[WikiEN-l] Dealing with corporate propagandists

[Geoff Burling]

On Sat, 27 Nov 2004, Sean Barrett wrote:

> Mark Pellegrini stated for the record:
>
> > what is to stop them from starting large, organized astroturfing on
> > Wikipedia?
> >
> >
> > I think it would be a good idea to having some contigency plans in place
> > should that happen.
>
>  From the back of the bottle of contingency plans: "Revert, ban, repeat."
>
Based on what I know of manipulating public perception, & the challenges of
the Internet, I think we ought to look at our accumulated experience with
another group: Scientology, & the related Wikipedia articles.

I have stayed away from this topic, except for the occasional peak & the
minor edit or two (I find typos & bad grammar in other people's writings
far quicker than in my own). However, to my knowledge none of the
Scientology-related articles have turned into the no-man's land that some
of our fiercely disputed articles have become.

I believe David Gerard has been monitoring the Scientology-related articles;
perhaps David could offer some ideas of how to deal with possible
astroturfing -- whether initiated by Microsoft or another corporation --
based on his experience.

Geoff