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Wikipedia Actively Battling PR Sockpuppets

Posted by Soulskill on from the citation-needed dept.

Nerval's Lobster writes "Over the weekend we discussed news that PR firms have been selling their ability to modify Wikipedia entries to help clients clean up their image. Now, the Wikimedia Foundation's executive director has confirmed that Wikipedia editors are actively engaged in a wide-ranging battle against those PR firms. Over the past couple weeks, those editors have isolated several hundred user accounts linked to people 'paid to write articles on Wikipedia promoting organizations or products,' according to Sue Gardner. Those users' accounts violate Wikipedia's guidelines, 'including prohibitions against sockpuppetry and undisclosed conflicts of interest.' Some 250 suspicious user accounts have already been nuked. Correcting biased text is a thankless job for those Wikipedia editors — the literary-world equivalent of killing endless hordes of zombies approaching your protective fence. But that job gets even harder when a PR agency deploys dozens, or even hundreds of writers to systematically adjust clients' Wikipedia pages."

8 of 166 comments (clear)

  1. Wikipedia is an MMO by mythosaz · · Score: 5, Interesting

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_is_an_MMORPG

    1. Re:Wikipedia is an MMO by Moryath · · Score: 5, Insightful

      No kidding. So many burnt-up, cynical admins who think that they can just do what they want and abuse people - because they pretty much can. Look at the way Toddst1 treats people as a great example of how crappy Wikipedia culture really is.

      Every time I see a story about Wikipedia, I remember this from years ago. And I chuckle, because that corrupt place hasn't changed one bit since. They have a new crop of Essjays now, and the Durova List behavior is alive and well too.

  2. Thankless. Well let me be the first to say by deathcloset · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Thank you!

  3. A pox on all PR/marketing firms by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Is there anything at all that advertising and marketing firms can't turn to shit? Anything?

    I say name 'em and shame 'em. Where is a list of companies and people that have hired a PR firm to manage Wikipedia articles? Once I know, I'll never deal with them.

  4. Microsoft have been doing this since 2007 by tuppe666 · · Score: 5, Interesting

    To show there is nothing new under the sun...ironically from the wikipedia entry "On January 24, 2007, Rick Jelliffe made claim on his blog that a Microsoft employee offered to pay him to make corrections in Wikipedia articles concerning Office Open XML" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticism_of_Microsoft

  5. 3 domains of verifiability by deathcloset · · Score: 5, Interesting
    I wonder what articles have been targeted? (maybe a comment posted concurrently with my composition will list them).

    To speculate - I've noticed that articles on wikipedia fall into the three broad categories, unsurpisingly the same as those of nouns: 1) people, 2) places, 3) things.

    3) "Things" articles are the 'simplest' to disentangle or find the truth of because "things" include works of art, mathematics, science and physical objects. It's easy to tell a lie when an article says that the hit song, "I feel good" is written by Mozart, or when an article claims gravity makes things fall up. These claims are relatively easy to test or refute. The problem with these types of articles is they may require some real expertise (especially philosophical and mathematical articles) to verify - but that is also their virtue

    2) "Places" articles (which include 'historical events') become more difficult because often these places do not exist any more, or the events usually have already happened, usually a really long time ago. These articles suffer the classic problems of history multiplied by the power of the internet.

    1) "People" articles. These articles are rife with arguments over what actions events in a person's life are significant, and what elements of those actions are significant. The words chosen to describe a person can make all the difference - he was a "Great Leader" or he was a "Good Leader" - which one best describes Hitler*?

    So I would venture that this firm has targeted articles in categories 1 and 2, although I guess there maybe product articles in category 3 which could be gainfully modified.

    Ah the truth of things. And the relative truth of places and people ;)

    *you graciously forgive this overused example.

    1. Re:3 domains of verifiability by icebike · · Score: 5, Interesting

      If you read some press stories about the sock puppet companies they are mostly targeting products or corporations, attempting to manage commercial reputation.

      In truth, this is not always unwarranted. When someone writes about the rash of Brakes failures on Toyota vehicles, the company ought to be able to have a clearly labeled Official Response position, rather than having them feel forced to resort to sockpuppetry to get some actual facts, or corporate nattering as the case may be, across.

      Having policies in place that forbid official statements just begs for sockpuppet tactics. There have been cases where authors of books had their remarks removed because they were not considered a credible source for information about their own books.

      Furthermore, it would seem that as long as the sockpuppet was indicated, in a foot note, as a paid source of a product or company, that fact alone should make the posting more official and credible rather than less so. Who is more authoritative on the capabilities of a product than the manufacturer? Some random user perhaps?

      --
      Sig Battery depleted. Reverting to safe mode.
  6. Re:Free Market by ebno-10db · · Score: 5, Funny

    The free market has determined that your organs are worth more than you as a whole.