Udhay Shankar N wrote: [ on 05:58 PM 12/4/2007 ]
Dirty Laundry coming out (via Eugen)
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/12/04/wikipedia_secret_mailing/
And some more follow up here:
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/12/06/wikipedia_and_overstock/
This appears to be playing out in classic abuse-of-power style.
Here's the bit that is especially thought-provoking:
If you ask Judd Bagley and Patrick Byrne what's going on, they'll tell
you the ban is part of much larger attempt to discredit their views on
naked shorting. They believe that a small group of people is using
Wikipedia as means of controlling public opinion.
"When you think of how the public consciousness of an issue can
develop, one of the first things that's going to happen in today's age
is people are going to Google the issue and then read the Wikipedia
article that comes up," Byrne says. "So if you can control that
article, you can really deflect the discourse."
Whatever the motives behind it, there's no doubt that the Wikipedia
inner circle rules those four articles with an iron fist. And as
Charles Ainsworth points out, this puts a cloud over the entire
encyclopedia.
"Wikipedia, in its way, is of great benefit to the web community," he
says. "But I've also been greatly dismayed that Wikipedia has
apparently attracted some intelligent but problematic personalities
with ambition, secret personal agendas, and cold, ruthless behavior
towards other editors and ideas that they perceive as threatening
their power, position, or agendas. What's disheartening is that Jimbo
and the rest of the Wikimedia Foundation not only don't do anything
about it, but they appear to support these charlatans to some degree."
"When Bagley attempted to level the playing field, he was banished
immediately," Ainsworth continues. "Obviously, there's something
seriously wrong with the way Wikipedia is being managed and
administered. I don't know if it threatens the long-term viability of
the project or not, but it is cause for concern among those of us who
spend a lot of hours actually trying to write quality articles."
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((Udhay Shankar N)) ((udhay @ pobox.com)) ((www.digeratus.com))
