[WikiEN-l] "How the Professor Who Fooled Wikipedia Got Caught by Reddit", _The Atlantic_

[Gwern Branwen]

On Sun, May 20, 2012 at 4:37 PM, David Levy <lifeisunfair at gmail.com> wrote:
> As Gwern (User:Gwern) continues to edit the English Wikipedia (today
> concluding a different "experiment") and appears to have stopped
> participating in this discussion (thereby ignoring questions about the
> acknowledged vandalism), I agree that the account and associated IP
> addresses should be blocked until such time as a promise to cease the
> disruption and evidence that the damage has been repaired are
> forthcoming.

There's nothing to answer; and I've been copying the most informative
or hilarious quotes for posterity, such as an active administrator in
good standing wondering if it might actually increase article quality
and not constitute vandalism at all!

The whole thing was worth it just for that quote; I could not have
made up a better example of the sickness.

As for today's experiment, I'm surprised anyone cares. After all, all
that was involved was one single link to a webpage written by a
non-expert. I should be getting a barnstar for removing it, judging by
everyone's reactions. (The result, incidentally, was that
click-through fell from 9 a day to 1 a day, which was 17% and not the
5% I had predicted.)

-- 
gwern
http://www.gwern.net