Yeah, it seems to take people who could've been good people and just turn them into sociopathic manipulators to get what they want because the whole system is designed that way because so many people get away with it... like
Herschelkrustofsky and the admins sockpuppeting wars between each other, they're all as bad as each other really just different sides, ugh...
me I just don't want to go anywhere near those kind of lines... So I don't want to get involved in any of the controversial stuff there because it's just irretrievably broken... But then pretty much anything can be turned controversial, like nationalists with an agenda on otherwise innocuous articles sneakily rewriting history. So it's like the only real thing to do is just keep away from Wikipedia, but then it's so important now on Google too. What the hell
:/
They need to develop some kind of policy to recognise the fact that they cannot actually tell who is a sockpuppet and who is not, get rid of the ridiculous "AGF" stuff and be realistic and treat everyone like the random anons they are, and trust on content not contributor
I think it's not just a problem with Wikipedia though, it's a problem with the internet, because when you get down to it, it's all the same tactics of astroturfing but unpaid (well, usually,
Herschelkrustofsky and some others obviously get paid for it) - and the law and means of detection just hasn't caught up with the technology really, I'm not sure if it can ever be without being overly invasive. *sigh*