http://www.freerepublic.com/tag/wikipedia/ en-us Thu, 31 Dec 2009 15:36:02 GMT Focus Forum 15 http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2418360/posts Looks like the folks at Wikipedia were prepared for the worst when it came to Rush Limbaugh. Actually they were a little too well prepared. Shortly after the news broke that the conservative political radio talk show host was hospitalized, Wikipedia updated his page – and pronounced him dead. Folks (like us) who happened to take a look at LimbaughÂ’s biography, saw this: Rush Hudson Limbaugh III (pronounced /ˈlɪmbɔː/;born January 12, 1951, died December 30, 2009) is an American radio host and conservative political commentator. He is the host of The Rush Limbaugh Show, the highest-rated talk-radio program in the... RadarOnline http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2418360/posts#comment Thu, 31 Dec 2009 15:36:02 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2417604/posts Jimmy Wales, the founder of Wikipedia, had an article in yesterday's Wall Street Journal drawing attention to the rise of "online hostility" and the "degeneration of online civility." He (and coauthor Andrea Weckerle) suggested ways in which we can "prevent the worst among us from silencing the best among us." I agree with just about everything that they say. But there is one problem that Mr. Wales does not go near. That is the use of Wikipedia itself to inflame the political debate by permitting activists to rewrite the contributions of others. All by itself, that surely is a contributor... The American Spectator http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2417604/posts#comment Wed, 30 Dec 2009 14:31:55 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2415903/posts Since my Saturday column described how Wikipedia editors have been feverishly rewriting climate history over much of the decade, fair-minded Wikipedians have been doing their best to correct the record. No sooner than they remove gross distortions, however, than the distortions are replaced. William Connolley, a Climategate member and Wikipedia’s chief climate change propagandist, remains as active as ever. How does Wikipedia work and how does Connolley and his co-conspirators exercise control? Take Wikipedia’s page for Medieval Warm Period, as an example. In the three days following my column’s appearance, this page alone was changed some 50 times in battles... Financial Post http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2415903/posts#comment Sun, 27 Dec 2009 21:26:17 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2414062/posts Since my Saturday column described how Wikipedia editors have been feverishly rewriting climate history over much of the decade, fair-minded Wikipedians have been doing their best to correct the record. No sooner than they remove gross distortions, however, than the distortions are replaced. William Connolley, a Climategate member and Wikipedia’s chief climate change propagandist, remains as active as ever. How does Wikipedia work and how do Connolley and his co-conspirators exercise control? Take Wikipedia’s page for Medieval Warm Period, as an example. In the three days following my column’s appearance, this page alone was changed some 50 times in battles... National Post http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2414062/posts#comment Wed, 23 Dec 2009 22:38:25 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2413741/posts During the 70 years that the communists controlled the Soviet Union, they had a peculiar way of teaching history to the people. They would teach things as historical fact that never happened. If you were one of those who took umbrage with their revisionist history lessons, you would soon find yourself living in a tiny apartment in a part of the country where they laugh at anyone who claims the world is getting warmer. In a communist country this is the only way to convince the masses that they are actually better off than anyone in the history of... Enterprise Record Post Scripts http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2413741/posts#comment Wed, 23 Dec 2009 15:19:55 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2413044/posts If you want to know the truth about Climategate, definitely don’t use Wikipedia. “Climatic Research Unit e-mail controversy”, is its preferred, mealy-mouthed euphemism to describe the greatest scientific scandal of the modern age. Not that you’d ever guess it was a scandal from the accompanying article. It reads more like a damage-limitation press release put out by concerned friends and sympathisers of the lying, cheating, data-rigging scientists Which funnily enough, is pretty much what it is. Even Wikipedia’s own moderators acknowledge that the entry has been hijacked, as this commentary by an “uninvolved editor” makes clear. Unfortunately, this naked bias... The Telegraph http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2413044/posts#comment Tue, 22 Dec 2009 16:36:52 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2411648/posts We now know, thanks to a whistle-blower, that all the data and anything based on the CRU data is manipulated, massaged and tickled to present a lie. We also NIWA has done the same thing by using only nine sites two of which are remote islands thousands of kilometres from mainland New Zealand. Now we find out that one of the Climat-nati, one who features extensively in the CRU emails, U.K. scientist and Green Party activist William Connolley undertook to hijack the Climate Change argument on Wikipedia. Connolley took control of all things climate in the most used information source... Whaleoil.Gotcha http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2411648/posts#comment Sun, 20 Dec 2009 14:40:45 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2411668/posts How Wikipedia’s green doctor rewrote 5,428 climate articles ... Connolley took control of all things climate in the most used information source the world has ever known – Wikipedia. Starting in February 2003, just when opposition to the claims of the band members were beginning to gel, Connolley set to work on the Wikipedia site. He rewrote Wikipedia’s articles on global warming, on the greenhouse effect, on the instrumental temperature record, on the urban heat island, on climate models, on global cooling. On Feb. 14, he began to erase the Little Ice Age; on Aug.11, the Medieval Warm Period. Financial Post (National Post) http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2411668/posts#comment Sun, 20 Dec 2009 15:24:37 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2411433/posts ... All told, Connolley created or rewrote 5,428 unique Wikipedia articles. His control over Wikipedia was greater still, however, through the role he obtained at Wikipedia as a website administrator, which allowed him to act with virtual impunity. When Connolley didn’t like the subject of a certain article, he removed it — more than 500 articles of various descriptions disappeared at his hand. When he disapproved of the arguments that others were making, he often had them barred — over 2,000 Wikipedia contributors who ran afoul of him found themselves blocked from making further contributions. Acolytes whose writing conformed to... Financial Post (Canada) http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2411433/posts#comment Sun, 20 Dec 2009 01:17:11 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2411260/posts How Wikipedia’s green doctor rewrote 5,428 climate articles The Climategate Emails describe how a small band of climatologists cooked the books to make the last century seem dangerously warm. The emails also describe how the band plotted to rewrite history as well as science, particularly by eliminating the Medieval Warm Period, a 400 year period that began around 1000 AD. National Post http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2411260/posts#comment Sat, 19 Dec 2009 19:13:19 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2410961/posts Laissez Faire Wikipedia What we believe * Humans deserve care and respect, regardless of societal status. Including: o Illegal aliens, Prisoners, Ex-Prisoners, and Drug abusers. o Punishment as a form of justice leads to abuse. * Capitalism promotes wealth as an indicator of human value. o People are thought of as commodities instead of humans. o Richer people spend less time in prison than poor people. o This is a form of fascism o Republicans and Democrats are both capitalist political parties. o Lobbying is legalized corruption on behalf of corporations. The LF Wiki http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2410961/posts#comment Sat, 19 Dec 2009 04:33:48 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2392807/posts Wikipedia.org is the fifth-most-popular Web site in the world, with roughly 325 million monthly visitors. But unprecedented numbers of the millions of online volunteers who write, edit and police it are quitting. That could have significant implications for the brand of democratization that Wikipedia helped to unleash over the Internet -- the empowerment of the amateur. Volunteers have been departing the project that bills itself as "the free encyclopedia that anyone can edit" faster than new ones have been joining, and the net losses have accelerated over the past year. In the first three months of 2009, the English-language Wikipedia... The Wall Street Journal http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2392807/posts#comment Mon, 23 Nov 2009 18:51:35 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2382313/posts "[Wikipedia Authors] are 80 percent male, more than 65 percent single, more than 85 percent without children, and around 70 percent of them are under the age of 30." Boston Review http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2382313/posts#comment Mon, 9 Nov 2009 19:18:20 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-bloggers/2369950/posts I have been a registered editor at wikipedia for about two and a half years. The following restriction was just placed on me: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Administrators%27_noticeboard/IncidentArchive572#Grundle2600:_continued_problems "Grundle2600 is subject to an indefinite topic ban - he is prohibited from editing any pages relating to US politics or politicians. The ban will be enforced by escalating blocks." As a so-called justification for this restriction, the following contributions by me to wikipedia were cited: "On April 20, 2009, Obama convened his Cabinet for the first time, and ordered them to reduce the $3.5 trillion federal budget by $100 million." Source: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/04/19/AR2009041902009.html "In February 2009,... http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-bloggers/2369950/posts#comment Sat, 24 Oct 2009 14:10:33 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2369744/posts I have been a registered editor at wikipedia for about two and a half years. The following restriction was just placed on me: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Administrators%27_noticeboard/IncidentArchive572#Grundle2600:_continued_problems "Grundle2600 is subject to an indefinite topic ban - he is prohibited from editing any pages relating to US politics or politicians. The ban will be enforced by escalating blocks." As a so-called justification for this restriction, the following contributions by me to wikipedia were cited: "On April 20, 2009, Obama convened his Cabinet for the first time, and ordered them to reduce the $3.5 trillion federal budget by $100 million." Source: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/04/19/AR2009041902009.html "In February 2009,... http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2369744/posts#comment Sat, 24 Oct 2009 01:28:17 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2356521/posts "Conservapedia has had over 105,000,000 page views and over 665,000 page edits. The truth shall set you free."www.conservapedia.com Conservapedia http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2356521/posts#comment Wed, 7 Oct 2009 06:39:06 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/2349056/posts Teddymandering is the practice of changing a law to benefit your political party, then reversing the change when your political party will benefit from the original rules to which you objected. Named for former Massachusetts Senator Edward M. "Teddy" Kennedy. Senator Kennedy influenced the Massachusetts state legislature to change the Senatorial succession law during the 2004 election. His reasons were strictly because Senator John Kerry, if elected President, would be replaced by an appointee of (then) Governor Mitt Romney, a Republican. At the time, Kennedy was against any interim appointment until a special election could be held. In 2009, as... http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/2349056/posts#comment Sat, 26 Sep 2009 22:27:24 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2340800/posts NRO's "The Corner" discusses Wiki's bias Over at NRO’s “The Corner,” Jay Nordlinger tangentially mentioned Wikipedia’s left-wing bias. (Also read John J. Miller’s excellent article.) What does one get when a biased Internet medium covers biased MSM “journalists”? In one, minor case, the Wikipedia profile of MSNBC’s David Shuster calls him: “a regional Emmy award winning American journalist for NBC News and MSNBC.” David Shuster filled in for Keith Olbermann on MSNBC’s Countdown Monday. Here are a few of the questions this “journalist” asked about the 9/12 rally of his guest, Clarence Page, in the opening segment alone: It seemed... NewsRealBlog.com http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2340800/posts#comment Wed, 16 Sep 2009 06:05:46 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2336839/posts The Republican congressman whose outburst of "you lie!" during President Barack Obama's healthcare speech to Congress is now under lock and key. At least online. Rep. Joe Wilson (R-SC) now has a locked Wikipedia page after vandals edited his profile to allege that he was a dooshbag." In his Bio it stated: He is a dooshbag that called the President of the United States a liar on national television and has no respect for the office he holds. http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2336839/posts#comment Fri, 11 Sep 2009 01:07:06 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2324891/posts Today's Internet is governed by the idea that crowds of people can create the news, share information and collaborate on online projects. So when Wikipedia, the user-written encyclopedia that's built an empire on this ideal, decided this week to add a layer of oversight to its system, the Web erupted in debate. The popular encyclopedia, which has drawn criticism for inaccuracies, says it will try assigning editors to some of its entries. These trusted volunteers likely would have to approve public edits before they're published to English-language stories about living people. Some see the move as a shift away from... CNN http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2324891/posts#comment Wed, 26 Aug 2009 16:16:18 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/2311070/posts Lawyer for parent foundation worried about impact of recently dismissed lawsuitLiterary agent Barbara Bauer wasn't happy about being called the "dumbest" of agents on a list title "20 Worst Literary Agents" posted to Wikipedia. So Bauer sued the San Francisco-based Wikimedia Foundation, which oversees the website, for defamation -- even though an unaffiliated user of the online encylopedia was ultimately reponsible for creating and posting the item. The case was dismissed by Judge James Perri of New Jersey's Superior Court based on the US Communications Decency Act's immunity from liability afforded to operators of online services. And as a University... NBC Bay Area http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/2311070/posts#comment Sat, 8 Aug 2009 01:54:54 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2305000/posts Wikipedia, the online encyclopedia, has been drawn into a row over its decision to publish common responses to the 10 Rorschach inkblots. The plates were created by the Swiss psychiatrist Hermann Rorschach for his book "Psychodiagnostik," published in 1921. Because they were made more than 90 years ago their US copyright has lapsed. However, psychologists have complained that publishing the inkblots and responses is the equivalent to putting answers to school exams on the internet. "The only winners seem to be those for whom this issue has become personal, and who see this as a game in which victory means... The Telegraph http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2305000/posts#comment Fri, 31 Jul 2009 03:51:14 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2304931/posts Call it the Press Conference From Hell.Toledo mayoral candidate Ben Konop, an earnest young liberal, thought it would be a great idea to conduct a press conference in front of the home where his mother grew up. Little did Ben know that Maxwell the Heckler, the next door neighbor, would completely destroy his press conference and forever burn that incident into the public memory of Mr. Konop. To get the full hilarious flavor of how Maxwell destroyed the press conference, take a look at the video. Most of the heckling consisted of "Boo! LIAR! BOOOOO!" The first reaction of your... NewsBusters http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2304931/posts#comment Fri, 31 Jul 2009 01:46:38 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/2295683/posts The battle over Wikipedia's use of images from a British art gallery's website has intensified. The online encyclopaedia has accused the National Portrait Gallery (NPG) of betraying its public service mission. But the gallery has said it needs to recoup the £1m cost of its digitisation programme and claims Wikipedia has misrepresented its position. The NPG is threatening legal action after 3,300 images from its website were uploaded to Wikipedia. The high-resolution images were uploaded by Wikipedia volunteer Derrick Coetzee. bbc http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/2295683/posts#comment Sat, 18 Jul 2009 21:04:35 GMT http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2291496/posts Wikipedia says Obama born in Kenya Online encyclopedia can't make up its mind on president's birthplace By Joe Kovacs © 2009 WorldNetDaily Wikipedia just can't seem to make up its mind about where President Barack Obama was born. The free, online encyclopedia this afternoon displayed at least two countries the commander in chief may have been born in – the United States and Kenya. WND documented how the entry for the "Early life and career of Barack Obama" changed numerous times. At 4:45 p.m. Eastern, Wikipedia said: "Barack Obama, the current President of the United States, was born on August... http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2291496/posts#comment Mon, 13 Jul 2009 15:38:30 GMT