Wikipedia Subverted by CCP Interests, says Wikimedia

[Forsher]

While I originally thought this was more like my friend, who basically spouts PRC propaganda just... well, I have no idea what her homelife was (or is) like but presumably her parents were quite married to the official line because she didn't get it from going to school in NZ... just reading it back, the title might have actually happened:

Wikipedia has suffered an "infiltration" that sought to advance the aims of China, the US non-profit organisation that owns the volunteer-edited encyclopaedia has said.

The Wikimedia Foundation told BBC News the infiltration had threatened the "very foundations of Wikipedia".

The foundation banned seven editors linked to a mainland China group.

Wikimedians of Mainland China accused the foundation of "baselessly slandering a small group of people".

Wikipedia seems like a prime target to be manipulated in a Comrade Ogilvy style fashion (it's a sequence in 1984, I'm sure you know what I mean and don't need it explained because you definitely read the book), or the old "he who controls the past, controls the future". Get everyone to think everything they know is just a Mandela Effect and surely they'll be eating out your hands?

You can get everyone up in arms about misinformation on Facebook and so on, but Wikipedia is an intellectual institution... but its very concept (as noted above) makes it uniquely vulnerable to this kind of subversion. And even people who look at talk pages don't do so for every issue.

So... what say ye, NSG? Does Wikipedia belong to a different age... a Utopian vision of the web... that's finally about to succumb to the failure of history to end?

n.b. Wikipedia's own rules are insufficient to prevent Comrade Ogilvy episodes... see what happened to the Big Four tennis article

[The North Polish Union]

Wikipedia being used as a tool to support various political interests is nothing new. The Croatian Wikipedia has been run by actual pro-Nazi Ustaša supporters for a long time.

[Tsaivao]

This just in: wikipedia is used to create and spread false information

who'da thunk, it's almost as if this hasn't been happening since the website was created. Wikipedia has measures and methods in place to limit misinformation, but like all sources of information (especially sources of aggregated information on a white background in a nice and clean ad-free website) it is vulnerable to presenting things that are false or malicious. The key is to just not blindly trust any information source you find, even if it does have a citation.

[Northern Connecticut]

here is china, spewing fake news again. What else is new?

[Polish Prussian Commonwealth]

read the actual thing, from what i understand it's mainly restricted to the chinese language wikipedia?

[Washington Resistance Army]

read the actual thing, from what i understand it's mainly restricted to the chinese language wikipedia?

That's also my understanding, and why I'm pretty meh about this. It's long been known that the non-English wikis have lax rules and oversight to say the least.

I mean fuck, do y'all remember when it was revealed that most of the Scots Wiki was written by an American teenager who thought Scots language was just poorly spelled English?

[Iwassoclose]

wasn't Wikipedia gaelic or w/e completely mangled by one woman who was just making shit up

i wouldnt call it an intellectual anything lol its just an aggregate site for other sources which source other sources

[Aboveland]

Spanish Wikipedia for articles concerning anything to do with Argentine politics is overrun by Peronist and Kirchnerist militants, so nothing new.

[Cosmic79]

Wikipedia seems to anger a lot of people with its efforts to avoid becoming a tool of propaganda. First the far-right crowd, now Chinese shills.

I wonder how Chinese shills will respond to this. Will they try a different approach, or will they start slandering Wikipedia, like they do with everything that challenges their regime? Maybe they'll go after the people who made this decision and try to find ways to blackmail them. Or will they do nothing and move on to other social media platforms?

[Wormfodder Delivery]

wasn't Wikipedia gaelic or w/e completely mangled by one woman who was just making shit up

i wouldnt call it an intellectual anything lol its just an aggregate site for other sources which source other sources

Think that was Scots and it was done by a kid.

[Great Algerstonia]

I don't trust Wikipedia for any political information. There is blatant revisionism on Unit 731 on the Japanese Wikipedia, the Croatian Wikipedia was literally taken over by fascist Croatians and turned into a complete fascist propaganda that was only taken care of earlier this year, the English Wikipedia has a painfully obvious bias towards the Democratic Party, and now this.

[Great Algerstonia]

Wikipedia seems to anger a lot of people with its efforts to avoid becoming a tool of propaganda. First the far-right crowd, now Chinese shills.

I wonder how Chinese shills will respond to this. Will they try a different approach, or will they start slandering Wikipedia, like they do with everything that challenges their regime? Maybe they'll go after the people who made this decision and try to find ways to blackmail them. Or will they do nothing and move on to other social media platforms?

The former two.

[Great Algerstonia]

While I originally thought this was more like my friend, who basically spouts PRC propaganda just... well, I have no idea what her homelife was (or is) like but presumably her parents were quite married to the official line because she didn't get it from going to school in NZ... just reading it back, the title might have actually happened:

Wikipedia has suffered an "infiltration" that sought to advance the aims of China, the US non-profit organisation that owns the volunteer-edited encyclopaedia has said.

The Wikimedia Foundation told BBC News the infiltration had threatened the "very foundations of Wikipedia".

The foundation banned seven editors linked to a mainland China group.

Wikimedians of Mainland China accused the foundation of "baselessly slandering a small group of people".

Wikipedia seems like a prime target to be manipulated in a Comrade Ogilvy style fashion (it's a sequence in 1984, I'm sure you know what I mean and don't need it explained because you definitely read the book), or the old "he who controls the past, controls the future". Get everyone to think everything they know is just a Mandela Effect and surely they'll be eating out your hands?

You can get everyone up in arms about misinformation on Facebook and so on, but Wikipedia is an intellectual institution... but its very concept (as noted above) makes it uniquely vulnerable to this kind of subversion. And even people who look at talk pages don't do so for every issue.

So... what say ye, NSG? Does Wikipedia belong to a different age... a Utopian vision of the web... that's finally about to succumb to the failure of history to end?

n.b. Wikipedia's own rules are insufficient to prevent Comrade Ogilvy episodes... see what happened to the Big Four tennis article

Per https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:No_Nazis racists are explicitly not allowed on Wikipedia. However other groups can do as they please, and they often have other users helping them, usually on the site for the same bad-faith purposes.

[Ifreann]

read the actual thing, from what i understand it's mainly restricted to the chinese language wikipedia?

That's also my understanding, and why I'm pretty meh about this. It's long been known that the non-English wikis have lax rules and oversight to say the least.

I mean fuck, do y'all remember when it was revealed that most of the Scots Wiki was written by an American teenager who thought Scots language was just poorly spelled English?

[The United Colonies of Earth]

While I originally thought this was more like my friend, who basically spouts PRC propaganda just... well, I have no idea what her homelife was (or is) like but presumably her parents were quite married to the official line because she didn't get it from going to school in NZ... just reading it back, the title might have actually happened:

Wikipedia has suffered an "infiltration" that sought to advance the aims of China, the US non-profit organisation that owns the volunteer-edited encyclopaedia has said.

The Wikimedia Foundation told BBC News the infiltration had threatened the "very foundations of Wikipedia".

The foundation banned seven editors linked to a mainland China group.

Wikimedians of Mainland China accused the foundation of "baselessly slandering a small group of people".

Wikipedia seems like a prime target to be manipulated in a Comrade Ogilvy style fashion (it's a sequence in 1984, I'm sure you know what I mean and don't need it explained because you definitely read the book), or the old "he who controls the past, controls the future". Get everyone to think everything they know is just a Mandela Effect and surely they'll be eating out your hands?

You can get everyone up in arms about misinformation on Facebook and so on, but Wikipedia is an intellectual institution... but its very concept (as noted above) makes it uniquely vulnerable to this kind of subversion. And even people who look at talk pages don't do so for every issue.

So... what say ye, NSG? Does Wikipedia belong to a different age... a Utopian vision of the web... that's finally about to succumb to the failure of history to end?

n.b. Wikipedia's own rules are insufficient to prevent Comrade Ogilvy episodes... see what happened to the Big Four tennis article

Sad. I enjoyed reading Chinese Wikipedia (through Google Translate, alas) to learn about events in Imperial China that are only vaguely covered in the English wiki in a more unified and detailed way, like why the Tang had Afghan commanderies. Thought it was weird but okay that they called late-dynastic peasant rebellions "revolutions" but I guess that might be translation weirdness if it's not actual manipulation. Thankfully K.e. coffman is keeping part of the English Wikipedia clean of lies and bullshit.
I would say that the age of the free encyclopedia any IP can edit any page of has passed. Once the state's capacity is big enough to encompass digital information it will be out to manipulate as much as it can get within its own standards. To the powerful, who change reality, any repository of truth, which describes reality, is just a mirror and illuminator of their deeds, in the way that they love to see them.

[Kowani]

read the actual thing, from what i understand it's mainly restricted to the chinese language wikipedia?

That's also my understanding, and why I'm pretty meh about this. It's long been known that the non-English wikis have lax rules and oversight to say the least.

I mean fuck, do y'all remember when it was revealed that most of the Scots Wiki was written by an American teenager who thought Scots language was just poorly spelled English?

there are some pages in the non-english language wikis that are literally just a sentence
id be surprised if they still had moderators/admins for some of the african languages tbh

[Forsher]

That's also my understanding, and why I'm pretty meh about this. It's long been known that the non-English wikis have lax rules and oversight to say the least.

I mean fuck, do y'all remember when it was revealed that most of the Scots Wiki was written by an American teenager who thought Scots language was just poorly spelled English?

there are some pages in the non-english language wikis that are literally just a sentence
id be surprised if they still had moderators/admins for some of the african languages tbh

Well, here's an English one that's three.

[Vikanias]

In recent months it looks (maybe years?) like political groups are trying to use Wikipedia for political gain. Or just to spread false information to get people into a ideology, and when a site does something the shills gets mad and try to make the site look bad. It’s garbage. Wikipedia does a good job at moderation. Even though it’s mostly people doing it on their free time.

[Dakini]

Wikipedia being used as a tool to support various political interests is nothing new. The Croatian Wikipedia has been run by actual pro-Nazi Ustaša supporters for a long time.

They also basically banned everyone who didn't support a pro-gamergate view of things back in the day, effectively allowing misogynists to run the English language one.

And they wonder why only 20% of their editors are women.

[Dakini]

read the actual thing, from what i understand it's mainly restricted to the chinese language wikipedia?

That's also my understanding, and why I'm pretty meh about this. It's long been known that the non-English wikis have lax rules and oversight to say the least.

I mean fuck, do y'all remember when it was revealed that most of the Scots Wiki was written by an American teenager who thought Scots language was just poorly spelled English?

And who got corrections from actual Scots speakers reverted because he gained admin priviliges?

[Sungoldy-China]

I don't care about Chinese wikis,
they are simple, shallow and almost worthless.
Compared to those on the Chinese Wiki,
I can easily find more useful information on other websites.

I would be interested in English wikis, not in the content,
but in the differences between foreigners and my own ideas.

[GuessTheAltAccount]

A wiki that "anyone can edit" is one that the CCP can edit. News at 11.

That's why we're supposed to get our info from legitimate sources, not from Wikipedia.

[Parxland]

Fuck the CCP

[Great Algerstonia]

Fuck the CCP

All my homies hate the CCP

[The Reformed American Republic]

Fuck the CCP

All my homies hate the CCP

Based.