Every body knows the importance Google puts on Wikipedia and its contents. But some one by the name of Virgil Griffith took it upon on himself to check what goes behind all the edits and his research shows that Big multinational corporations, big Govt agencies, congressman are manipulating Wiki contents and using it to their benefits. The site in question is http://wikiscanner.virgil.gr/ and you can read more on the story in The Independent Article. ( the UK tabloid)
Unfortunately, this will only become a greater and greater problem as more organizations get wind of the scheme.
^^ But now we have the WikiScanner! No, seriously, who's surprised? I'm not - the U.S. government does everything it can to hide its errors - why would this be any different?
Well, as long as the thing is human-editable, what did they expect? OF COURSE people are going to try to sneak in a few advantages to themselves here and there. I don't see it as horribly evil for some political candidate or businessperson to edit their own articles and take out a few damning sentences. It's what humans do.
Although this is happening I believe that wiki is more trustable than private web sites that can only be edited by one maniac.
In this current age of wikisteria, there is no bad news that can possibly affect wikipedia in a negative way. It has so caught on in the public mindset that reality is no longer relevant. Think of tulip bulbs, stock market bubbles and the current "I Love Google" bubbles. Wikipedia will continue to grow regardless of bad news.
wow, it's really intresting to read. if human is editing somethink , it's better to think twice that it's true or not
now that stories like the CIA employee edits have popped up, i see a reduced reliance by google on wikipedia in the coming months.
I read the article and as somebody who owns a few dedicated servers and a copy of legit licensed IP2Location database to track hackers, spammers, etc... I honestly don't see how this guy can trace IP's back to the CIA, MySpace, etc... It's just not possible. No IP tracking tool is that good. I don't doubt there are edits being made that shouldn't be because Wikipedia is pretty much garbage, but it's not like anybody takes the information on there seriously anyway (at least I *hope* nobody takes it seriously). I personally don't like the fact that for almost any search on Google a Wiki page comes up these days. That's just wrong. I also don't like the fact that the editors at Wikipedia remove valid information I've posted 90% of the time just because it's not cited on the internet from a "credible" source. I'm a musician and have been around the punk rock scene for over 20 years and I added quite a bit of info on obscure bands that existed pre-Internet. Their records currently sell for big bucks on eBay because there is a collector market for obscure bands. I have info from touring with my band, my magazine collections and from writing my own fanzines years ago but some Wikifools deleted my pages saying that there were no valid internet sources cited (lol, like a band that had articles in Maximum Rock-n-Roll, Flipside, or Option magazine 20 years ago and broke up is going to have current articles about them)... It's still a part of a piece of history but so much for it being "human edited"... I also HATE how they purposely target musicians and artists with their comments of "Do not add your friends band or a band you're a fan of"... Jeez, who the heck is going to write about a band except a friend, associate or a fan? Maybe Karl Rove added the Wiki pages for the Dead Kennedys.... I don't disregard the article posted by the topic starter, I'm just saying some of it crosses the fine line of reality and journalistic sensationalism.
Sorry guys for not responding though I opened the thread! Lets discuss more about it. What I personally think is - most who edit Wiki are also DMOZ editors. At present we find good informations on Wiki. But if things are like this- soon it will become another huge web skeleton like DMOZ
I agree with what jhnrang said above. I also wonder how they can trace things back to the CIA and MySpace just simply becuase they dont have a ip scanner that good. If it was possible to trace back to the cia wouldnt the goverment be on it by now? and taking it down and whatnot just like the mpaa do with warez / torrent sites etc etc Regards
Thanks. But in this age of technology--nothing is impossible. How could they trace the destructive virus " I Love You" to a philipino? How could they trace the 17 years old Israeli boy who hacked the Pentagon in 2004? There are so many things/technologies/knowhow beyond our general imaginations that-- I believe nothing is impossible. Just consider a fact-- Do you think the tabloid would have published the story if it didn't have authenticity? I can claim --this or that--you can claim too. But people would only take it that seriously when our claims have substantiative proofs. -- Isn't it? So it is highly possible to trace each and every IP. Believe me.
Certian IPs are registered to the CIA. If you find edits on wikipedia that have come from these IPs (and wikipedia knows the IPs edits come from) the edits may well have come from the CIA.
Yes, but the difference is big corps are "ok'ed" and we are not. I have contributed to many wiki pages and all of my contributions were removed.