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The Rise of Paid Wikipedia Consulting

Posted by samzenpus on from the history-belongs-to-the-typers dept.

jfruh writes "Roger Bamkin is a director at Wikimedia UK; he also is on retainer for the government of the British territory of Gibraltar, and has nominated and approved Gibraltar-related articles for the "Did You Know" box on the Wikipedia front page. Maximilian Klein runs a business called UntrikiWiki, and advertises his services by saying "A positive Wikipedia article is invaluable SEO." Are such users violating the spirit of what Wikipedia is about? Or should we trust that the wisdom of crowds will offset obvious shilling?"

2 of 85 comments (clear)

  1. Dupe? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Informative

    http://news.slashdot.org/story/12/09/19/0414235/wikipedia-scandal-high-profile-users-allegedly-involved-in-paid-editing

  2. "Wisdom of crowds" by Arancaytar · · Score: 4, Informative

    Possibly used to apply to Wikipedia 6 or 7 years ago. Then its rise in popularity caused trolling and political shilling to become more attractive, libel lawsuits for living person biographies to become a danger, and an increasing obsession with "notability" (ie. having spawned at least one internet meme) to develop. Preventing the former and enforcing the latter required a tight and locked down command structure. Any moderately popular article is locked to anonymous edits now.

    That means Wikipedia is no longer dependent on the wisdom of crowds, but the incorruptibility of its management and directorial staff.

    Whoops.