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Wikipedia’s nonprofit status questioned by D.C. U.S. attorney

washingtonpost.com

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Re: Wikipedia’s nonprofit status questioned by D.C. U.S. attorney

#621

Post by 93po »

rnd0 wrote: post #445
dxroshan wrote: post #260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is happening is very scary. Many people don't seem to care about any evidence or sources. They blindly follow whatever lies that their leaders say. I think this has been the case at anytime in history. However, now, with the internet, it is easy to spread such lies to mass and easy for such leaders to make blind followers.

Clearly people care very deeply about sources and evidence -and they're attacking things (wikipedia, various gov websites) which can be used as objective sources. If you don't have objective sources, it's easier to lead people around by the nose -hence the attack.

Here's the root of the problem though: wikipedia isn't an objective source by its very nature. Wikipedia requires mainstream established news sources for a lot of articles that aren't academic in nature, and especially for articles about people. You cannot include information that isn't supported by corporate news articles, which means corporate news is now the arbiter of truth, and corporate news lies all the time about everything.

Wikipedia is, and always has been, the encyclopedia of the elite and billionaire narrative, and especially the left-wing narrative, which dominates nearly all corporate news groups. I say this as a far left person myself.

Re: Wikipedia’s nonprofit status questioned by D.C. U.S. attorney

#622

Post by barotalomey »

hnlmorg wrote: post #567
albumen wrote: post #546

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Social Justice Warrior. The acronym has been around for a long time.

That doesn’t mean what everyone is familiar with it. For example I’ve been around since internet slang first developed a life of its own. And yet I wasn’t immediately familiar with SJW either.

In 2025, most online users have learned how to look things up using.. the internet.

Re: Wikipedia’s nonprofit status questioned by D.C. U.S. attorney

#623

Post by nailer »

mikeyouse wrote: post #49
nailer wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

Go ahead and read some of the thousands of 1-star reviews on TrustPilot for WinRed: https://www.trustpilot.com/review/winred.com?stars=1 It turns out the name of the political donation game is recurring donations and spammy messages. I 100% believe people donated to some random cause via act blue and didn’t realize they were signing up for recurring donations through there —- like all political fundraising arms do as…

I have. People donate once and have trouble cancelling the donation. It’s bad but the people donating actually are republicans and have donated before - which is a different situation from the people who aren’t democrats, haven’t donated to democrats and have repeatedly been donating to ActBlue.

Likewise, I have not heard that winred don’t use CVVs, which HN, having many people with experience in handling online payments would agree is bizarre.

Re: Wikipedia’s nonprofit status questioned by D.C. U.S. attorney

#624

Post by 93po »

pwarner wrote: post #583
mjrpes wrote: post #56

Here's the letter: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ocNyx34Et19sKtlta0bTPPzSPcp... No claims, no evidence. No sources, except "it has come to my attention" and "information received by my office".

It was probably Elon

Can we stop bringing up annoying people in every single comment section when they have nothing to do with the topic at hand?

Re: Wikipedia’s nonprofit status questioned by D.C. U.S. attorney

#625

Post by Spivak »

boxed wrote: post #511
Spivak wrote: post #365

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wealthy people who could be coined liberal-tarians or just your average tech bro political grab bag largely backed Trump out of financial interest and who, imo, deluded themselves that the administration would be unsuccessful at "the bad stuff" much like his 2016 run. No amount of shouting from the rooftops that this time was actually different convinced anyone. I can't really blame us collectively, we resoundingly v…

Who specifically was the question.

This isn't really a hard list to compile.

* Paul Graham

* Mark Zuckerberg

* The Ghost of Elon Musk before he fell down the alt right pipeline and now is no longer liberal-tarian.

* Sundar Pichai

* Jeff Bezos

* Sam Altman

* Jensen Huang

* Tim Cook

A who's who of people who felt their businesses were being threatened by the Biden administration with a starry-eyed view of how this next round might benefit them and being in denial of the crazy.

Re: Wikipedia’s nonprofit status questioned by D.C. U.S. attorney

#626

Post by 93po »

frob wrote: post #614
tomhow wrote: post #346

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The only YC figure who espouses any position on U.S. federal politics is Paul Graham, who loudly campaigns against the current administration almost every day on Twitter.

Hi Tom. You're burning your credibility here fast as the new moderator. dang derived his respect as an admin from not getting into fights in the threads. It additonaly tarnishes your credibility as you're doing this in defense of your employer. You look like a rage-poster who has the same response copied and ready to go from thread to thread. Please take a moment to step back and examine if this is the image you want…

Alternatively, hi tom, you're a human being with opinions and you're allowed to discuss whatever you like on this site just like anyone else.

i think dang is successful at moderation in part because he does have a reputation and track record of being fair and unbiased in his moderation, and i do agree showing bias in conversations can make people question moderation decisions more, but i'm not sure tom is showing bias by including information relevant to people he knows, and i think he can both discuss however he likes while also being transparent and genuine in unbiased moderation

tom has and does stay out of debates and in-depth conversations around HN related stuff. he's simply dropping some information in to dispel disinformation, which i think is reasonable

Re: Wikipedia’s nonprofit status questioned by D.C. U.S. attorney

#627

Post by firesteelrain »

Wikipedia website even says your donation goes to other projects. As a 501c3, they are banned from making political contributions. They should change from 501c3 and break off their political arm into another appropriately categorized IRS recognized model.

https://www.opensecrets.org/orgs/wikimedia-foundation/recipi...

Re: Wikipedia’s nonprofit status questioned by D.C. U.S. attorney

#628

Post by Agraillo »

ncr100 wrote: post #368
foogazi wrote: post #310

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One time sure, 150+ on the Russia propaganda network ? I’m drawing my own adult conclusions about it: “The friend of my enemy is my enemy”

Yes. 150+ times is akin to Funding an individual, rather than seeking to add a unique perspective.

I'd argue that there's another perspective, more complimentary to US politics. There's obviously a list of "experts" aligned with RT narrative which they use depending on the topic. No media like RT wants someone from this list to be too visible and appear too often, whether they are pay-rolled shadowy or not. So it looks like not so many "experts" are eager to be on alert on this list.

Re: Wikipedia’s nonprofit status questioned by D.C. U.S. attorney

#629

Post by firesteelrain »

blibble wrote: post #152
firesteelrain wrote: post #38

Wikipedia/Wikimedia could move to a country that allows this type of manipulation on their platform or figure out how to comply with the existing US law. Wikipedia could also stop operating as a 501c3 and incorporate. But the typical out for these organizations are that they are not responsible for what people post. I don’t feel like that is very responsible. They already have moderation on the platform. But Wikimedi…

or they could move to a country that respects the rule of law and continue operating as they do at present may I suggest Switzerland

It’s not about that. It’s about tax avoidance. By saying they are 501c3, there are rules and laws they must follow or risk losing their 501c3 status. Now that they have been put on notice, it’s important for them to tighten up

Re: Wikipedia’s nonprofit status questioned by D.C. U.S. attorney

#630

Post by Tycho »

kashunstva wrote: post #428
Tycho wrote: post #255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I recall right-leaning social media sites like Gab, Parler, r/TheDonald, Infowars being taken offline. I can’t read the WP article because it’s paywalled, however I have been suspicious of Wikimedia for a long time. I used to donate to them thinking I was helping to keep the severs running, then being alarmed to find the money was going on all sorts of nonsense. The former CEO (Maher) was blatantly a political/intell…

> I recall right-leaning social media sites like Gab, Parler, r/TheDonald, Infowars being taken offline. Were these not the actions of private entities rather than official government acts?

Yes, but actions taken by corporations in concert with the government, due to pressures exerted by the government by extralegal means, which, I’m told, is the definition of fascism.
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