Tag Archives: wikipedia

Under the looking glass : Controversy and Wikipedia

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The aim of this blog entry is to look at a controversial Wikipedia article and analyze the talk page for the four dimensions of online communities.  My initial intent was to discuss the ever-controversial Scientology page.  Upon reflection, however, I’ve changed my mind.  There is a fairly well-known actor in the security community who goes by the handle of th3 j3st3r (The Jester).  To date, his “real” identity is unknown.

What makes him both well-known and controversial is that he’s a gray-hat hacker who attacks sites he deems bad.  For instance, he regularly attacks sites he claims are jihadist fronts, effectively making the sites unreachable.  This behavior is viewed by many as extremely controversial and, as a result, there are a number of people that want to expose him.  Interestingly, some of this controversy appears on the talk page for his Wikipedia entry.  The following is an analysis of the talk page as well as how this relates to how Wikipedia works.

As an aside, I’m realizing that my own opinions seem to be contributing, somewhat, to my analysis.  So, for the record, I’m not entirely sure where I stand with respect to the Jester.  On the one hand, I find his ability to remain anonymous intriguing.  On the other, his activities are somewhat questionable.  It is difficult, however, to argue that the sites he alleges to have disabled should remain on the Internet.

Ideology: What underlying assumptions and values drive the discussion?

The commentary on the talk page appears to come from two different viewpoints.  The commenter is either a critic of the Jester or someone who appears to be trying to keep a neutral point of view.  The critics all seem to believe that the Jester is a fraud of one sort or another.  Those trying to remain neutral seem to do a good job of remaining objective by providing facts, requesting additional information, or directing others to Wikipedia guidelines.

Overall, it seems that the discussion is driven on one side by critics who question whether the Jester should have a Wikipedia entry at all, and on the other side by editors who are striving to write a neutral article.

Face Systems: What language points to how people get along? “phatic discourse” (small talk); language that invokes or establishes relationships / power differentials; jokes; play

The use of negative wording such as “self-promoting moron” and “twitiot” seem to be used by commenters that are against having this article appear in Wikipedia.  Very few arguments made for removing this article seem to be made without a negative tone.

Many of the responses to arguments for removal use very strong, solid language.  Instead of coming across as defensive in nature, the responses state facts up front along with a follow up statement identifying that the information provided is clear and acceptable.  When personal attacks are made, the response language is strong, to the point, and identifies relevant Wikipedia documentation identifying unacceptable behavior.

There are a few conversations that seem to concentrate on ensuring that proper language and facts are used within the article.  One of these regards what language to use to identify the unknown gender of the Jester.  This brief conversation is, with one notable exception, cordial and to the point.  Without analyzing the article itself, however, there is no clear conclusion to the conversation.

The noted exception in the gender conversation is a brief anonymous statement.  The anonymity itself is interesting as the comment appears to be inflammatory.  The date stamp on the comment indicates that it actually occurs after the main conversation has already been completed, despite the comment appearing in the middle.  In the end, the comment doesn’t lend much to the overall conversation.

Forms of Discourse: What is the structure of communication? emoticons/standard grammar/linking/citation

Many of the comments calling for removal of the article are anonymous.  I find this quite relevant as it seems to indicate a user who is not committed to the cause they promote.  Additionally, these removal requests rarely include any documentation supporting their position.

Most commentary responding to the removal requests contain links and citations supporting their positions.  The language used is strict, but respectful.

There are a few instances of emoticon usage.  Each of these instances appears to be an attempt at levity, each punctuating a statement that appears to be playful.

Socialization: Any language, phrases, or moments where you can see people attempting to teach each other something?

I’m not sure if this qualifies, but at the beginning of the talk page is discourse from one particular commenter, Paul the Less, who seems dead-set against having the Jester article included in Wikipedia.  Over a period of approximately two weeks, he comments that the Jester is not notable and that the article should be removed.  His comments use negative language and seem to attack the Jester while requesting removal of the article.  Other commenters provide links to information they believe proves that the Jester is noteworthy and reject the proposal for deletion.

At one point, Paul the Less posts a comment that implies that the Jester is one of the other commenters.  One of the responses notes that “outing” a user is against Wikipedia policy.  Paul the Less follows up with an apology as well as a reversal of his request for deletion, citing a link to an article he believes marks the Jester as notable.

Finally, Paul the Less goes on to make additional comments about other topics to be included in the article along with a request for clarification of Wikipedia guidelines.

 

Overall analysis of this talk page leads me to conclude that there are, at times, very complex interactions between users of Wikipedia.  Some users are quite passionate about a subject that may interest or enrage them and post comments that clearly show their feelings.  Others strive to remain neutral, both when editing articles and when responding to commentary on the talk page.  While this particular article does have a number of passionate contributors, it is clearly not as contested as some other articles appear to be.  Wikipedia policy allows for highly controversial articles to be locked for editing when necessary, though one can argue that this policy may result in other types of bias.

Article curating, overall, seems to be a collaborative effort.  In some cases, metered discourse brings about useful conclusions regarding sections of an article.  In others, passionate disagreement can result in additional information being added to an article to present multiple angles of a controversial topic.  And in some instances, rational discourse deteriorates into the irrational.  It appears, however, that many editors strive to avoid the irrational and steer conversations, instead, to neutral ground.

Historic Struggle

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Turns out, editing Wikipedia is rather difficult.  At least, it is in this particular case.  The prospect of modifying the page, adding my own voice, helping out the community, all of this is appealing.  On the other hand, there’s a lot of research to be done.  And, to be honest, the history of Lafayette, while interesting, isn’t quite interesting enough for me to want to spend a lot of time digging.

I spend a lot of time learning every day.  In my case, that learning typically has a very technical leaning.  I’m a technophile and the prospect of digging into some new technology is something I find both interesting and exciting.  I’ve been known to spend hours poking and prodding at something new, much to the chagrin of my family.

In the end, though, this is an assignment and I’m eager to obtain a good grade on it.  Part of the project is to validate links, clean up the wiki markup, and generally ensure that the article meets the structural standards for a Good Article award.  I’m going to concentrate my efforts in this area.  After all, this is a group project and we all have our strengths and weaknesses.

Encyclopedia of Design

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This week, the Introduction and History group was able to meet during class to discuss what our initial steps will be towards fleshing out how we will structure the sections we are responsible for.  For my own part, I decided to tackle the issue by comparing other “Good Article” entries for colleges.  I pulled the intro and history sections from three other colleges, Columbia University, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and Washington & Jefferson College.  The goal of this exercise was to determine a commonality between these entries that we could use to guide development of our own.

Interestingly, there is almost nothing in common between these entries beyond the main heading of “History.”  This was a rather unexpected turn as I honestly thought that there would be a commonality here.  Granted, I have merely skimmed the information provided about Good Articles as well as the Wikipedia Manual of Style, but I have used other encyclopedia’s in the past.  They were, of course, made of dead trees, glue, and a not insignificant amount of ink.  Within the pages of each encyclopedia, article layout and style was quite rigid.

With Wikipedia, each article is typically self-contained.  There are definitely links between articles, but there seems to be no rules that dictate that article layouts should be identical.  The Manual of Style seems to be more interested in clear and concise language usage rather than a rigid layout.  There is a Layout section, but the primary purpose of this guidance is to ensure that standardized sections of an article are included.  For instance, all articles should include an introduction and table of contents, but subsequent sections are arbitrary.  They should all have the same style, but the content of these sections is left up to the writer.  And finally, all articles end with a footer containing a pre-defined set of content, in a specific order, but none of this information should affect the overall entry.

After making this discovery, the group discussed how we should proceed with our particular entry.  We definitely need a history section, but what should be in there?  How do we decide what to add and what to leave out?  In the end, it seems we’ve decided to determine what we find interesting and important and add that.  We want to make sure that events we believe are important are in there as well as other events that may not be as important, at least to us, but are interesting.  The current list we have is as follows :

Founding of the college : Most of this information is in the introduction already, but for completeness, it should have a subheading under history.

The Lafayette Charter : The original charter has changed a bit over time.  We want to highlight the various paths the college has taken over the years.  Originally the college was intended to be a Military and Civil Engineering school, but that was quickly replaced by a manual labor school.  From there the college moved to raising silkworms, switched again to a model school, and finally settled on liberal arts.  Or, at least, that’s the information I have thus far.  More research is required here.

Church affiliation : I’m not sure if this matters or not.  The college is currently associated with the Presbyterian church, but how strong of a bond is that?  And with the recent announcement that this association will be abandoned, maybe this is something that isn’t necessary?  It is part of the history, however, and maybe deserves a mention, even if it’s merely a footnote.  Additionally, if the college is currently associated with the church, that association should be added to the infobox on the Wikipedia page.

Lafayette in wartime : From what we heard in the presentation we attended about the history of Lafayette, wartime had a significant impact on the college.  From low enrollment numbers, and Lafayette was likely not the only one to suffer from that, to drilling on the quad, this history seems interesting enough to be mentioned.

Civil Rights : As if having members of the Tuskegee airmen attending Lafayette was not enough, Lafayette seems to have been quite progressive when it comes to civil rights.  The story about the president of Lafayette opting out of a bowl game in support of civil rights is an amazing story.  I believe the inclusion of Nishiyama, the Japanese kamikaze pilot, is another example of where Lafayette has been a civil rights leader.

Recent history : This section was floated for inclusion, but, to be honest, I’m not sure what we would add here.  Per the others in my group, recent history would include anything that happened “during the lifetime of a current student,” which means that history from roughly the early 1990’s and current is included.  Perhaps this section includes information such as how we hosted Gorbachev and Biden?  The fate of this section remains to be seen.

It will be interesting how these sections develop over the next week.  There is more research and a lot of writing to be accomplished between now and then.

Rewriting History

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Wikipedia has become one of the most used resources on the Internet today.  It is often the first non-search website a person goes when researching a given topic.  While sometimes innacurate and often contested, Wikipedia is proof that crowd-sourced content is viable and accurate.

As part of my English 253 class, we have been tasked with re-writing the Wikipedia entry for Lafayette College.  I am part of the Introduction and History group.  We will be working to re-write the introduction and ensure that the history of the college contains relevant and neutral information as per the guidelines for a Good Article entry.  Of course, with an almost 200 year history, it seems unlikely that every event will be added.  Instead, we hope to add what can be considered relevant and important events.  This, however, lends its own problems as the very act of choosing those history entries can be considered a non-neutral view.

The current introduction to the entry seems to start off strong and neutral, but degenerates quickly into language appropriate for the front of a college brochure.  The first paragraph seems to be quire neutral and contains pertinent information.  I don’t see a reason to make any changes to the very beginning.  The next paragraph seems to be entirely problematic.  It starts out with a comment about the student body, very fact based.  From there it jumps into a variety of rankings from prominent publications.  While these may be facts, their presence in the introductory paragraph seems to color this as positive spin for the college rather than mere factual information.  It makes the entry appear to be non-neutral which is something we need to resolve.

I made a few changes to the introduction to clean it up a bit and split off the questionable content into its own paragraph.  I also moved the Alison Byerly announcement, which seems appropriate, into its own paragraph.  I also added a comment about who she is replacing.  I’m curious if these changes will persist or if a third party will revert them.  I also added myself as a watcher on the page.  This should alert me to any changes made from here on out.

Last Wednesday, 2/20/13, our class met with the college archivist, Diane Shaw.  She gave a presentation on the college’s history, during which I took a few pages of notes.  I summarized and added these notes to the Talk page for the Lafayette College Wikipedia entry.  My hope is that having that information there as a guide, we can refer back to them as we make our changes.  Additionally, I emailed my content addition to my group and then was able to meet with one of our group members on Friday during class.

I believe we’re going to meet a few more times in order to organize our thoughts and determine how we are going to proceed with the rewrite of the page.  From my perspective, if we keep to factual information only, it won’t be much of a problem.  Being a technical writer, I don’t find presenting factual information like this in a neutral tone to be very difficult.  Provided I don’t add any additional commentary, that is.