US Government Caught Manipulating Wikipedia 471
surfi writes "As The Inquirer points out, someone with a House of Representatives IP address has been feeding propaganda into the 'invasion of Iraq' article on Wikipedia."
Well at least they are in good company with trustworthy institutions like
the CIA and the Vatican.
Use /. moderation on wikipedia (Score:3, Interesting)
I've had this happen so very rarely edit.
What is needed is a
New Slashdot Story Template (Score:3, Interesting)
[INSERT GROUP HERE] Caught Manipulating Wikipedia
This has now become so commonplace that it really shouldn't surprise anyone or even be considered news. Answer this question: they've been "caught" -- now what? Will Jimmy Wales declare war on the U.S. Government or the Catholic Religion? This isn't even going to generate enough interest in the mainstream media to become a blip on the national radar. I also imagine the average American or Catholic probably doesn't even know what Wikipedia is.
Re:They're not that stupid (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Whoa, whoa, whoa (Score:2, Interesting)
The Fox News reporter might say something like this "Some say that Nancy Pelosi is sexually attracted to Laura Bush." The reporter didn't say it, a named source didn't say it, no SOME said it. Who's some? The trick here is that the reporter managed to get his own opinion into the story under the guise of journalism.
Journalists are journalists because they source the facts in their stories. Encyclopedias do as well. What this house office did was to just interject their own opinions into the article without sourcing them by using the old standby "SOME SAY."
Count the instances of the word "SOME" in the edits you see. The edits were intended to corrupt the article with unsourced opinions.
Re:Whoa, whoa, whoa (Score:5, Interesting)
Substantive links that would justify an invasion on their own with no other reason or purpose were disproved. But various links existed nonetheless.
I included a link that showed the government found Al Qaeda ties in Iraq years before Bush took office. Just because someone doesn't source and cite everything with endless streams of URLs from people who have nothing better to do than construct their own perfect view of the world on Wikipedia doesn't mean it's not still true. If there are no sources AND is not true, it will most certainly be reversed in short order.
Unfortunately, the simple fact is that most people who regularly edit Wikipedia are very likely to prefer the article's older form, which ignores the nuance and difficulties of acknowledging there actually were ties, since it doesn't fit into the neat little box of "everything the administration says or does is a lie". Don't get me wrong: I think Wikipedia does a fairly good job. Damned good, in fact. But there is a LOT of bias in a lot of articles, and it's no surprise that bias tilts toward the views of majority of the demographic doing most of the edits.
Just because a little number isn't floating in the air next to one of the edits doesn't make it untrue. The fact of the matter is that all of these edits were actually increasing the accuracy of the article, weasel words and all. Using weasel words is sometimes the only way to quickly update an article where people are making sweeping statements and conclusions that are, quite simply, incorrect. So yes, "some people" believe that any ties to Al Qaeda were disproved. But that's not correct. At all. By all rights, that entire section should be rewritten to accurately represent the situation.
I think the last edit sums it up:
Such a link was never suggested by President Bush or the Bush administration as a justification for the invasion [emphasis mine]; rather, that such a relationship existed at all is seen as compelling.
And indeed it was.
Re:Hey, it's our friend in intelligence! (Score:1, Interesting)
1. My views are my own.
2. I am not paid, by anyone, for any reason, at any time, to post comments on slashdot on articles such as this.
3. The fact that I am actually open about my identity, interests, and affiliations is seen by you as an indictment of anything I say, whereas somehow your thoughts are inexplicably pure with you being completely anonymous. Curious. By your logic, you could just as easily be running an information campaign for Leftist causes, or possibly even for a US adversary. I mean, after all, anyone could just look at your prior posts, to confirm that, right?
I find it funny - perhaps "telling" would be a more accurate word - that you don't seem to address the actual content of my comments here any longer. Instead, you just accuse me of spewing propaganda and direct people to my home page to somehow "prove" that anything I say can't be trusted. The other thing I find amusing is that you feel that somehow invalidates anything I say. How is any correct statement or compelling argument any less respectively correct or compelling on that basis?
Would it make you feel better if I was completely anonymous? Or is your sense of balance in the universe preserved by the belief that I must be a paid propaganda mouthpiece on slashdot, instead of a living, breathing, thinking person with views that differ from your own?
It's pretty sad, spun. From our previous conversations, you seem like a pretty nice person. But the fact that you are behaving the way you have been toward me recently makes me reconsider that assumption.
Re:They're not that stupid (Score:2, Interesting)
[Starting to get OT] Re:They're not that stupid (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Use /. moderation on wikipedia (Score:3, Interesting)
and if the Wikipedia mods meta meta moderate
From what I've been hearing so far, they've been doing a bit too much of that already.
I agree in general though, it would be good to detect shenanigans and any sort of oscillatory flame war.
Re:They're not that stupid (Score:3, Interesting)
Military Suicides No I'm not counting that because it isn't true. Here are the most recent numbers I could find: FYI, the average among that age group is 13 per 100,000.
Also from the story: Iraqi Casualties I don't count them all as terrorists or enemy combatants, though some of them are. According to IraqBodyCount.org [iraqbodycount.org] there have been about 78,000 to 85,000 deaths due to violence in Iraq since 2003. It doesn't indicate how many of those were perpetrated by other Iraqis. Then you shouldn't have much to worry about for much longer. Considering how much you overstated your other "facts", I think I'll take this one with a grain of salt as well.