[wikipedia bans .gov edits]

"Isn't it interesting what you can find in Hansard when you do a little searching. All manner of amusing things, such as the fact that the Department of Health has had its outbound IP address banned by Wikipedia because of constant editing. Back in January, Ben Bradshaw admitted that between August 2005 and August 2007, people at the DoH had made almost 1500 edits, page creations and/or entries on Wikipedia. This then resulted in Wikipedia banning the DoH's address from the site according to Bradshaw a few weeks later.*

No doubt there were many disgruntled civil servants editing Patricia Hewitt's page constantly and leaving scurrilous slurs against her. The DoH is not alone in being a department to have fun with Wikipedia though. According to Gerry Sutcliffe at the Department of Culture, Media and Sport, people in the department have created or amended 103 entires on Wikipedia. No doubt all the edits were necessary because of the constantly changing budget for the 2012 Olympics!**

Most of the other departments are now facing similar questions too, so time will tell if they are found to be hiding something, or perhaps just fibbing. For example, the Chancellor of the Exechequer says that because anyone with an internet connection could do it, it would cost too much to answer.... doesn't look good when the DoH manages it though."

* 5 Feb 2008 : Column 1068W Hansard** 19 Feb 2008 : Column 620W Hansard

Dizzy Thinks via digg.

From the House of Commons Debates (Answers):

"19 Feb 2008 : Column 620W

Departmental Internet
Mr. Stephen O'Brien: To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport how many Wikipedia entries have been (a) created and (b) amended (i) by (A) special advisers, (B) Ministers and (C) communications officials and (ii) from IP addresses of (1) special advisers, (2) Ministers and (3) communications officials in his Department since August 2005. [185530]

Mr. Sutcliffe: 103 Wikipedia entries have been created or amended by people in my Department. We do not hold the information as to how many of these changes were made by (A) special advisers, (B) Ministers and (C) communications officials.

All staff in the Department are required to sign an acceptable use policy before they are given access to the internet. Occasional and reasonable personal use is permitted provided it does not interfere with the performance of duties. Any activity that would bring the Department into disrepute is prohibited."

[blogs are corrupting popular opinion]

So says Andrew Keen. Lastnight on newsnight Gavin Esler was supposed to "interview" Keen but seemed rather to put forth his own prepostorous views (though they were aligned with Keen's more of less).

To me, this discussion seemed just another attempt to subvert the positive potential of blogging or any other collaborative enterprise based on the internet. Esler's introduction highlights discrepancies in Wikipedia and he makes grave assertions that the *poor* public will be misinformed. In fact, he says rather smugly, it was the BBC that created the page on Alistair Darling replete with incorrect information; they cunningly replaced Darling's photo with an image of a badger (innuendo?). Oh goodness me. Esler says that's the problem with web 2.0 - "anyone" can edit and create thus everything online is unreliable (his logic, not mine). Really? He's assuming that "the masses" (as Keen calls us) aren't critically literate and the web just enables us folk to do too much. We know that educators are consistenly teaching students on the merits of certain sites and isn't that what we might call critical literacy? Does that mean everyone believes what they watch on television? I think it's safe to say we *understand* life isn't quite like tv...and guess what, neither is the 'net. It does seem that Esler thinks it should be; he asks viewers who think everything they read online (but wouldn't that apply to offline too?) is true whether they'd be interested in his flying machine (which doesn't fly...).

After his scene-setting intro. Esler turns to Keen and says (now how's this for journalistic objectivity?): "Andrew, I mean, a lot of things on the web are pretty stupid or irritating..." Keen later responds: "If we are all amateurs, there are no experts." And there you go - a nice summary of the ensuing talk. I wonder what sites Esler navigates to lead him to that odd assumption. Charles Leadbeater was there too but sadly wasn't able to get a word in with Keen and Esler raving about the woes of web 2.0. Leadbeater did constantly remind Esler and Keen that the public is knowledgable. The key is to make people participants and that of course would help them develop critical literacy.

I did video it and was planning on uploading it to youtube but probably can't do that for copyright reasons (seeing as I didn't make everything in the video...). At least the bbc have put a link up to the video on their site, here. This is the blurb that goes with the video:

"In the era of what author Andrew Keen calls online amateurism, can we trust everything we read on the internet?"

Interestingly, the bbc's blog post about Keen includes segments of Keen's latest book (oh no, is that distributing unreliable information?!), but more interestingly there are 120 comments. All those people participating but does that mean more unreliable information is being created (as both Keen and Esler claim)? Maybe Esler et al should read Nancy Patterson's helpful guide on how to evaluate web resources. To me, though, it seems so odd in this day and age - after postmodernism, modernism, poststrucuralism, feminism, postcolonialism, and a myriad other "events" - that people like Keen and Esler still seem to believe in a single Truth. Whether in print or online or on tv or on radio - who's *truth* is it really?

If you're interested in what Leadbeater has to say, there's a presentation of his here.

[wikipedia]

An example of why I discourage students from using wikipedia:

"The Essjay controversy occurred after a prominent English Wikipedia editor and administrator — briefly a Wikia employee — known by the name
"Essjay" "forged his credentials and faked having a doctorate."

NEW YORK: In a blink, the wisdom of the crowd became the fury of the crowd.

In the past few days, contributors to Wikipedia, the popular online encyclopedia, have turned against one of their own who was found to have created an elaborate false identity.

Under the name Essjay, the contributor edited thousands of Wikipedia entries and once was one of the few people with the authority to deal with vandalism and to arbitrate disputes between authors.

To the Wikipedia world, Essjay was a tenured professor of religion at a private university with expertise in canon law, according to his user profile.

But in fact, Essjay is a 24-year-old named Ryan Jordan, who attended a number of colleges in Kentucky and who lives outside Louisville.

Jordan contended that he resorted to a fictional persona to protect himself from people who might be angered by his administrative role at Wikipedia. He did not respond to an e-mail message, nor to messages conveyed by the Wikipedia office.

Read the rest of the article here.

Further info available at wikipedia too.

Thanks to Angela for the head's up.