5,744
edits
Changes
m
no edit summary
The '''Wikipedia''' ("[http://wikipedia.org .org]") was the first large scale test of the [[wiki]] technology for general purpose [[public knowledge base]] gathering and distribution. As of late April 2003 it had over 115,000 articles and hundreds of contributors, perhaps thousands, as the use of pseudonyms and IP numbers to identify even named frequent authors is a rampant practice there.
Some believe that there is a good deal of [[disinformation]] going on via the wikipedia, small cliques devoted to censorship, to [[pro-technology propaganda]] and systematically raising the [[flak level]] on views that question American supremacy or hegemony, [[w:scientism|scientism]], [[w:mathematical fetishism|mathematical fetishism]], [[w:philosophy of mathematics|"Platonism"]], the [[w:political economy|political economy]] and concept of [[w:wealth|wealth]] implied in [[w:neoclassical economics|neoclassical economics]], the current [[w:particle physics|particle physics 'Standard Model']] as an undisputed [[w:foundation ontology|foundation ontology, or basis for all models of what is "real"]], [[w:imperialism|imperialism]], [[w:militarism]], human [[w:cognitive bias|cognitive bias]], Internet [[w:infrastructure bias|infrastructure bias]] and questioning the very idea of a [[w:persuasion technology|persuasion technology]]. Despite discussions on [http://meta.wikipedia.org/wiki/Systemic_Bias_of_Wikipedia 'Systemic Bias of Wikipedia'] and various [http://meta.wikipedia.org/wiki/worst_cases worst cases] and [http://meta.wikipedia.org/wiki/threats threats] that might arise from continued failure to address this systemic bias, a [[w:groupthink|groupthink]] seems to preva prevail there that by some magical means, the wiki process or neutral point of view policy itself can overcome the imbalance in authors or points of view or the powers of sysops.
One issue where there has been substantial discussion of bias is on the [[raising standards of evidence]] on claims uncomfortable to the [[Bush administration]]. For instance articles with inflammatory titles like [[w:Bush League|Bush League]] or [[w:Bush Knew|Bush Knew]] have often been replaced with those that fail to explain the significance of the common but inflammatory title, or worse, obscure or omit evidence of collusion or incompetence on the part of figures in that administration. The most flagrant example is probably the omission of any discussion of whether [[intelligence failure]] prior to [[September 11, 2001]] was sufficient to conclude collusion or incompetence by administration figres, and the citation instead of weak and easy-to-discredit rumours and urban legends, e.g. that Israeli citizens were warned in advance to evacuate. This [[replacing credible by sensational claims]] tactic is one of many well known [[weapons Weapons of mass distractiondeception]] used by the Bush League itself.
Another issue is simple deletion of views without [[refutation]], abuse of the concept of [[reverting]] an article (eliminating the contributions of several authors on the [[ad hominem]] grounds that a 'suspect' author contributed a fewk in the chain), and simple failure to follow rules for deletion and being conservative about elimination of text. Accusations that one anonymous IP or pseudonym "is" a hated or targetted author seem to be quite common as well, and seem to justify for some sysops an endless extension of [[IP ban]] tactics. This practice is more common on French and other non-English wikipedias, where a small clique has effectively taken control of the whole editorial process. The English wikipedia is exceptional mainly for this having taken a bit longer!