On 07/02/2012,
guptchar@ovi.com <
guptchar@ovi.com> wrote:
>
> This is the story of Nichalp[1], an Indian student from Mumbai who became
> obsessed with editing Wikipedia at a young age. He transformed several
> articles into featured articles, and became a role model for many editors.
> He was granted the bureaucrat, oversight and administrator privileges -
> nobody deserved these rights more than him, not even Jimbo.
>
> A major change in Nichalp's life came when he came to Australia for higher
> education. Facing a severe financial crunch, Nichalp decided to use the only
> extraordinary skill he had - editing Wikipedia - for making money. He put up
> ads on several freelancer recruiting websites, promising to write articles
> in oexchange for small amounts of money.[2] These were the days when the PR
> professionals had started realizing the importance of Wikipedia. There were
> many takers for Nichalp's services. With his "sockpuppet" accounts, Nichalp
> made a number of contributions (many of which stand deleted now).
>
> Unfortunately for Nichalp, the Wikizealots live in an idealistic world. They
> don't realize that, in the long run, editors cannot be expected to devote
> their time to the project for free.[3] When the Wikihounds came to know
> about one of Nichalp's paid editing accounts they came after him. Nichalp
> knew he would be stalked in real life, so he made his main account inactive.
> Meanwhile, he continued to be active through his other paid editing
> accounts. A man of foresight, Nichalp started another account in April 2009
> to gain back his admin rights.[4]
>
> The Wikihounds have an astonishing ability to track the suspicious accounts
> - they tracked another one of Nichalp's paid editing accouents.[5] The drama
> prompted the Arbitration Committee to send him an email enquiry about the
> paid editing concerns. Nichalp's identity was well-known to those who had
> exposed his paid editing. The personal information that he had posted
> earlier on his user page and elsewhere on Wikipedia (and social networking
> sites) had made it easy for Wikihounds to stalk him in real life. Denial was
> not an option - Nichalp knew the Wikihounds were capable of producing
> evidence against him. Pleading not guilty would only gather more eyeballs
> and possibly lead to media attention - that could sabotage his post-college
> career. Pleading guilty was not an option either - it would lead to the same
> fate. Nichalp did what he felt was the best option before him. He neither
> accepted the charge, nor denied it. What happened next was unfortunate for
> him. Ignoring his 5-year long devotion to the project, the Arbitration
> Committee took away his bureaucrat, administrator and oversight rights in an
> unopposed judgment.[6]
> Realizing that his paid editing accounts may be under survelliance from the
> Wikihounds, Nichalp abandoned all of them. All of them, except one - the one
> he had started in April 2009 with the objective of gaining back his admin
> rights: Wifione. Nichalp carefully crafted his new wiki identity. He devoted
> this new account to earning money from India's most notorious self-styled
> "management guru". To make sure his paid editing does not appear blatantly
> obvious, Nichalp (or shall we call him Wifione, now?) engaged in a wide
> range of edits. Wifione rose up in the wiki-hierarchy and became the
> administrator. He tried not to appear like a paid editor, but the constant
> pressure from his client forced him to make constant edits to the pages
> associated with the client. Anyone looking at his top 50 edits would not
> fail to notice that much of his work in the article namespace was devoted to
> the pages associated with his client and its competitors.[7] But Wifione
> knew
> that nobody would oppose him openly: his client is infamous for suing any
> one who criticizes him or his organization. Nobody wants to be sued for 500
> million bucks in a court that lies in the remotest part of the Indian
> subcontinent - traveling to and staying in Silchar during every court
> hearing could bankrupt a humble wiki editor. Besides, Wifione had taken care
> not to repeat the mistakes he had made as Nichalp - he had left no tracks
> that would lead the Wikihounds to him. Or so he thought.
>
>
> [1]
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Nichalp
>
> [2]
>
wikipediareview.com/index.php?s=1122a1d3e604276b519c9501881856f4&showtopic=24786&st=0&p=177577&#entry177577
>
> [3]
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Paid_editing
>
> [4]
>
en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:Contributions&dir=prev&action=view&target=Wifione
>
> [5]
>
en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:Jimbo_Wales&oldid=295308358#Cash_for_spam
>
> [6]
>
en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Arbitration_Committee/Noticeboard&oldid=296240244#Nichalp
>
> [7]
wikidashboard.appspot.com/enwiki/wiki/User:Wifione
>
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