Wikipedia's Lamest Edit Wars

Hugh Pickens DOT Com writes "Who says Wikipedians don't have a sense of humor? While perusing Wikipedia I recently came across an article documenting the lamest examples of wikipedia edit wars over the most trivial things. As one wikipedian says: 'Some discussions are born lame; some achieve lameness; some have lameness thrust upon them.' A few of the most amusing examples include: Was Chopin Polish, French, Polish–French, or French–Polish? Can you emigrate from a country of which you are not a citizen? Can you receive citizenship if you already have it? The possibilities for intensive study are endless. Next up, Are U2 an 'Irish band' or simply a band that happen to be from Ireland, since two of their members were born in the UK? A heated discussion took place for over two-and-a-half weeks that resulted in at least one editor getting blocked and many more getting warnings. Next, should members of the Beatles be listed in the 'traditional' order or in alphabetical order? Another edit war which flares up continuously in The Beatles involves whether to identify the band as 'The Beatles' with a capital T or 'the Beatles' with a lower case t. The issue became so contentious it merited an article in the Wall Street Journal. One such installment of this saga was brought before the arbitration committee (by an administrator, no less) where it was quickly declared 'silly.' Next, Is J. K. Rowling's name pronounced like 'rolling' or to rhyme with 'howling'? Rowling is on record claiming she pronounces her name like 'rolling'. An irate editor argues that this is a 'British' pronunciation and the 'American" pronunciation of her name should also be noted. 'This is slightly ridiculous as she is English, and therefore of course will pronounce it in an English manner. Perhaps it rhymes with "Trolling"?' Finally did Jimmy Wales found Wikipedia or co-found it? 'Not surprisingly, those who actually were around at the time and know the answer stayed far away from this one. The casualty list has yet to be compiled, but no doubt editor egos will be among the worst hit.'"

Years ago, I was involved in an edit war.

[Lord Kano]

Namely, this was in the page for Desiree Washington, the woman that Mike Tyson was convicted of raping.

In the section about the rape accusation, trial and conviction of Mike Tyson, I added information about a previous false allegation made by Ms. Washington against a high school friend.

Someone reverted my change with a cryptic comment about "BLP". I saw it a few days later and re-created my change. Again, my change was reverted with more comments about "BLP".

This was several years ago so I don't remember exactly what was said back and forth but the gist of it is that the other party thought that there was something in the wikipedia rules about the "Biographies of Living Persons" that prevented me from including the information about the false rape allegations Desiree Washington made in the past. I challenged the person to show specifically where BLP precluded me from including this information, they could not so I restored my change.

Apparently this other editor had wikipedia political connections because I received a "Warning" for making my edits. I was willing to be banned over this because for me it's about the principle of the thing. If wikipedia is a free encyclopedia that anyone can edit, I was going to make sure that this factual information was included. Hell, I can generate throw-away email addresses and wikipedia accounts. I'm not sure who resolved this but what happened in the end was that Desiree Washington's page went away and the information about the false rape allegations in her past were included on Mike Tyson's page.

After this, I stopped editing articles. I realized that situations like this are precisely why wikipedia isn't considered an authoritative source in the academic sense. People with more knowledge about a subject and with the supporting documentation can lose edit wars if the ignoramus on the other side has the political clout to have them blocked.

LK

Re:I have to laugh over the rolling vs howling...

[S.O.B.]

Chuck Norris doesn't pronounce words...words pronounce him.

Wikipedia's real nature

[Akratist]

Wikipedia has become staffed with a sizeable number of edit trolls, who know a lot about a tiny slice of something, and think that gives them great and wise moral authority over the entire domain...somewhat like real academia. I found this out the hard way when I made an edit to an article, which was modest, relevant, and neutral in tone. Immediately, it got removed by someone who left a mini-screed about it. I checked the person's history and found that they had numerous arguments with other users, but apparently still retained their account because they managed to effectively play rules lawyer with Wikipedia's policies. Again, like real academia. That said, articles like this make me cringe, because it a) turns people off of what is really an excellent resource, and b) makes Wikipedia sound like it is somehow less worthy than traditional reference sources (where no one sees the bile and acrimony that goes into the production of some of those works). It's like anything, some people are bound and determined to play the chemically imbalanced turd in the punchbowl.

Re:Aluminium

[Mr Z]

I know your trolling, but here's the actual history behind the name. [grammarphobia.com]

I remember giving up on Wiki

[sandbagger]

I'd been contributing to an article on a film. We'd sourced plenty of material and it was a really in-depth affair.

Then some ding-dong undergraduate deleted it and substituted his own 35,000 word essay. This boring shot-by-shot description written in stiff prose and sprinkled with gems from the thesaurus undid a year of work and good luck trying to get it repealed because his school buddies have plenty of time to wage an edit war when the rest of us are at work.

Re:I have to laugh over the rolling vs howling...

[Anonymous Coward]

Chuck Norris is a batshit crazy nut-bar who can't tell the real world from fantasy. The only real strength Chuck Norris has is that he has been able to parlay substandard martial arts skills into a career in which he beats up dark skinned people on television for money.

Re:The problem is

[Wootery]

Further, here [freelists.org] is some discussion on just this topic.

(I could've sworn there was an official mention of this on Wikipedia itself, but I can't find one.)

Re:Next up: Slashdot's lamest submissions

[hcs_$reboot]

You can also vote for your favorite submissions [slashdot.org] instead of complaining ;-)