On 3/16/07, Andrew Gray <shimgray(a)gmail.com> wrote:
On 16/03/07, Avi <avi_wiki(a)yahoo.com> wrote:
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Another case of wiki vandalism that made headlines:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070316/ap_on_en_ot/people_sinbad
Count me in as one of those who thinks that we may need a PR blitz as to 1) How wiki
works 2) What vandalism is 3) A training brochure in basic wiki use. (check histories and
editors, etc.)
It's an interesting case. Some seemed to be forwarding links to the
specific vandalised revision - which has happened before - but most
were just forwarding a cut-and-pasted version of the vandalised
article, without any obvious links.
Which is, um. I mean, I could copy and paste [[George W. Bush]], add
"is gay" in the intro, and forward it around. And we'd still have
people assuming it came from us just because it said so...
My two cents:
I'm happy and amused that Sinbad has a sense of humor about it all.
We need to encourage that... if we can make that part of the press
coverage, so that celebrities see that a WP vandalism doesn't have to
be a big bad deal, and people can fix it and laugh about it, then we
win big.
Perhaps the WMF should send him a big bouquet of flowers or a fruit
basket congratulating him on his timely resurrection.
--
-george william herbert
george.herbert(a)gmail.com