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Phony Wikipedia Entry Used By Worldwide Press
Hugh Pickens writes "A quote attributed to French composer Maurice Jarre was posted on wikipedia shortly after his death in March and later appeared in obituaries in mainstream media. 'One could say my life itself has been one long soundtrack. Music was my life, music brought me to life, and music is how I will be remembered long after I leave this life. When I die there will be a final waltz playing in my head, that only I can hear,' Jarre was quoted as saying. However, these words were not uttered by the Oscar-winning composer but written by Shane Fitzgerald, a final-year undergraduate student, who said he wanted to show how journalists use the internet as a primary source for their stories. Fitzgerald posted the quote on Wikipedia late at night after news of Jarre's death broke. 'I saw it on breaking news and thought if I was going to do something I should do it quickly. I knew journalists wouldn't be looking at it until the morning,' The quote had no referenced sources and was therefore taken down by moderators of Wikipedia within minutes. However, Fitzgerald put it back up a few more times until it was finally left up on the site for more than 24 hours. While he was wary about the ethical implications of using someone's death as a social experiment, he had carefully generated the quote so as not to distort or taint Jarre's life, he said. 'I didn't expect it to go that far. I expected it to be in blogs and sites, but on mainstream quality papers? I was very surprised.'"
I, for one, welcome our revisionist-history overlords!
Kid-proof tablet..
"First Post"
-Maurice Jarre
i think that perhaps news that the composer was on his deathbed was leaked and this guy put his wiki entry in. then the composer decided to check the interweb before checking out and realized he had final words to utter. and now he's a decomposer.
I understand those words individually, but when you put them together like that they don't make sense.
"Our two-party system is like a bowl of shit looking at itself in a mirror." - Lewis Black
I've pretty much given up on articles without citations. I don't find them particularly interesting any more because they beg too many questions in the light of skepticism. Perhaps the eventual fallout of this sort of thing will be that others have the same attitude :) Also a very good reason to cite Wikipedia with a permalink (which the cite link will do for you) as it will let people at least know WHY you said something TOTALLY WRONG.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
And they tell me I can't use Wikipedia as a source for my high school research papers... Please, if the press can do it, I can do it.
godaddy can cut this cost in half for you.
Fine then, let's try this:
In Soviet Russia, Wikipedia rewrites you!
Kid-proof tablet..
Check facts (Y/N):> Y
Option not available. Please try another option.
Check facts (Y/N):> N
Publish article (Y/N):> Y
After logging in slashdot still does not take you back to the page you were on. It's been that way for 20 years.
You don't even have to know that AIG isn't a bank!