with politicians here. They are not the result of some miraculous virgin birth (not even the Republicans or the President). One side has something and the other wants it. It is just going to be interesting to see how far they will go to get it or protect it.
putting the 'B' in LGBTQ+
Am I the only one who, upon reading this, immediately wondered if there's stuff from Real Ultimate Power in the history of the Ninja page? Like how they love to flip out all the time, and how they're totally sweet...?
The "cue the foo posts in 3, 2, 1..." posts will commence with no subsequent foo posts in 3, 2, 1...
Maybe instead of banning them outright, the ip's involved in this matter (or any serious breach of the rules) should not just be banned, but silently rerouted to a server running a different copy of wikipedia. They could make all kinds of 'mistakes' etc there, but only similarly banned ip's would ever see that content. They keep wasting time (and taxpayers money) while the rest of the world would have a chance to do without their contributions to humanity.
Does anybody know of such a system implemented in any forum/community software? I think it would be quite effective.
This space is intentionally staring blankly at you
We Capitol Hill residents call 'em "Congress Critters".
Look, I think the political creatures in Washington are essentially pork-feeding, selfish, backbiting wh0res generally, but let's be honest - they are not alone.
The IP ranges of US Congress have been currently blocked, but only for a week until the issue can be addressed more directly.
This is simply WRONG. I'd wager that a HUGE number of people posting in Wiki are self-interested, or are grinding some sort of political axe.
Just because John Smith isn't actually EMPLOYED by the DNC doesn't mean his revision about President G.W. Bush is automatically based on an altruistic desire to post the truth. One minute reading any intarweb forum will tell you that much.
Roberta Johnson could be posting a revision to the Ted Kennedy article because she's an ardent Republican that hates him. Her edits are somehow more 'valid' than that of a staffer in Cheney's office?
Wikipedia is an open document. The revisions are clear and publicly visible. Why is it all right to censor and prohibit posters whose motivations are obviously suspect, while completely (naively?) ignoring the gazillions of posters whose motivations are probably no less base, but not obviously so?
This is wrong.
-Styopa
Am I the only person who avoids Wikipedia like the plague because of these skewed entries and slanderous edit wars? I know I'm missing out, but after an entry I collaborated was "attacked" by someone who held a different opinion (read: blanked the article until Wiki delete minions got at it) I lost faith in its general ability to harbor legitimate information. I know it's there, but I don't want to have to sift through it. That's what the internet is for.
Bury me in mashed potatoes.
That wasn't originally there, but was added after the original statement by someone else, who left a note saying: "(this may be true, but it needs a source!)".
Stupidity is like nuclear power, it can be used for good or evil. And you don't want to get any on you.
when it's been the frightful beaver all along. Well, we do know that bunnies - with their razor sharp front teeth - are still highly dangerous. I'm told shrubbery or a wood shield can help a person defend themselves. That Holy Grail. It's a vile quest that ensnares only the most upright and honorable. *sigh*
then who protects the congresmen from the people who "engage in revert wars and slanderous or libelous behavior"?
"22 astronauts were born in Ohio. What is it about your state that makes people want to flee the Earth?" Stephen Colbert
I'm particularly amused by the note in subscript after that remarkable claim:
'Citation needed.'
Which gives me a mental image of a wikipedia editor like some genial dusty old university professor saying 'Not that we don't believe you about the deadly beavers, you understand, just that you haven't properly cited a source for this claim of yours...'
Real Daleks don't climb stairs - they level the building.
Heh, even worse, this article is current! :o
Beware: In C++, your friends can see your privates!
FTA: 156.33.*.*
Maybe this'll come in handy someday. Can't imagine what I'd use it for though.
When huge groups of people start sharing information, the powerful lawyers/politicians go nuts and have their staff start deleting things and protect their scheming and lying.
I am so not surprised.
Yet another step toward open and free (both beer and thought) society.
Am I the only one who, upon reading this, immediately wondered if there's stuff from Real Ultimate Power in the history of the Ninja page? Like how they love to flip out all the time, and how they're totally sweet...?
I pray to god you don't edit the Ninja page. You didn't mention a thing about kick-ass guitar solos.
Sweet informative mod.
.. that used to go around with spray cans an do grafitti.. and now instead do stupid edits in wikipedia.. (and become congressional aides apparently)
how about creating 2 separate pages in the wikipedia, one for autobiography and one for biography. The autobiography page would be edited only by that person the page is about (or by those authorized by the said person). The biography would be collaborated by others.
Firstly, I would like to thank my staff for their thorough work of destroying all copies of the memo I sent out asking them to this. I would also like to congratulate them on their exemplary performance in carrying out my instructions to spread my campaign propaganda throughout the wikipedia with such totality, clarity and speed.
There will be a token superficial investigation of the case after which we will conclude that it was infact a justified action to combat the ever-present terrorist threat. I will therefore shortly introduce new legislation outlawing all negative points of view of congresspeople (on the condition that they're from my party) as unpatriotic - this will be billed as an entirely appropriate reaction through careful manipulation of the wikipedia articles on 'terrorists' and '1984_(book)'.
Now bow down, you snivelling peasants!
FGD 135
Some would disagree with you that the tragedy of the commons applies in this case:
"When people reflexively apply this model to open-source cooperation, they expect it to be unstable with a short half-life. Since there's no obvious way to enforce an allocation policy for programmer time over the Internet, this model leads straight to a prediction that the commons will break up, with various bits of software being taken closed-source and a rapidly decreasing amount of work being fed back into the communal pool.
In fact, it is empirically clear that the trend is opposite to this. The trend in breadth and volume of open-source development can be measured by submissions per day at Metalab and SourceForge (the leading Linux source sites) or announcements per day at freshmeat.net (a site dedicated to advertising new software releases). Volume on both is steadily and rapidly increasing. Clearly there is some critical way in which the ``Tragedy of the Commons'' model fails to capture what is actually going on." -- Eric Raymond
Between this article and previous articles concerning the locking of Wikipedia pages, I can't help but wonder if what is happening amounts to some kind of evolution. Depending on how Wiki solves this, what we may see is the system evolving to include some form of the old fashioned, but sometimes maligned model of peer review. Maybe I'm wrong, but it is an interesting process to watch -- especially for somebody (like me) who thinks peer review is good thing.
The first principle is that you must not fool yourself - and you are the easiest person to fool. -Richard Feynman
No one died. Senator Charles Sumner was caned into unconsciousness on the floor of the Senate Chamber, but recovered and continued to serve thereafter. Additionally, it's worth noting that the senator in question was attacked, not for speaking against slavery, but for his personal (very personal, and fairly ugly) verbal attacks against the other two Senators.
I'm sure that you would love to be able to point to this as being an example of how rabid Southern senators were about keeping slavery, but really it's an example of the fact that some people can only be insulted so much before they react irrationally. Seriously - I don't think it matters whether you're a senator or not, I think that if you call enough people "noise-some, squat, and nameless animal . . . not a proper model for an American senator" that sooner or later one of them (or one of their friends) is going to beat the shit out of you. Does that excuse the attack? Of course not. But it wasn't about slavery, it was about pride - and no one died.
Ce n'est pas un vrai mouvement de robot!
www.merkeylaw.com is calling for congress to revoke ection 230 of the communications decency act in order to hold Wikipedia accountable for online libel and harassment.
Glad I'm not the only guy to think the blocking could back-fire. Theoretically (and I'm sure someone will correct me), now members of Congress have standing to sue Wikipedia for an equal rights violation (you give everyone rights to edit information, to even possibly slander the politicians, but do not give those people who are theoretically best able to judge the accuracy that right.)
If they don't watch out, they could find themselves in a free-speech shoot-out with Congress passing laws that wiki owners are responsible for all content posted online, or that hey have a responsibility to get rid of "slanderous" information within a certain period of time.
So far the whole ISPs being protected because they're only allowing the info to go through them protection is, AFAIK, common law and if Congress starts passing laws saying "nope, that's not true... passing along 'bad content' is just as bad as posting 'bad content', printing it in a pamphlet, going on TV and spreading false information..." and then, if you believe in slippery slopes (I don't, but some people do) then before you know it allowing pirated media to pass through your Wifi connection makes you subject to copyright infringement suits because the argument gets made that you're responsible for whatever harm you allow to go live. Yeah, right now it's got protection in the courts, but passing a law could kill that protection.
I'm not saying steps shouldn't be taken, but how about a compromise with perhaps an Official Content seal? The Congressman and his aides are able to add a little icon or whatever to indicate that their changes came from them and is accurate or at least endorsed by them. Then the burden is back on the public: Trust what 3rd parties are saying or trust what the politician says it true. It's not going to change anyone's beliefs one way or the other, but at least the politicians will be happy knowing they can put on a PR campaign warning their knowledgable constituants not to trust Wiki content without their endorsement
This would be the perspective of the staffer. Thanks for sharing, along with the thinly-veiled threat. That's how we know you're probably a young attorney too.
For the record, you know something's wrong when your idiot boss loudly made a point of term limits, and then doesn't quit after that amount of time. Stating that publicly-available factual information is not libelous.
We call these things facts out here in reality-land.
It's a sad state of affairs when we have to block our own goddamn house of government for vandalising public property.
The other half are so dumb they take everything at face value.
You are the one person exactly on the cusp.
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
wikipedia should just lock all subjects that seem to be eliciting frequent editting. it's a sure sign partisan hacks are out and about
incidently, about the ip range block: there is no technological fix for this. that is, there is no technological fix for a creative human with malicious intent. the only antidote for this sort of problem is vigilance by well-meaning humans
wikipedia needs some sort of triage center for controversial subjects where all sides of the issue are heard and nothing gets changed/ added/ deleted without serious debate. no voice should be blocked, all voices should find a route for expressing their concerns. but what makes it in as an actual wikipedia subject entry has to be seriously filtered
because if not, if certain voices are just shut out from wikipedia, next, you will see social conservative assholes saying the whole of wikipedia is a liberal media tool, or some such bs: "it was founded with pornography $!" that wikipedia is a political tool of the left of course is not true, but if wikipedia is painted with a factional partisan brush becuase a faction was denied a voice, it will lose universal appeal, and that would be a shame
factional conservative and liberal voices must be triaged on wikipedia, not squashed, or wikipedia itself will be pilloried by politically vested interests, and then we all lose, as the universality of wikipedia will come to pass
there is no way to rummage out all factionalism and partisan hacks. there is only letting them express themselves and filtering their contributions mightily. locking them out turns them into a voice against wikipedia. and unfortunately, in this world, the most biased voices are almost always the loudest voices on all issues. a shame, but true. don't let them be unleashed against wikipedia, keep them engaged and busy, and FILTERED MIGHTILY
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
It's not that they have too much time on their hands. They consider this a big enough priority to spend time on it instead of other tasks. A politician's first priority is usually their public image. Legislative tasks come second. That's the real problem.
Developers: We can use your help.
Wikipedia is using a democratic process against the US Government. I'll be laughing extra hard next time I hear them defending American freedom and values.
Stasis is death. Embrace change.
Real Ultimate Power is linked in the "See Also" Love it! One time, this Ninja totally flipped out just because this kid looked at him.
This gonna sound kinda sappy, but reading this RFC, or an EFF suit, or a book by Lessig, or even the GPL, really makes me feel like I'm observing a "Founding Fathers Moment," like when the Constitution was drafted. I'm glad there are large, DIVERSE, collectives of rational people trying to define fair rules.
https://www.accountkiller.com/removal-requested
Refusing to route their packets would be a good corrective measure, and even patriotic!
--Mike--
Don't tread on my IP
According the the Catholic priests on South Park, this certainly applies to the beavers of Galgameck.
"The IP ranges of US Congress have been currently blocked, but only for a week until the issue can be addressed more directly."
I'm sure that US Congressional staffers won't have any way to get around that.
I'd give my right arm to be ambidextrous.
Wikipedia wars.
Your flippin tax dollars at work.
I guess none of them know how to use TOR.
You can not have it both ways. You can not everyone edit and contribute except?
If you look several of the senators pages where vandalized. If data was wrong or flat out lies why shouldn't a member of staff or the person themselves edit?
Wikipedia is great for a lot of things but as soon as opinion and not facts come into play it falls apart.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
Wikipedia has some really cool content, but the more generally appealing it becomes, the more it will attract the attention of vandals, propagandists, scammers, spammers, compulsive liars, and other pushers of misinformation.
The takers far outnumber the makers.
Don't you mean statues?
"Beavers explosively attack people with their menacing teeth. They are the most deadly animals alive."
That's the best kind of vandalism. The kind that doesn't actualy remove information or mislead. Take this entry on Paganini: He was widely considered a hardcore motherfucker, and probably the first musician to be a badass. Who cares if that's not true, or in proper encyclopdeaic form? It's fucking hilarious for the handful of people that might ever read it.
I said literacy not spelling.
Please accept my sincere apologies. I should've realized that the ability to spell words properly has nothing to do with the ability to read words properly. How silly of me.
I'm a big tall mofo.
Wikipedia is a valuable resource, but its value will increasingly become tied to the credibility of its authors. Traceability is key to this credibility, and if that means authors must stand or fall on what they write. That may mean authors lose a right of privacy but so be it.
You lost me at "liberal". You always know that a message is completely devoid of actual content when it has to be peppered with liberal this and neocon that and whatever-wing something else in order to keep the audience's attention.
If you want a vision of the future, imagine a youtube comments section scrolling - forever.
Does the uncyclopedia get vandalised by people correcting the jokes with facts?
I'm Feeling Lucky + Santorum != senate page
Well, for a week at least they'll have to work -- rather than just out their surfing the web.
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
Without having looked to deeply into the depth of his methods an increase in the volume of new open source projects does not nessesarily imply that the overall ammount of work being fed into the communal pool is increasing. If everyone is writing their own web browser from scratch, that would be less work overall than everyone working on a few web browsers. Tragedy of the Commons must be applied to an individual common, that is any one project at a time.
T Money
World Domination with a plastic spoon since 1984
and these people are running our country...
Perhaps no citation because nobody who has been attacked by beavers has ever lived to tell the tale?
I'd be willing to be that many of us have been bored interns before, and when you're unpaid, bored, and don't have much to do, starting stupid Wiki wars with each other all the while making their bosses look bad.
If you've ever been an unpaid intern in a position like this, you may know what I'm talking about.
Blow up congress.
Wikipedia should just ban all content reguarding active politicians because they cant behave themselves.
Simple. Children should be spanked.
... backing that claim up with hard evidence would have been easy (that's the legendary blood-thirsty rabbit of Caerbannog in case you are wondering)
Only to idiots, are orders laws.
-- Henning von Tresckow
Ok, not to encourage this but I just refreshed the wikipedia beaver page about 5 times and watched the text literally changing before my eyes. The slashdot effect - in stop motion capture!
1. Do some silly and stupid on wikipedia.
2. Escalate it into a conflict.
3. Raise it into mediation level (or fail to do so)
4. Find there is a consensus against your actions.
5. Bitch about it in wider media, where you can assume no one knows what you actually did, or is familiar enough with wikipedia guidelines to realise what you did wrong.
6. ???
7. Profit!!
Do you know what a Strawman Argument is? If not, you have a natural gift for them. Bravo!
-1, Congressional Troll ?
I wonder if/when Wikipieda will implement a moderation/meta-moderation system, maybe something like Slashdot's? I don't think Wikipedia contributors should be banned, not even anonymous users from "trollful" IP addresses. Anonymous public speech is important for public discourse. However, maybe a moderation system could help slow the trolls.
cpeterso
They seem to be unstoppable in that regard.
Anyone else recall the current Pope's modifications? For at least a couple days, he had an interesting picture caption.
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Pope_Ben edict_XVI&oldid=35921512#Friendship_with_Jesus_Chr ist
And another one was when he had Palpatine as his image for what was several days as well, though it was taken down.
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Pope_Ben edict_XVI&direction=prev&oldid=12526972
Luckily though, someone got a shot of it.
http://sotto.org/2005/04/19/the_first_sith_pope/
I predict that this type of thing is going to happen a LOT more in the future, as Wikipedia becomes more popular and used as a resource by the mainstream public. What celebrity or political figure is going to sit by and have negative details posted at their entry? Corporations will certainly make sure that their pages are squeaky clean. How long before the page for "Microsoft" or "McDonalds" is being checked daily or hourly by paid staff to alter any critical material as soon as it is posted?
With staffers replying to all in slandering emails last year and now this, wiki can just block the IPs and disaster averted! Everyone knows that staffers are not smart enough to just log in from home :)
*edits*
He did now.
I'm a big retard who forgot to log out of Slashdot on Mike's computer! LOOK AT ME.
The internet brings out the worst is some people. Wikipedia is no different then anyplace else in the net.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
That wasn't the policy they applied to my high school.
I am trolling
I spent some time researching this but it just took too long. I'd love an easily-usable directory of government-owned netblocks.
Build a man a fire, he's warm for one night. Set him on fire, and he's warm for the rest of his life.
It simply doesn't get more righteous than that.
Get thee glass eyes, and, like a scurvy politician, seem to see things thou dost not.--King Lear
"I found an error in my wiki-bio." Wikipedia sucks!
"Wikipedia doesn't suck! If you find an error, just fix it!"
"I can't fix it, I'm a Congressman."
The Tragedy of the Commons has nothing to do with what you're talking about, and vice versa.
The Tragedy of the Commons has to do with the inefficient allocation of common resources. We're talking about people not having any incentive to limit their consumption of fish from a lake, for instance. Not only do they not have any incentive to limit the number of fish that they catch, but they may actually be better off if they catch more fish before everyone else does.
Your talk about there always being "trolls" has nothing to do with a purely economic situation.
Cyric Zndovzny at your service.
Lenin used this in a way. Basically if you repeat a lie often enough then it becomes a truth.
"Everyone is watching this show tonight on TV. Everyone is watching this show tonight on TV. Everyone is watching this show tonight on TV. Everyone is watching this show tonight on TV." and pretty soon, what do ya know? Everyone is INDEED watching that show tonight on TV.
If you tell a lie often enough, it becomes a truth. THAT is Leninism. It has been used by BOTH US political parties as well as marketing types and political interestes forever.
So the idea that the general population ALWAYS knows what is best is VERY dangerous to society. One of the things the Constitution attempts to stifile is mob rule. That is the Republic of our Democratic-Republic.
Libertas in infinitum
From the link you gave:
Sumner accused Andrew Butler of taking "a mistress . . . who, though ugly to others, is always lovely to him; though polluted in the sight of the world, is chaste in his sight -- I mean," added Sumner, "the harlot, Slavery."
How is this a personal attack? Sounds to me like he's attacking Butler's stance on slavery.
Sumner did personally attack another Senator, Stephen Douglas, but it was "Representative Preston Brooks, Butler's South Carolina kinsman" who caned Sumner.
It's clear that these men's respective stances on slavery were very much involved.
"How long did it take for the Supreme Court to figure out that black people and women were people? A long time, but it did eventually take place."
How long will it take the Supreme Court to figure out that fetuses are human people?
Liberals go to great lengths to protect bird eggs, turtle eggs, special monitoring and care of pregnant endangered species (like pandas, etc.) -- but human fetuses? Slice and dice baby!! Hypocrites.
Maybe Wikipedia should have a mirror hosted inside the Library of Congress, and make it read-only...
Fortunetly, someone fixed that mistake. Thanks for pointing it out!
Q: What happens when trolls go prefessional?
A: They run for Congress.
And the corollary. Politicians are born with this statement: "That was fun. The only thing that could make it better is getting paid for it..."
Sure I'm paranoid, but am I paranoid enough?
This is perfect proof that, given two interested parties and debatable facts, a public document editor cannot be used an authority.
Score one for Britannica http://www.britannica.com/
Beware: I believe all are created equal, and have the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
The IP ranges of US Congress have been currently blocked
I'm not sure what good that'll do; they'll just make their edits from private IP addresses.
-Rich
I rest my case.
I suspect they've heard a lot about this and have learned their lesson!
Your logic if it makes sense, well America shouldnt be the best because we always cooperate during times of war, and always seem to win. So now you are saying we shouldnt have a strong military?
Strong military means cooperation, because you cannot have a strong defense if you have no unity, if its every man, woman, child, for his or herself, what you have here is exactly that, every man, woman, child, for his or herself, a giant prison.
Look in prison to see how life is when the strongest compete with each other.
Look at a corporation like Google to see when the strongest cooperate with each other.
You can make more money by cooperating with Microsoft than by competition. You can make more money by buying Microsoft and forming a super company than by competition. If what you say is to make any sense then it has to apply to corporations not just individuals.
You have your opinion, but if you post something like that please back it up with something. Otherwise you'll basically have Slashdot rate you as troll and turn against you in unity.
I don't see what the big deal is. Why should we run out of fish? Just create more. Why should we only fish in one lake?
You sound like a terrorist. If you want a revolution, go to Cube or talk to Hugo Chavez, but it's ridiculous for you to even think of revolution here. It's even more stupid to post your thoughts on Slashdot, I mean if you are a terrorist you arent a very smart terrorist.
There will be no revolution. The reason? People don't want a revolution. The people on the internet complaining about civil liberties arent the people who actually care about civil liberties. The people who actually care about civil liberties are in prison.
Face it, if you want more freedom, you'll go straight to jail, so just accept having no freedom and be a good citizen. It's what our parents wanted all along isnt it?
Look, slavery never ended, racism never ended, poverty never ended, and peoples minds havent changed much. People still think the same, the same personality types dominate, and nothing much has changed.
Now that the obvious has been stated, accept that you are going to either be a slave or a slave master, and figure out how to profit so you can buy your freedom before you go into debt.
I don't mean to insult women, I love women, but lets be honest here. Society is run by men not women. When there is a female president, that is when women are truly free. When Hilary Clinton wins the election, this is when women are people.
Currently, women are just property, as are minorities and anyone who does not make millions. Look, if you arent a millionaire by now, you should choose your slave master, because in federalism, you are someone elses property, and you own property.
Who owns who, is defined and decided by how much money and power you have.
I suppose there is more security in a world where everyone is owned by someone else.
Congress declares trolling illegal.
Congress trolls internet.
Congress breaks the law.
Profit.
It's business as usual in the swamp known as DC.
Someone hates these cans.
I never said a violent revolution. I'm saying if you have a chip in you and you are watched 24/7, you'll be too afraid of your boss to even think of revolution.
Revolution? By who? Some computer geeks on the internet? Most people don't care about cyberspace, maybe thats why theres so much freedom in cyberspace, but what happens once people decide to control cyberspace?
I don't think there will be a revolution, but hey if there is a revolution, I won't be a party of it. The revolution will be rich millionaire vs rich millionaire, it will be Bill Gates vs Rockefeller vs Larry Page vs Warner vs whoever is in the billionaire boys club. I guarentee you that you'll have nothing to do with it because you don't have the money to bribe politicians, hire lobbyists, and I doubt you have the political wit to even control your state party or even your block. Look, some street gang controls your block, then the mayor controls them, then the governor controls the mayor, and so on. You know the system. You are a civilian, so unless you control a billion dollar corporation, you arent going to get far leading a revolution.
I suggest you change your mind, I'd hate to see you end up in some prison getting tortured all day and night. Is it worth it? Years of torture? How does that sound?
Definitely.
nothing else to do now that jeff ganon aint around anymore
The even worse thing is that Slashdot trolls are a whole hell of a lot better at writing content that starts off plausible-sounding than our national leaders. The CongressTrolls, on the other hand, made tons of blatant edits that managed to get them banned.
It's not just that the people running the country are trolls. It's that they're incompetent trolls. Surely, if you work in politics, you'd be expected to know how to manipulate public opinion, write and speak convincingly, and know how to convey an image. I would think that if you possess these fairly basic skills, that you'd be a good troll.
Any program relying on (nontrivial) preemptive multithreading will be buggy.
I heard that a law prohibiting "annoying speech" on the Internet was introduced recently. Some people argued that it might be abused against websites containing criticism meant for the public eye, while in theory the law is probably meant to mimic similar legislation against telephone harassment aimed at individual recipients.
Now, if having to repeatedly undo political graffiti sprayed all over your encyclopedic work-in-progress by your elected representatives isn't annoying to you, I don't know what is. If that law is to be used at all, wouldn't it be nice to see it first used in accordance with its purpose, rather than counter to it?
I ignored Wikipedia in the start, convinced that it couldn't work.
/..
Then I started being refered to Wikipedia as the source for information on various obscure subjects more and more often.
And now I do a bit of editing myself, when I know something in an area that is not that popular.
There are a few kooks, and some editors clearly have emotional problems that ought to keep them away from collaboratory projets. But the vast majority of people and edits are constructive. I believe nine out of ten edits to text I have written have been for the better. I had not expected that. This is much better than any other well-known place I have seen on the net, including
I even did a few minor edits to the Goerge W. Bush article, without getting dragged into a figth.
Wikipedia works better than it has any right to do.
(The English version that is)
No no, that excerpt was just mistitled. It should have been under "The Beaver".
This is a joke! Washingtons politicians aren't your typical wiki-editors. These guys have money, power, and a large support base to back them up.
"Hello? Oh, hi John? Those bastards at Wikipedia blocked your staffers' IP addresses? Not a problem. I'll just hire some temps to do the editing out of their own homes."
You can't stop an open document from being edited.
Because when I was writing my post pointing out the time-span of the edits, I initially believed it to be much shorter (up until the next edit, since generally vandalism seems to be reverted on the next immediate edit). But no, the next edit was indeed the addition of the bizarre citation requirement.
If other reasons we do lack, we swear no one will die when we attack
Thank you, Millenniumman, that was the joke.
Help us build a better map!
the politicians probably heard about that journalist that got implicated in the Kennedy assasination (or something similar) & instantly sprouted a new fear. Perhaps they even felt proactive.
Not that this statement is corroborated by any evidence.
Do you have any idea of what you are talking about?
Female Prison Rape in NY
The whole argument of Wikipedia not being sued for libelous material on their site was that people could change it back. Find a false-hood, change it. Now you're saying they have to find a false-hood, pass it along to a third party or hope that someone likes them more than hates them (and everyone naturally has a bias against politicians) and cross thier fingers that said false-hood gets taken down.
In trying to fix what they perceive as falsehoods (whether they are or not, you know the Congressman is going to say they are) OTHERS are going back in and reposting the inflamatory material. The ones posting this inflamatory material aren't being blocked though, it's the ones trying to "fix" it.
Bye-bye to the whole "don't like it? Fix it!" arguement, hello lawsuits saying Wiki isn't taking steps to prevent libelous material. They just need to prove 1 wrong thing has been posted/exists somewhere in relation to some US citizen and they've got standign to go to court. Wiki can stand there saying "but most of our stuff is good" but, alas, will it be enough.
Pick a better argument.
When the going get's looney the looney turn pro ...or something like that
I'm pretty sure that henry david spent some ink extoling the virtues of the loon, but maybe I'm think of something about him rather than by him... A play titled "the Night Thoreau Spent in Jail" maybe? It seems like the stuff about loons in Walden was a little subtle for me to grasp other than this ivy league slacker thought it was more fun to watch the loons go about their business than it was to kill and eat them. Ummmm, loon .
Still, all in all, I think we could do with more loons and fewer congressional pages. It seems the only good that these pages do is keep congresmen off the street by having illicit trysts with them. And, as we all, know when these congresmen aren't screwing their pages they're screwing the whole country. I guess the escallation to wikipedia has them getting into some strange stuff beyond the nation's borders too.
Yes. Think about all the people working on Firefox. Now imagine all of those people instead of working on Firefox working on their own personal browser. The end result is less is accomplished and less work overall is done.
T Money
World Domination with a plastic spoon since 1984
Okay, assume for jest a second that the congressional aides are doing this as part of their professional duties, on the clock so to speak. We know that they're doing it on the clock 'cause their doing it on the company network (uhgh, I sense my kettle turning black). A "company" network that is funded by us regular working stiffs who don't have pages about us on wikipedia BTW.
So the boss man has command the aides, pages, and other assorted (or sorid as the case may be) agents to un-besmirch the boss' entry on wickedpedia. What's to stop same form utterring "Takest thy laptop and goest tho forth unto that place that is known as STARBUCKS. There you shall find a network that clean and unblemished."
> The end result is less is accomplished and less work overall is done
less work != less accomplishment, and vice versa. People can do a shitload of work and have nothing to show for it. It does not mean they did no work. Otherwise, theoretical physicists are all worthless and don't deserve to get paid a dime, ever, unless their theories immediately pan out to working products.
That is simply not the case.
No, moderators need to be paid. If you do not pay them money to adhere to fair rules, they will try to get their payment in other forms, usually involving eploiting their special status as moderator.
This space is intentionally staring blankly at you
Doing a shit ton of work with nothing to show for it is the equivilent of doing no work. If you don't believe me, just shift the same papers arround all day at work tomorrow and then tell your boss that you're actualy doing work and that this is inherrently better than you doing no work at all.
T Money
World Domination with a plastic spoon since 1984
That's a very good point, about languages I mean.
Just look at the juxtaposition between the languagesEsperanto and Ido. Esperantists are almost universally altruistic and sentimental about their language and the whole movement it represents. Supporters of Ido on the other hand are striving to popularize their "improved" version of the same language ("Ido" means "child") by hook or by crook. The difference is evident in examining the Wikipedia statistics for the two languages.
The Esperanto Wikipedia has more content and a higher ratio of users per page of content. Its articles tend to be more detailed and they have logged many more edits per article, mostly correction and augmentation, and the Esperanto page view count is high, indicating that their content is being actively used.
The Ido Wikipedia, with half as many content pages, has only a tenth the number of users. Their articles show a striking similarity to those in the Esperanto Wikipedia, probably because Esperanto is easily translated into Ido. (A Perl script could do the bulk of it.) However, the Ido page view count is abysmally low. Apparently, nobody reads the Ido Wikipedia.
"What's wrong with that?" one might ask. The answer is that the Idists are deliberately misrepresenting their language and themselves. They present it as though it were soon to replace Esperanto altogether. Their high page-count was a deliberate effort in this same direction. They have, in the past, published web pages with photos of beautiful young women (models, of course) to promote their pet language.
So for Ido the Wikipedia is only a tool of propaganda and misinformation. "Just look at how many articles there are!" But for Esperanto it's the real thing; articles translated from more than a dozen other languages (and then back into still other languages from the Esperanto) and referenced on a regular basis by a community of thousands (including real beautiful young women) who actively use the language on a daily basis.
I don't know about other languages but yes, the nature of the wiki depends heavily upon the culture and the motives of the people who work on the articles.
I'm not saying tribes did not have small scale wars. Most tribal wars however were nothing like the sorts of world wars that industrial society has had.
Tribal wars usually lasted days, maybe months, and were faught between families who were trained and agreed to fight. Usually the strongest won, and the tribes would then come to an agreement.
Tribal wars were avoided through the use of marijuana, tabacco, rituals, religion, and other methods which made up the government. Overall, if you look at how America, Africa, and many tribal countries were before Europe became the global power, it seems that things were going fine. If you go back even beyond that point back to Rome, Rome had many of the same problems and collapsed. If you go to Egypt, Egypt eventually collapsed. Growth can be good, but when government grows too big, and when people are undereducated, this reduces security in itself.
If you look at North Korea, very strong centralized government, extreme discipline, extreme laws, extreme control over the population. We have to at some point decide to set the tone, and make up some basic rules on human rights. If America is to be the world leader, it has to also be the moral leader. Right now I don't think we look very good to the global community, and this weakens America.
War always existed, but the scale and types of wars are moving in a bad direction. A non-violent war should be favorable over a violent war. Diplomacy should be used more often, and if there are to be actual wars, the scale has to be controlled. A nuclear war, or using some of the biological weapons, could literally wipe humanity out, and once nano-technology arrives, if we move onto nano-viruses and weapons, its safe to say that humanity will use these weapons on itself and be wiped out.
At one point, PC's did not have viruses, but eventually someone wrote a virus, and this started the virus wars. Now you have to worry about getting a virus from every file you open, you have to worry about worms, and things only become more sophisticated as the technology advances. Is this what we want for nano-technology? It does not take a rocket scientist to see where we are headed if we keep going.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/artic le/2006/02/03/AR2006020302610.html