Technology Corner

If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!

If you ever needed to do some research on the internet, chances are that at one time or another you found yourself in the knowledge pits of Wikipedia.

While Wikipedia can be greatly informative on just about anything, and most articles will state reasonable sources, there are always those “black sheep” articles that can spot the reputation of the entire site. Since, as you may know, Wikipedia can be edited by anyone, lots of false or erroneous information is published. Gladly, the battalions of volunteers policing the articles (some people who actually know what they are talking about) usually remove the “bad” information very quickly.

Nonetheless, since there is no real peer-review going on, some universities have adopted a policy not to accept Wikipedia as a valid source of information you can cite. This kind of publicity is a major draw back for Wikipedia.

When the information published is fallacious but was edited so without bias, ok it’s bad, but can be excused. Now, when someone clearly edits the information about themselves or others in order to change their public image, then it gets more complicated. And it seems that is done more often that I would have thought. Recently an article on Joe Hack.com reporting how Fox News was caught with their pants down changing their own Wikipedia pages. This prompted me to research some more on the subject and try to find other “episodes”. I got my job cut short when I read on maltastar.com how Virgil Griffith developed a software that allows to discover the IP addresses of the person who edited a particular Wikipedia entry, the wikiscanner . Some of the examples are simply unbelievable. From the maltastar.com article:

- Microsoft tried to cover up the XBOX 360 failure rate

- Apple edit Microsoft entries, adding more negative comments about its rival

- Bill Gates revenge? Microsoft edits Apple entries, adding more negative comments about its rival

- The Vatican edits Irish Catholic politician Gerry Adams page

- In the 9/11 Wikipedia article, the NRA added that “Iraq was involved in 9/11″

- Exxon Mobil edits spillages and eco-system destruction from oil spillages article

- FBI edits Guantanamo Bay, removing numerous pictures

- Oil company ChevronTexaco removes informative biodiesel article and deletes a paragraph regarding fines against the company

- Scientology removes criticism and negatives article from Scientology page

- Al Jazeera TV station adds that the foundation of Iraq was just as bad as the Holocaust

- Amnesty International removes negative comments

- Dell Computers deletes negative comments on customer services and removes a passage how the company outsources work to third world countries

- MySpace removes paragraph when their website was hacked

- EA Games deletes whole paragraphs of criticism about employment practices and business methods

- Dog breeding association deletes whole paragraphs about fatal attacks by dogs on humans

- US Republican Party changes the “Post-Saddam” section of the Baath Party article to a different account of the war, changing the language from “US-led occupation” to “US-led liberation”

- Fox News removes all controversial topics against the network from the Fox News page

- News of the World deletes a number of criticism against the paper

- Nestle removes negative comments on its business practices from its page

- UN address calls journalist Oriana Fallaci a racist “prostitute”

- Portuguese government removes entries about Prime Minister’s scandals

- DieBold, the company that controversially supplied computerized polling stations in the US elections, removes numerous paragraphs with negative comments

- Walmart removes criticism of outsourcing work. The retailer also changes negative paragraphs of underpaid workforce

- Sony removes harmful paragraphs against blu-ray systems

- Someone at Reuters calls Bush “a mass murderer”

- Coca Cola removes negative content about its effects

- British Conservative Party removes negative references of its MPs and deletes paragraph of the party’s old policies

- US University adds the “prestigious” adjective to its page

- Boeing edits from “Boeing is a leading American aircraft and aerospace manufacturer” to “Boeing is the leading American aircraft and aerospace manufacturer”

- MSN Search is “a major competitor to Google”. That’s what MSN added to their page

- BBC changes Blair’s drink from coffee to vodka and his workout from the gym to the bedroom. Someone from the BBC also changes Bush’s page, changing the name from “George Walker Bush” to “George Wan*** Bush”

- Someone from The Guardian edits the Wikipedia page of rival newspaper The Times. Originally in the article it is said that The Times sells more than The Guardian. After the edit, The Guardian sells more.

I’d say that lots of people were caught with their pants down this time. Congratulations Virgil.

Why not trying the software yourself? Go to the wikiscanner page and maybe you’ll see something someone wished it was never seen.

If by any chance you are looking for alternatives to Wikipedia, OEDb came up with the top 7 alternatives, although some may say that there is no serious competitor to Wikipedia.

What do you say? Should Wikipedia review their user edition policy or is exactly that that gives it its strong points?