Republicans Investigate Wikipedia Over Allegations of Organized Bias (thehill.com) 173
An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Hill: Republicans on the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee opened a probe into alleged organized efforts to inject bias into Wikipedia entries and the organization's responses. Chair James Comer (R-Ky.) and Rep. Nancy Mace (R-S.C.), chair of the panel's subcommittee on cybersecurity, information technology, and government innovation, on Wednesday sent an information request on the matter to Maryana Iskander, chief executive officer of the Wikimedia Foundation, the nonprofit that hosts Wikipedia. The request, the lawmakers said in the letter (PDF), is part of an investigation into "foreign operations and individuals at academic institutions subsidized by U.S. taxpayer dollars to influence U.S. public opinion."
The panel is seeking documents and communications about Wikipedia volunteer editors who violated the platform's policies, as well as the Wikimedia Foundation's efforts to "thwart intentional, organized efforts to inject bias into important and sensitive topics." "Multiple studies and reports have highlighted efforts to manipulate information on the Wikipedia platform for propaganda aimed at Western audiences," Comer and Mace wrote in the letter. They referenced a report from the Anti-Defamation League about anti-Israel bias on Wikipedia that detailed a coordinated campaign to manipulate content related to the Israel-Palestine conflict and similar issues, as well as an Atlantic Council report on pro-Russia actors using Wikipedia to push pro-Kremlin and anti-Ukrainian messaging, which can influence how artificial intelligence chatbots are trained.
"[The Wikimedia] foundation, which hosts the Wikipedia platform, has acknowledged taking actions responding to misconduct by volunteer editors who effectively create Wikipedia's encyclopedic articles. The Committee recognizes that virtually all web-based information platforms must contend with bad actors and their efforts to manipulate. Our inquiry seeks information to help our examination of how Wikipedia responds to such threats and how frequently it creates accountability when intentional, egregious, or highly suspicious patterns of conduct on topics of sensitive public interest are brought to attention," Comer and Mace wrote. The lawmakers requested information about "the tools and methods Wikipedia utilizes to identify and stop malicious conduct online that injects bias and undermines neutral points of view on its platform," including documents and records about possible coordination of state actors in editing, the kind of accounts that have been subject to review, and and of the panel's analysis of data manipulation or bias. "We welcome the opportunity to respond to the Committee's questions and to discuss the importance of safeguarding the integrity of information on our platform," a Wikimedia Foundation spokesperson said.
The panel is seeking documents and communications about Wikipedia volunteer editors who violated the platform's policies, as well as the Wikimedia Foundation's efforts to "thwart intentional, organized efforts to inject bias into important and sensitive topics." "Multiple studies and reports have highlighted efforts to manipulate information on the Wikipedia platform for propaganda aimed at Western audiences," Comer and Mace wrote in the letter. They referenced a report from the Anti-Defamation League about anti-Israel bias on Wikipedia that detailed a coordinated campaign to manipulate content related to the Israel-Palestine conflict and similar issues, as well as an Atlantic Council report on pro-Russia actors using Wikipedia to push pro-Kremlin and anti-Ukrainian messaging, which can influence how artificial intelligence chatbots are trained.
"[The Wikimedia] foundation, which hosts the Wikipedia platform, has acknowledged taking actions responding to misconduct by volunteer editors who effectively create Wikipedia's encyclopedic articles. The Committee recognizes that virtually all web-based information platforms must contend with bad actors and their efforts to manipulate. Our inquiry seeks information to help our examination of how Wikipedia responds to such threats and how frequently it creates accountability when intentional, egregious, or highly suspicious patterns of conduct on topics of sensitive public interest are brought to attention," Comer and Mace wrote. The lawmakers requested information about "the tools and methods Wikipedia utilizes to identify and stop malicious conduct online that injects bias and undermines neutral points of view on its platform," including documents and records about possible coordination of state actors in editing, the kind of accounts that have been subject to review, and and of the panel's analysis of data manipulation or bias. "We welcome the opportunity to respond to the Committee's questions and to discuss the importance of safeguarding the integrity of information on our platform," a Wikimedia Foundation spokesperson said.
Everyone knows... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Everyone knows... (Score:5, Interesting)
And besides there's always consevapedia is you want a conservative viewpoint encyclopedia, or a good laugh if you actually have a brain.
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Objective reality has a well known liberal bias.
Brilliant! To prove your point, here’s a helpful excerpt from a Biden era “fact check” manual:
* The inflation is small and “temporary”. The working class is doing well economically.
* The border is secure.
* The Steele Report is gospel, Hillary didn’t fund it, the laptop is a Russian plant, the lab leak theory is propaganda.
* Violent crime rates were lowered by police defunding. The GF riots were “peaceful”. Kamala never donated to free GF rioters. Decriminalizi
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For example men being women?
Re:Everyone knows... (Score:4, Insightful)
"But pointing this out got you branded anti-masker by the left. But it's not like the right had gained a handle on reality at this point."
Please stop with this shit. Nothing in the Trump era is about right vs. left except according to Trump and Maga.
The anti-masker shit is just an outgrowth of anti-information, Fauci said use a mask so MAGA opposed masks. That's it.
"But now the left has gone to absolute crazy town."
And there it is.
"...the left is politically aligned with Muslim groups so they won't publicly criticize the Muslim religion for their abhorrent treatment of women."
Bullshit and bullshit. In today's news, the only thing closely relevant is support for Palestine, but that's not support for Islam, it's support for an entire people suffering genocide.
" In fact a prominent women's rights campaigner from Iran was protested when she went to speak at a university in the UK,..."
You understand this is a topic about American politics, right? Or are you just a paid troll?
"And then there's the assertion by the left that it's fair to have biological males who went through male puberty competing in women's sports."
OK Trumper.
"That's as anti-science and anti-reality as you can get. "
Why? Why should sports be segregated by gender at all? Where's the science for that? And if a person receives hormonal Therapy, who are you to decide whether them competing in ANY capacity is fair? You don't seem to even know what science is.
"Finally, just look at the 1619 project, which is almost completely a work of fiction."
And now...racism. Full blown Donald Trump cheerleading.
"So no, liberals can no longer claim that reality has a liberal bias. "
Says the Trumper who thinks he's on the down low.
Re:Everyone knows... (Score:4, Insightful)
And now...racism. Full blown Donald Trump cheerleading.
Thinking the 1619 project is a pile of dog shit is not racism.
Anyone who downplays contributions of black people should be kicked in the dick- but so should attempts at rewriting history.
Didn't you know that teh US banded together and formed the Continental Congress to protect the institution of slavery from the British?
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Britain didn't abolish slavery until the 1830s, or the slave trade until the second form of independent US Government was 20 fucking years old.
What happened here, is someone learned about Somerset v. Stewart in 1772 and mistook that as Britain actually feeling negatively about slavery at that time.
Virginia was the largest colony by terms of land, people, and slaves.
You'll find that Patrick Henry, while crying "Give me liberty, or give me death!" to the Second Virginia Convent
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Are you implying that if someone thinks the 1619 Project is revisionist garbage completely devoid from any historical pinning that can be attributed, that makes them... an apologist?
Why should sports be segregated by gender ? (Score:2)
No by gender, Yes by sex. We say women sport men sport because colloquially everybody until recently (a few decades ago) use women/men for male/female - but the reality is we split sport by sex which we use the colloquial gender name for, but make no mistake the separation is for sex (you can get into a lot of issues of somebody appearing one sex but having hormone insensitivity that does not change the reason for separat
Re: Why should sports be segregated by gender ? (Score:2)
"So unless your sport involve ZERO upper and lower body strength, it makes sense to separate sports by sex"
Per your own logic this is based on the importance of strength only. Therefore this assertion only makes sense if it's a sport where dexterity cannot make up for strength.
Re: Everyone knows... (Score:4, Funny)
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The poster above pointed out how batshit crazy it is to let men compete against women
Why is it "batshit crazy"? It isn't because men are always better at sports than women, because there's plenty of Reddit neckbeards who'd get knocked to the ground if they went up against professional female athletes. The reality is - it's just a vestige of sexual discrimination that you refuse to let go of.
including forcing women to share locker rooms
So build more locker rooms, it ain't rocket surgery.
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So build more locker rooms, it ain't rocket surgery.
Unfortunately for many Republicans, it may as well be. Blurring the lines between the sexes terrifies them because any more than two boxes to check confuses them.
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So build more locker rooms, it ain't rocket surgery
EVERY modern rec center / wellness center / pool center that I have been in over the last two decades has private "family" changing rooms available for ANYONE who wants to use them. Further, every locker room has private toilet stalls you can choose to use if you don't want to disrobe in front of others.
The notion that ANYONE is being FORCED to be naked in front of other people in a locker room is such a load of bullshit.
Re: Everyone knows... (Score:3)
There were how many trans athletes in the USA at the maximum?
Three. That's what is getting everybody's knickers in a twist. And it wasn't about being unfair to women. Trump caring about fairness? He even cheats at golf.
This was just about taking the most marginalised group possible, and victimizing them. Nothing more. And people who never understood critical thinking just lap it up.
Re: Everyone knows... (Score:2)
No, it was about finding an 80/20 issue the democrats still couldn't back down from. The gop strategists don't care. Neither does the dnc. They switched sides on the masking issue early on. The issues for them only matter in relation to polling, or dollars. This was a polling issue where nearly all existing gop support and swing voters were on one side, so they took something that affected three people and amplified it.
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It isn't because men are always better at sports than women
It depends on the sport. Most of the sports that are popular, such as U.S. football or basketball, are sports that became popular at a time when basically only men / boys were allowed to play in sports. My mom, who grew up in the 1950s, "played" basketball in gym class, but she was not allowed to even run the full length of the court (they had 5 who only played offense and 5 who only played defense) because "girls were too fragile" to run as far as the boys.
But there are some sports where females have a b
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You realize that's like a dozen people nationally you're worried about? I can name 10 other things of more importance.
Re: Everyone knows... (Score:2)
You don't know what Ad Hominem is.
It is NOT insulting people.
It is where you say an idea is wrong because someone said it. It may also be accompanied by an insult to attempt to support the argument.
When someone says only an idiot would believe something and then explains why, that is not Ad Hominem. It's just an argument with an insult next to it.
Feel free to object to the insult, but don't make shit up.
Re:Everyone knows... (Score:5, Insightful)
You're conflating moral choices from the left with outright lies and deception from the right. The whole premise of your argument is garbage. I'm very liberal but I do not in any way excuse what happened on Oct 7th, quite the opposite. But choosing to back Palestine is a moral decision isn't the same as the willful ignorance and lies told by the right.
Re:Everyone knows... (Score:4, Interesting)
I'm very liberal but I do not in any way excuse what happened on Oct 7th, quite the opposite. But choosing to back Palestine is a moral decision isn't the same as the willful ignorance and lies told by the right.
Is it even "backing Palestine" to oppose genocide of Palestinians? I can't stand either religion whose followers lay claim to Gaza, but I don't think that disliking someone's religion is sufficient justification for genocide. Israel was founded on the British partition of Palestine by the USA through the UN and it immediately began literal and self-described colonization of as much land as it could get its hands on, whether or not it was included in the lands which were handed to it.
Hamas is terrible, but it was founded in the eighties and in response to Israeli terrorist organizations which were murdering Palestinians, and Netanyahu has repeatedly and publicly told us that he makes sure Hamas receives funding which is sent to it as part of his Gaza strategy — so not only does history not start October 7, but Netanyahu deliberately made sure that something like the October 7 attack would happen, and then proceeded to go from semi-genocidal behavior to fully genocidal behavior. Therefore it's clear that his goal was always genocide. What did the world expect Palestinians to do, roll over?
To me, both Hamas and Israel's terrorist organizations are the enemies of not just all people who even believe in morality, but also the future of humanity because this conflict increases the chance of nuclear war day by day. We are closer to it today than we have ever been because the US-Russia cold war was between two nations with some things to lose. But Hamas was also inevitable and the blame for their successes falls on Netanyahu's willful insurance of their funding. And We The People of these United States of America have in turn enabled both him and Israel to do what they are doing in the region.
On that basis, we've already picked sides, and we've chosen the side of genocide.
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If the roles were switched, there wouldn't be a single Jew left alive in Israel right now
Soon there won't be any Palestinians alive in Gaza.
Netanyahu is just as bad as Hamas, both of them need to go. Hamas is going, and Netanyahu won't be in power forever
It won't take him forever to finish his genocide.
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Soon there won't be any Palestinians alive in Gaza.
The ethnic cleansing going on in Palestine is horrific.
That being said, at the current rate of IDF killing, Gaza (let alone the West Bank) is set to be depopulated in ohhhhhh, 62 years, 1 month, 5 days, and 13 hours.
So no, that claim is complete fucking bullshit. You're really on a roll with your dumb fucking comments lately.
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Soon there won't be any Palestinians alive in Gaza.
I was so sick of the over-use of the word "terrorist", and now the same with "genoncide".
Are Gazans a race now, or are Arabs as a whole a threatened "race"?
Since the October 7 mass-murders, more babies have been born in Gaza than people killed. If this is genocide, it is the least effective genocide in history.
Re: Everyone knows... (Score:2)
Its about equal, but starving them will do the trick nicely. At the very least it will damage their health and intelligence.
The purpose isn't genocide, the purpose is ethnic cleansing. A bit of genocide here and there to make them leave certainly helps. Its also part of the standard Zionist playbook, with Deir Yassin being one example where the Irgun Stern just murdered the entire village to the last baby to help the rest along.
When Zionism came up as political ideology, this was precisely what the opponent
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and you cannot make them full citizens if you want a theocracy based on religious principles they don't share
Eh, it's not quite that sinister on the why-there-can't-be-a-one-state-solution.
In the case of the Palestinians, you can't make them full citizens if you don't want a theocracy.
They outnumber the Israelis of Jewish ethnicity, and they have a predilection for Islamic theocratic government.
A one-state solution for Israel would amount to another genocide. Not the murdery (though there would be plenty of that) kind- but the spreading their people to the wind kind.
None of that justifies Israel's ethnic clea
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I was so sick of the over-use of the word "terrorist", and now the same with "genoncide".
Same.
Are Gazans a race now, or are Arabs as a whole a threatened "race"?
No, they are a people.
Genocide is not limited to race.
"Genocide is the specific intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial, or religious group"
Since the October 7 mass-murders, more babies have been born in Gaza than people killed. If this is genocide, it is the least effective genocide in history.
Ethnic cleansing is more appropriate. There's no UN convention on ethnic cleansing, however, so people reach for genocide.
Of course, under the UN convention, ethnic cleansing can arguably be called genocide- particularly if you turn the people into refugees "spread to the wind" as such.
You could make the same argument that "the ethni
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they could obliterate the entire population of Gaza overnight if they really wanted to.
Not even close.
Israel is expending munitions as quickly as we can send them to them.
They're pinned at just about the maximum rate of destruction.
Assuming the legends are true, and they've got some nukes, that could speed up the process, but not by that much.
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Lol, you don't seem to have a clue. Israel is showing restraint, they don't need any more weapons if they wanted to murder every last person in Gaza.
You can say it until you're blue in the face, but it's simply not true.
Israel is expending munitions right now at many times the rate they can produce them.
They can stand on the border and try to yell the Gazans to death quicker, I suppose.
It's also naive to think that Israel is only facing murderous terrorists in Gaza, the entire arab world has wanted them destroyed for decades.
You're still stuck in the 1950s, I think.
Today, Israel has multiple treaties with the Arab world.
I don't have time for this, so go somewhere else with Palestinian support.
Oh, I think we both know that's a lie. You've got all the time in the world. People as stupid as you don't have shit going on in their life. Realistically, you're probably
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It's also naive to think that Israel is only facing murderous terrorists in Gaza, the entire arab world has wanted them destroyed for decades.
They've wanted to conquer the whole Arab world since forever, and they are now attacking pieces of it outside of Gaza. They wrote themselves a book that said it was all theirs, and now they're trying to make it come true. The evangelicals are helping them try because they believe it will bring about the end times. As it happens, there's several of the foretold signs around right now, so they naturally think it's working and are doubling down. In the bargain, we have the tools and equipment to make it happen
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However, the classical "Eretz Israel" definitely includes many chunks of currently Arab land outside of even the partition borders.
I always found it funny that "From the River to the Sea" is now called a call for Jewish genocide, while it was a literally, I shit you not, part of the founding charter of Likud.
To spread the borders of Israel- as a solely Jewish state- from the River to the fucking Sea.
Re: Everyone knows... (Score:2)
As usual, the hypothetical counterfactual genocide, which you have been convinced of by an extremely resourceful state which sees truth as just another battlefield,
trumps the actual genocide, whose journalists are getting systematically murdered by the said propagandist state.
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I'm neither of those things. I'm not sure who your comment is for, but it isn't me.
Re: Everyone knows... (Score:3)
Giving Palestinians the same sort of agency as Israelis is perverse. Hamas is supported by Netanyahu, he's explicitly defended sending money to them as a strategy to divide and conquer and to reduce the risk of foreign sympathy.
(Foreign sympathy for Palestinians he sees as a threat to Israel. Terrorism, obviously not.)
There's one side which has all the power, all the freedom, all the choices in Israel-Palestine. Now that the genocide is getting completed, it's time for people like you to stop both-sidesing
Re:Everyone knows... (Score:4, Funny)
"now the left has gone to absolute crazy town"
Really ? You've seen Trump's presidency, and the left, is the crazy.
I'm sorry to inform you that your brain has left the building, hope you like living in Batshit Stupid City.
While I have you, I have a once in a lifetime deal on Trump's phone, with an exclusive 1,500%(*) off sale, $499 for a solid gold phone, 1,800%(**) made(***) in the USA, you can beat that deal, contact me, but be quick, the deal is only valid for 48 hours.
(*) Don't ask me, Ask Trump
(**) Same, he knows Math that common mortals can only dream of
(***) For some values of 'Made'.
Re:Everyone knows... (Score:5, Interesting)
Your argument is pretty typical of the "qualitative research" I like to tease my soft science colleagues about. You tell a story about "one side" and then tell another story about "the other side" and pretend they're equal. In your case your story about "the left" is pretty questionable too. A reasonably liberal view like freedom of religion and non-descrimination is in no way equivalent to excusing poor treatment of women (or anybody else) in hard core Islam any more than it is to excusing poor treatment of women in hard core Christianity.
In all but a few countries, support for implementing Sharia law is a small minority among Muslims. Support for such a thing is so vanishingly small in the US I couldn't find any polls that even asked.
Yet half of Americans think the bible should influence US law, 2/3 of Christians, and ~90% of white evangelicals.
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In all but a few countries, support for implementing Sharia law is a small minority among Muslims. Support for such a thing is so vanishingly small in the US I couldn't find any polls that even asked.
I'm going to agree with you that the risk of Sharia is overplayed, but you also just radically underplayed it.
I'm going to call the claim of "few" misleading. [ie.edu], particularly if you remove non-muslim-majority countries from that map.
It seems to be a mostly cultural thing. You can identify locii where Sharia is clearly culturally important, and areas where secularism is more important.
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Ah, I said something about support among the population and you reply with a map showing government policy.
You think? Basing your laws on a particular religion is a cultural thing?
Re:Everyone knows... (Score:5, Informative)
The left has gone so far left that the rest of us can't see them anymore. Which makes them pretty similar to the right in my opinion. Reality doesn't want anything to do with crazy.
You want to use Ronald Reagan as a benchmark for this? I'll begin with his 1984 speech where he offered amnesty to people who were in the country illegally. https://www.npr.org/2010/07/04... [npr.org]
I believe in the idea of amnesty for those who have put down roots and lived here, even though sometime back they may have entered illegally
Today we have masked brown shirts snatching people from the streets and moved to concentration camps. I really do feel safer without the Home Depot day laborers...
How about when Governor Ronald Reagan signed the Mulford Act because scary black panthers were exercising their second amendment rights? The NRA even teamed up with him on that particular piece of legislation. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
In 2025 what would happen if a republican offered amnesty for illegals and told people they could no longer open carry?
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In 2025 what would happen if a republican offered amnesty for illegals and told people they could no longer open carry?
Bump stocks were banned during the previous Trump administration. The electorate just tends to have a very short memory for these sort of things.
Re:Everyone knows... (Score:4, Insightful)
What do you call this? https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
Masked men grabbing people and throwing them into rental trucks.
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> the left is politically aligned with Muslim groups so they won't publicly criticize the Muslim religion for their abhorrent treatment of women
This is simply bollocks.
The only thing the left has done with "Muslim groups" is defend their human rights. This meme that the left somehow is Islamic started after 9/11 when the right wing were actively talking about violating basic rights of Muslims under some pretense that an American Muslim was likely a threat to the US and should be suspected of Terrorism. T
Re: Everyone knows... (Score:3, Informative)
Clay shooting does just that. Class based assignment with a system to move you up or down based on ability.
Works great.
Re: Everyone knows... (Score:4, Interesting)
Works great.
Except that it ruffles feathers to even suggest that people should question why we still condone certain forms of sexual discrimination, so good luck ever getting other sports organizers to see things that way.
It's kind of ironic too, because if you're the parent of a young boy who'd rather do girl scout activities - yup, they'll be discriminated against and can't join. We certainly talk a great game about progress towards equality, but where the rubber meets the road there's still at least a few activities where what genitalia you were born with defines whether or not you'll be welcome.
Also, raising awareness of systemic inequalities in society was the original definition of "woke", so if it's making right-wingers with mod points feel uneasy, now's their chance to finally use the word in its correct context.
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Let's say we make every endeavour happen without regard to genitalia. Under that assumption, let's take a look at sports:
Everyone can play, but only people with a penis happen to ever win. Odd that.
Ok, now women would like to have competitions, but a male entering their competitions ruins the fun for everyone.
How to deal?
I am not discriminating against trans folks when I say they should not be competing in women's sports. I am supporting women. Trans male-to-female have had the advantage of testosterone dur
Re: Everyone knows... (Score:2)
But for most sports, particularly those where size or upper body strength are advantageous, the separation between people who had lots of testosterone during puberty and those who didn't is so large that you would effectively still have men and women's sports. And trans women would still be in the tiers populated by men. There would be no one in the highest tiers of performance that did not have high testosterone during puberty. Is it more sexist to have mens and womens events in the Olympics, or to have on
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"I made this account to tell liberals that they're dumb, so they're not allowed to keep passively outsmarting me like this"
do you need a hug bro
On behalf of South Carolina... (Score:5, Funny)
I deeply apologize that Nancy Mace has anything to do with us. We're working on fixing that at mid-terms...
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I expect nothing less from the party of small government.
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I deeply apologize that Nancy Mace has anything to do with us. We're working on fixing that at mid-terms...
Good luck, but as members of the House are elected in local elections, what usually happens is the bigger an idiot they are, as long as they don't commit any crimes, the more likely they are to be re-elected. She'll be defeated only if a better Republican runs against her. And I'm not sure that we'll even have mid-term elections in 2026. If we do, I expect Republican controlled states (cough cough, South Carolina is one) to do off the charts cheating so that Republicans win every election. South Caro
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Sure they would. Cost is no object when it comes to spending taxpayer money to support Donald Trump. Add another layer of gold to the Oval Office.
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Well, that's the point, they don't plan on having fair elections. Putin has elections too.
Of course there are various degrees of unfair, it takes time to reach Assad's 95% results.
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Because it's smart to put all your eggs in one basket, yeah?
Never heard of "plan b" ?
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I deeply apologize that Nancy Mace has anything to do with us. We're working on fixing that at mid-terms...
She recently reported an active shooter on the University of South Carolina's campus because she saw a white guy carrying a closed umbrella. No, I am not kidding [yahoo.com].
Snowflakes (Score:5, Insightful)
Just fragile snowflakes lashing out. The Smithsonian is now too "woke" for saying slavery was bad and displaying artwork created by people darker than a latte. https://www.npr.org/2025/08/24... [npr.org]
It's not fragility (Score:5, Insightful)
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How does the pace of Trump's march into fascism compare with the pace of Hitler's and Mussolini's?
Re:Snowflakes (Score:5, Interesting)
Just fragile snowflakes lashing out.
They're doing more than just lashing out. This administration is also instructing states to paint over their pavement art [orlandosentinel.com], ostensibly because it doesn't meet new DOT standards.
The real reason, of course, is they wanted to get rid of all LGBTQ+ themed pavement art, but that probably wouldn't hold up in court if they specifically singled it out - so it all has to go. Ever wonder why the cities in fascist regimes tend to look conformist and dull? Well, this is how it happens.
Re: Snowflakes (Score:2)
so it was fine when it was just some good old Christian boys shooting up churches, but now it's bad? The fun went away now everybody can do it? I'm a bit confused here, AC.
And what's a hair queer?
AC, are you okay?
Re:Snowflakes (Score:5, Insightful)
I would argue that cruelty is the point.
Time to move the foundations to Switzerland. (Score:2, Insightful)
Academic independence is over...
Ah, yes, of course. (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Ah, yes, of course. (Score:5, Insightful)
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Or my personal one, '"You are free to speak as long as it respectful to the politicians currently in charge."
As quoted from a sherriff trying to arrest someone at a public hearing
It's HUAC All Over Again (Score:2)
Comer has in his hand a list ...
Wikipedia can be moved (Score:5, Informative)
Wikimedia foundation has a lot of money.185 M of revenue. And an endowment of 100 million. They can easily move elsewhere and give the finger to censors. plenty of countries will be happy to house them.
The whole data fits on any HDD and is easy to duplicate, move and multiply, Streisand effect mode.
Re:Wikipedia can be moved (Score:5, Informative)
It only fits on a hard drive if you take the text. The media are about 470 TB (428 TiB) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org] The WMF operates 7 database servers worldwide, but the full data is in Texas and Virgina https://wikitech.wikimedia.org... [wikimedia.org]
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Wikimedia foundation has a lot of money.
That can't be right, they were begging for donations just last week.
Distract! Deflect! (Score:5, Insightful)
Wikipedia is OBVIOUSLY the most important topic in America today!
Right? RIGHT?!!
Talk about WIKIPEDIA!
Re:Distract! Deflect! (Score:5, Interesting)
It is a bit the point of this excellent article. The whole site is worth reading and subscribing (its free).
https://www.doomsdayscenario.c... [doomsdayscenario.co]
His articles on ICE are chilling. Pun not intended.
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
Epstein, Gaza, Ukraine, RUSSIA, Fascism, Soldiers in the Streets of America, Secret Police, Federal Reserve, Persecution of political enemies, Tariffs, Taxes, Healthcare.
Re:Distract! Deflect! (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, we certainly don't want to talk about the Epstein files now, do we!
Go after anyone that criticizes you (Score:5, Insightful)
We have a very thin skinned president and by extension a very think skinned Republican party. They are going after anybody and everybody that says anything they do not like. Examples include:
1. Revocation of Security Clearances
2. Legal Actions Against Media
3. Going after comedians for making fun of them
4. FBI raid of John Bolton
5. Trying to find some dirt on Obama. It does not have to be Epstein level, but anything better than the tan suit controversy will do.
6. High tariffs for countries that refuse to bend the knee to Trump. e.g. India refused to nominate him for the peace prize and is now suffering the consequences. Russia is the only country immune to any punitive actions from this govt.
The Republicans are doing serious and lasting damage to this country.
Democrats Investigate Fox Over Allegations of Lyin (Score:3)
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I really don't think less free speech is the answer here. I'm not one of those folks who is happy so long as it's my team that's trampling over The Constitution.
Re:Democrats Investigate Fox Over Allegations of L (Score:4, Informative)
Are you referring to Fox News? Because broadcast licenses and their restrictions only apply to free to air stations, not cable/satellite/streaming TV. They can be sued by victims of libel/slander, of course. But aside from that, they can just call all their news "entertainment" or "fan fic" and get away with it.
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Isn't it a private organization (Score:2)
Wikimedia Foundation allows the full contents and even the software to be downloaded, TMTG could run their own version of it.
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That's my question also. What law gives politicians and prosecutors the right to stick their fingers into the Wiki org?
For the sake of argument suppose the Wiki managers and paid editors are flaming biased bigots; that alone is not enough to prosecute an org. KKK is allowed to exist.
Can anyone name a specific law by identification and clause number?
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What if it's partially a front for hostile foreign actors? Not saying it is (it probably isn't, at least not yet, and hopefully never will be), but that is apparently what is oficially under investigation. Or to put it differently, imagine if RT started buying up small and midmarket TV and radio stations and started using them to push Russian state propaganda. Would you expect Congress to investigate that?
Robust but not indestructible (Score:3)
Wikipedia has a very well thought out and refined system of guidelines and norms [wikipedia.org] for resisting unsubstantiated interference.
Throughout its history articles that touch political nerves have been the stages of localised battles. But I think, by and large, while an article may sometimes bow out with a political edit, the process/system promotes a steady push back towards a solid citation-based state. In some cases, articles have to be "protected" to maintain stability, but this is generally a temporary measure.
Having said that, I would be concerned that an organised campaign by a large group (like the current American political right), could overwhelm this system. It is robust, but not indestructible. That would be truely sad - a book burning moment in modern history.
Excuse me while i whip this out (Score:2)
You made everything political, now everything IS p (Score:2, Insightful)
No matter what tribe you belong to, this tribalism is horrendous on BOTH sides of the great divide and one side has been extremely busy making everything into a political statement as part of their progression; so now everything IS political and is seen and attacked as such. One side has dissolved objective reality and hard facts and replaced it with emotional angles and what feels good and feels right. So now everything is up for interpretation and up to everyoneâ(TM)s individual emotion. One side has
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So if I'm reading you correctly, the GOP has replaced reality with "we make our own reality"*, and everyone else is defined by you as an activist, because we're looking at actual reality? And we're objecting to fantasy as law?
* VP Dick Cheney
Yeah (Score:2)
Nazis like Nancy Mace hate the objective truth (Score:2)
Of course they're attacking wikipedia, in service of the child rapist Donald Trump.
Re:How much of our tax money goes to wikipedia? (Score:5, Insightful)
I think it's just a poorly formed sentence. Wikipedia gets no tax dollars, as far as I know. Unless you count the fact that they are a non-profit organization and so they don't pay some taxes.
I believe the subsidized people are the academic institutions which receive subsidies. Read that way they are alleging that people who work at publicly funded institutions are using wikipedia to influence the public. Probably part of their general crackdown on people like me (I'm a public university professor.) Hey! I guess that means some of your tax dollars indirectly go to wikipedia. My university gets tax dollars, out of which I get paid a salary. I turn around and give like $50 a year to the wikimedia foundation.
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"Hey! I guess that means some of your tax dollars indirectly go to wikipedia."
No, but that wouldn't stop Trumpers from suggesting it.
"I turn around and give like $50 a year to the wikimedia foundation."
As is your right. How about this, should AMD and nVidia be concerned when the Trump Administration interferes in their business while taking a personal profit stake in their competitor, Intel? And we're talking about Wikipedia?
Re: How much of our tax money goes to wikipedia? (Score:2)
So they believe that people in academics should not have 1st amendment rights?
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They believe that you should not exercise them as an "agent of the government" by extension of a part of your paycheck coming from them. Which is also no better. Any attempt at neutrality will have bias - anything else is close to impossible. What we're really doing is just arguing about whether the bias is intentional or facts-based. And even then, only if they are the "correct" facts.
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The rule for us has always been that as a private citizen, we can say anything we like. If we are acting as a government agent though, like if I am in the classroom or on a news program with my university logo proudly displayed under my talking head, then we are more constrained. Honestly, that is as it should be.
But yeah, there seems to be a push in the direction of because our paychecks are derived from the government then that extends into all sorts of other controls. Like giving to Wikimedia or a politi
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Nearly nothing. Most of wikimedia's income comes is small donations from individuals. Then there's donations or grants from the various philanthropic institutions and companies. I wouldn't be amazed if the grant from the US government is less than 1% of wikimedia's income, maybe even less than 0.1%.
Now, that does not disqualify their concern. Wikipedia is the goto place for a lot of people when they look up information on a particular topic, that makes them quite powerful. Wikipedia has a requirement to lin
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Now, that does not disqualify their concern. Wikipedia is the goto place for a lot of people when they look up information on a particular topic, that makes them quite powerful.
If the government doesn't like it, they're free to put out their own press releases or do a public awareness campaign, but they're not supposed to investigate Wikipedia. Have you even read the 1A? Here it is:
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
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It's an intentionally misworded headline, probably based on intentionally misworded press releases by those responsible for the story. Wikipedia has done nothing wrong. What they want here is an investigation of academic staff whose paychecks come partly from the government.
Much like Title IX, the only enforcement the government has against things it doesn't like is by conditionally withholding federal funding. The current administration would certainly love to pull federal funding from any public univer
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To quote Dean Wormer: Zero. Point. Zero.
Re: How much of our tax money goes to wikipedia? (Score:2)
nag banners? I got 5 mails...
Re: Two things are simultaneously possible (Score:2)
Remember the freak out by republicans around Biden trying to influence disinformation in social media? Pot meet kettle.