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| http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/4695376.stm
Online reference site Wikipedia blames US Congress staff for partisan changes to
a number of political biographies.
Computers traced to Capitol Hill removed unpalatable facts from articles on
senators, while other entries were "vandalised", the site said.
An inquiry was launched after staff for Democratic representative Marty Meehan
admitted polishing his biography.
Wikipedia is produced by readers who add entries and edit any page, and has
become a widely-used reference tool.
'Liberal' to 'activist'
Using the public history of edits on Wikipedia, researchers collected the
internet protocol numbers of computers linked to the US Senate and tracked the
changes made to online pages.
The site lists half a dozen prominent biographies that had been changed by
Senate computers, including those of Minnesota Senator Norm Coleman, California
Senator Dianne Feinstein and Senator Tom Harkin of Iowa.
Senator Coleman's office has confirmed that staff there had made a number of
changes to his online record.
Where he was described as a "liberal" back in college, this was changed to
"activist".
Among other changes, staff also deleted a reference to Mr Coleman voting with
President Bush 98% of the time in 2003, despite running as a moderate the year
before.
Wikipedia said staffers of Senator Tom Harkin had removed a paragraph relating
to Mr Harkin's having falsely claimed to have flown combat missions over North
Vietnam, and his subsequent recantation.
A handful of miscellaneous vandalism edits had been made to some senators'
articles, it said.
One example was the entry for Republican Senator Tom Coburn, of Oklahoma, who it
was falsely alleged had been voted "most annoying senator".
Bush editing block
Senator Coleman's chief of staff, Erich Mische, said editing was done to correct
inaccuracies and delete information that was not reflective of the politician.
"They've got an edit provision on there for the sake of editing when things are
not accurate," Mr Mische told the Associated Press.
"I presume that if they did not want people to edit, they wouldn't allow you to
edit."
Wikipedia says the controversy raises questions about whether it is ethical for
those with a vested interest in the subject to edit entries about it.
It said the Congressional computer network has been blocked from editing for
brief periods on a number of occasions in the last six months due to the
inappropriate contributions.
The article on President Bush has been altered so many times - not just from
within Congress - that Wikipedia's volunteer monitors have had to block further
"editing".
But it also says its investigation showed the vast majority of edits from Senate
IPs were "beneficial and helpful".
Massachusetts newspapers disclosed last month that staffers for Representative
Marty Meehan had polished the boss's Wikipedia biography.
Deleted were references to a long-abandoned promise to serve only four terms,
and to his campaign war chest.
Accuracy study
Wikipedia was founded in 2001 and has since grown to more than 1.8 million
articles in 200 languages. Some 800,000 entries are in English.
It is based on wikis, open-source software which lets anyone fiddle with a
webpage. Anyone reading a subject entry can disagree, edit, add, delete, or
replace the entry.
A December 2005 study by the British journal Nature found it was about as
accurate on science as the Encyclopaedia Britannica.
But it has been criticised for the correctness of entries, most recently over
the biography of prominent US journalist John Seigenthaler - which incorrectly
linked him to the Kennedy assassinations.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/4695376.stm
LMAO. It's a good job Blair hasn't seen his own entry.
*snigger*
(And it wasn't me.)
Lord Cerne Abbas
We shall go on to the end, we shall defend our World, whatever the cost may be,
we shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall
fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills; we shall
never surrender, and even if this World, or a large part of it were subjugated
and starving, then we would carry on the struggle, until, in God's good time,
the New World, with all its power and might, steps forth to the rescue
and the liberation of the old."
To rebel is right, to disobey is a duty, to act is necessary !
http://www.veloceraptor.free-online.co.uk/identity.html
http://www.veloceraptor.free-online.co.uk/mylinks.html
http://lordcerneabbas.blogspot.com/
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