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&showto…
[3]
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Paid_editing
[4]
en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:Contributions&dir=prev&a…
[5]
en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:Jimbo_Wales&oldid=29530835…
[6]
en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Arbitration_Committee/Noticebo…
[7]
wikidashboard.appspot.com/enwiki/wiki/User:Wifione