Wikipedia survives while the rest of the internet breaks • Hacker News Board

Re: Wikipedia survives while the rest of the internet breaks

#61

Post by martey » Thu, Sep 04, 2025, 6:44 PM UTC

mothballed wrote: post #32

ars wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've noticed this exact same thing. And I too just gave up. People have their pet causes and they force the article to match, and normal, non-obsessed people give up. Any controversial topic should never be read on Wikipedia, it will not be accurate.

I noticed this during the election. As soon as Kamala become the contender, it was edited out that her father was described as a "marxist scholar" by a college newspaper. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Donald_J._Harris&...

I think that when a wealth of other reliable sources don't describe an economist as Marxist, Wikipedia shouldn't give precedence to a single op-ed in the Stanford Daily from 1976.

You're focusing on when the word "Marxist" was removed in 2024, but you might want to consider when it was added to the article (in August 2020, about two weeks after Harris was selected to be the vice presidential nominee): https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Donald_J._Harris&...

Re: Wikipedia survives while the rest of the internet breaks

#62

Post by mothballed » Thu, Sep 04, 2025, 6:45 PM UTC

IAmBroom wrote: post #53

mothballed wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It had been at least 2 years. [] Never became much of a contentious issue until Kamala was looking at the presidential nomination, from what I can tell, then suddenly there was a vicious fight to remove it based on reasoning that mysteriously didn't exist for years and years before that. [] https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Donald_J._Harris&... Edit: at least ~4 years https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?tit…

Or, it wasn't important enough to merit editorial discussion prior to that.

Flipping

>Any controversial topic should never be read on Wikipedia, it will not be accurate.

to

>A controversial topic will become important enough to merit editorial discussion

Is an interesting point. I think I will vouch you just for the genius of flipping it.

Re: Wikipedia survives while the rest of the internet breaks

#63

Post by Wikipedianon » Thu, Sep 04, 2025, 6:46 PM UTC

howenterprisey wrote: post #51

Wikipedianon wrote: post #30

The article criticizes doxxing but well-known Wikipedia editors doxx each other all the time... There's a site called Wikipediocracy that's been around for 20 years and an Arbitrator (Wiki's Supreme Court) was suspended for leaking secret deliberations to the "private" section of the forum—just make an account and you can see it too. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2... According to that Ar…

Hi. I was an arbitrator who voted to suspend that arbitrator. There was no doxxing involved, which anyone can verify. Barely anything else in your comment is correct either. Doxxing is an issue but from where I sit it's much worse from people outside Wikipedia.

Beeblebrox leaked internal mailing list messages to a forum known for doxxing in violation of the NDA they signed.

i know that Beeblebrox did not doxx anyone and I said that in my comment. my point is leaking information to a doxxing forum sends the wrong message and is dangerous.

Maybe you should create an account and look at the "Wikimedian Folks Too Embarrassing for Public Viewing" forum and get back to me. Or do something about it before the Trump administration uses this as an excuse to censor enwiki. Either way here are some excerpts if you don't want to.

From the first page, here's an active editor (iii, known as jps or ජපස) doxxing someone about UFOs. I took out the names to be polite but it's all there:

https://wikipediocracy.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=38&t=14172

"Is [username 1] (T-C-L) an alt account of [username 2] (T-C-L)?

For those who are not aware, [username2] is the name of an account used by one [redacted] on various platforms up until about 2024 when he more or less abandoned them. That account also was involved in the ongoing game of accusing [redacted] (T-H-L) of being [redacted] (T-C-L) which is about as fairly ludicrous an attempt at matching a Wikipedia username as I've ever seen.

Anyway, I feel like maybe he thought "If [__] can do it, so can I." And maybe that's the origin of the VPP.

Oh, this is about UFOs. Yeah, I'm in the shit. Maybe someone can link to some other stuff for you to read, but I just want to drop this here because I have nowhere else I get to speculate on these matters and everyone loves a good conspiracy theory data dump from time to time "

Here's the thread "Who is Wikipedia editor i.am.qwerty"

https://wikipediocracy.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=38&t=13821

"I.am.a.qwerty (T-C-L) gathered up a bunch of those articles and some earlier material to create Wikipedia and antisemitism..."

It goes on:

"But who is I.am.a.qwerty? Let's suppose, just for the sake of argument, that I.a.am.a.qwerty is a PhD student named [real name]. Specifically, this [real name]:"

    "[real name] is a PhD candidate [major] at [university name]. He received his BA (Hons) in [major] from [university]. Previously [real name] received his rabbinical ordination from the [other school] in [location] in [year]. [real name] is also the [job title] at [organization]."

I can't imagine any other community tolerating its members going on KiwiFarms and encouraging doxxing of other community members, so long as they didn't technically engage in it. But Wikipedia does.

Re: Wikipedia survives while the rest of the internet breaks

#64

Post by pessimizer » Thu, Sep 04, 2025, 6:48 PM UTC

IAmBroom wrote: post #52

pessimizer wrote: post #46

I've started to think that the fact that Wikipedia will change its descriptions of reality based on whoever is willing to spend the time and money to subvert it is a feature when it comes to survival. When the final sci-fi authoritarian dictatorship comes down, Wikipedia will happily explain that it was always here, and that Eastasia was always the enemy.

Its (relatively short) history suggests otherwise, so far.

It certainly does not. It is not dependable for any subject that anybody or any government that commands any significant resources has any interest in. I'm sure there's somebody right this second guarding distortions on some obscure page about some scientific phenomenon that 99.999% of people have never heard of because their investment depends on it.

The political model doesn't work at all. If you just count the votes of the people who show up to vote, the Party will hire buses and empty the retirement homes and homeless shelters. Maybe you can fight this irl if everyone knows there's an election, but nobody knows when there's a war on a talk page.

Re: Wikipedia survives while the rest of the internet breaks

#65

Post by Wikipedianon » Thu, Sep 04, 2025, 6:48 PM UTC

IAmBroom wrote: post #56

howenterprisey wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hi. I was an arbitrator who voted to suspend that arbitrator. There was no doxxing involved, which anyone can verify. Barely anything else in your comment is correct either. Doxxing is an issue but from where I sit it's much worse from people outside Wikipedia.

Also, the poster "Wikipedianon" makes Tu Quoque fallacies. The fact that some Wikipedia editors have engaged in doxxing of others doesn't make it less of a problem for the government to do so. Unsurprisingly, "Wikipedianon" is a hit-and-run profile created just for this post, AFAICT.

it's a hit-and-run because I don't want to get doxxed.

I dont want a world in which Trump regulates Wikipedia but pretending it's sunshine and rainbows is a joke at this point.

And the person you're replying to is strawmanning. I never said Beeblebrox doxxed anyone, just that they leaked secret information on a doxxing forum in violation of Wikipolicy and possibly privacy law.

Re: Wikipedia survives while the rest of the internet breaks

#66

Post by mrandish » Thu, Sep 04, 2025, 6:54 PM UTC

bawolff wrote: post #12

There has been this trend recently of calling Wikipedia the last good thing on the internet. And i agree its great, i spend an inordinate amount of my time on Wikimedia related things. But i think there is a danger here with all these articles putting Wikipedia too much on a pedestal. It isn't perfect. It isn't perfectly neutral or perfectly reliable. It has flaws. The true best part of Wikipedia is that its a work i…

I agree with both your points. Wikipedia is extremely useful because it's generally very good - and it's also not perfect.

I'll add I don't think it can be any closer to "perfect" than it is because the same fundamental traits which lead to its imperfections also enable its unique value - like speed, breadth, depth and broad perspectives. The only areas where it might very occasionally not be ideal tend to be contentious political and culture war topics or newer niche articles with low traffic. Basically topics where some people care too much and those where not enough people care at all.

But this isn't as big a downside as it might be because anyone can look at an article's talk page and edit history and immediately see if it's a contentiously divisive topic or, on the other end of the spectrum, see when there's been little to no discussion.

Re: Wikipedia survives while the rest of the internet breaks

#67

Post by mothballed » Thu, Sep 04, 2025, 6:54 PM UTC

martey wrote: post #61

mothballed wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I noticed this during the election. As soon as Kamala become the contender, it was edited out that her father was described as a "marxist scholar" by a college newspaper. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Donald_J._Harris&...

I think that when a wealth of other reliable sources don't describe an economist as Marxist, Wikipedia shouldn't give precedence to a single op-ed in the Stanford Daily from 1976. You're focusing on when the word "Marxist" was removed in 2024, but you might want to consider when it was added to the article (in August 2020, about two weeks after Harris was selected to be the vice presidential nominee): https://en.wiki…

You say it was added in August 2020, but the article was created in August 2020.

Not much of an indictment that additional information was added sometime shortly after the article was created.

Re: Wikipedia survives while the rest of the internet breaks

#68

Post by soupfordummies » Thu, Sep 04, 2025, 6:57 PM UTC

mediumsmart wrote: post #59

Wikipedia broke some time ago in order to be allowed to survive. There are still things that can be looked up there and taken at face value.

I read this comment three times and I still don't understand what you're trying to say. Not trying to be rude, just saying.

Re: Wikipedia survives while the rest of the internet breaks

#69

Post by b_e_n_t_o_n » Thu, Sep 04, 2025, 7:07 PM UTC

postmodern99 wrote: post #58

visarga wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In fact it’s the same values that “science” stands on: do our best everyday and continue to try improving. Scientists realized there is no "Truth", only a series of better and better models approximating it. But philosophers still talk about Truth, they didn't get the message. As long as we are using leaky abstractions - which means all the time - we can't capture Truth. There is no view from nowhere.

> Scientists realized there is no "Truth", only a series of better and better models approximating it. > it What is "it", if not truth?

The irony lol.

Re: Wikipedia survives while the rest of the internet breaks

#70

Post by theteapot » Thu, Sep 04, 2025, 7:07 PM UTC

pessimizer wrote: post #49

ars wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've noticed this exact same thing. And I too just gave up. People have their pet causes and they force the article to match, and normal, non-obsessed people give up. Any controversial topic should never be read on Wikipedia, it will not be accurate.

> People have their pet causes People are paid whole-ass salaries to edit Wikipedia (and to become mods on Reddit.) They masquerade as (a dozen different) obsessed weirdos, but they are just normal middle-class people who are being paid to lie.

I'd love some examples of specific pages.