Wikipedia investigates unethical edits by PR firm, Bell Pottinger - The Next Web (blog) Options

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<img alt="" height="1" width="1" />[b]Wikipedia investigates unethical edits by PR firm, Bell Pottinger[/b]
The Next Web (blog)
High profile PR agency Bell Pottinger has made over 1000 edits to their client's Wikipedia entries (with at least 10 different accounts), removing negative information and adding positive content, according to The BBC. Some press are now receiving a ...

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[Peter Damian]

I haven't looked through the edits made by the various accounts, but it appears that despite their rather naive approach, they managed to slant things they way they wanted them slanted. Of course, they didn't figure on getting caught because they bragged about it to the wrong people, but it seems to me that they has sussed that it wasn't necessary to do much more than what they did.

The depressing thing about this whole affair is that despite their naive approach of this sockfarm, Wikipedia's famed 'control and monitor' systems failed spot the problem editing. It was uncovered only after an undercover investigation into Bell Pottinger itself, run by the "Bureau of Investigative Journalism". They posed as agents for corrupt regimes and taped the conversations, in the course of which it was discovered that they were writing for Wikipedia. The Bureau report was published on December 6th, 2011, by the Independent http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/polit...pm-6272760.html. Only then was there a block on the sock master account (Biggleswiki) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Contr...ons/Biggleswiki .

Thus, the naive approach to conflicted editing was not spotted by the Wikipedia control system, and even if it had been more sophisticated, it would not have survived the revelations by the Bureau.

Jimmy Wales is now appearing in the media looking like some sort of Jesus, complaining about the 'ethical blindness' of the conflicted editing in Wikipedia. And the media have bought his story. Nothing about the complete failure of controls that led to this happening at all.

Note there are still 4,000 conflicted articles according to this http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:WhatL...re/Template:COI

Wikipedia's main control mechanism is to slap a template on something, and hope somebody else will fix it. Which they clearly don't.

This post has been edited by Peter Damian: