Biograph Company, Open slander and harrassment Options

[biographco]

First, I want to thank the editors of the blog and say that there is such a need for this forum about Wikipedia, since this so called "Encyclopedia" is crawled by many other information websites and so many editors on Wikipedia truly have an agenda that is unfair and biased.

My company is a small independent film company and had been on Wikipedia for quite awhile with an article. Our company is a very old company, and has an exemplary reputation. We did not even post the first article but one of the Wiki-members did. The first article was fine and fairly accurate. However, in 2004 after our monument in Hollywood event, one editor appeared and became malicious with intent to harm the reputation of the company. This "Editor" also had a certain group of "Editors" that knew this person or he/she recruited them in an effort to discredit our company, and supply false information. We feel this was a personal attack and intent on harming the company's reputation for certain reasons.

At the time, I was not that familiar with Wikipedia guidelines or standards, and one of our VP's was extremely upset and dared to defy this "Editor". This VP who had a previous Wikipedia account was promptly blocked. I admit our VP did go against some Wiki-policies. Our attorney then attempted to call and contact Wikipedia to resolve the issue, but without results. The article was further re-written, including ambiguous information and intentional inclusions to make the company look "Ridiculous" which is actually posted IN WRITING by one of the administrators, yes, that this was their intent and goal. Since this, we have not attempted to change anything, in-process of legal proceedings according to state and federal law.

We also noticed that some other members of Wikipedia who were trying to correct the article contacted us on our information. These other editors also discovered that their was malicious intent against us, and were blocked as well by this other coalition of editors determined to discredit the company. This information we know of because of the blocked editors contacting our office.

We also was recently hacked and even embezzlement of funds occurred by hacking that coincide with recent Wikipedia activity against the company. This has been already reported to the proper authorities, and we believe it may have been a Wikipedia person involved in this slanderous effort.

Unfortunately, anyone attempting to correct the article about us is "Blocked" or "Banned". A monopoly of only a few associated editors now is able to include any false or harmful information without recourse. With this in mind, we have several options that we are in the process of initiating against Wikipedia and the foundation, some of it possibly criminal.

It is sad that Wikipedia is a great idea but is monopolized and used for personal and sometimes hateful agendas against others without provocation. We want to make everyone aware of this and maybe this can be stopped before Wikipedia finally pushed too far, and will eventually be shut down for inappropriate activity.

Please feel free to check out the Wikipedia article under "American_Mutoscope_and_Biograph_Company" and also read the "Talk" sections as well as the archive sections. We also encourage any kind of input on this subject.

[anon1234]

It's standard practice for editors and administrators to engage in retaliation. It's just a petty power trip thing with many people over there. Legal complaints are by far the best recourse.

[biographco]

It's standard practice for editors and administrators to engage in retaliation. It's just a petty power trip thing with many people over there. Legal complaints are by far the best recourse.

Thank you for your reply and interest. Yes, we are going ahead with pursuit of legal action civilly as well as possible criminal.

By far!

I found this archived AN entry. Should we assume that User:Will_Beback is the "editor" in question here? He does have a history of being unusually persecutorial, as several members here will attest. He even went to the trouble of maintaining what can only be described as a large dossier of links on you and your company.

I hate to say this, but it's really best for someone in your position to avoid getting involved with these people in the first place. Their definition of "conflict of interest," as we've noted many times, is skewed and tailored to suit their purposes - in other words, Wikipedia demands that if you edit it, your primary interest is Wikipedia, not you, not your organization, and not your religion, political party, or anything else involving your personal beliefs (unless you're one of a handful of admins to whom these rules don't seem to apply). The whole thing is really a cultish Utopian fantasy whose ideals they attempt to enforce mostly by blocking people, but also by various other ad nauseum means that work just about as well - which is to say not very well at all!

Having said that, there's some material on the company's website that's somewhat, I daresay, not purely business-related...? I'm afraid that almost certainly raised some doubts among them as to your motivations, if not your sincerity. I don't suppose you've considered moving some of it off onto a different website?

Thank you very much for your reply. Our company history is interwoven with its future. However, it is a good idea to have a seperate history page dedicated only to its history. Again, we are a small company and don't pretend to be Dreamworks LLC. but we are "Real". Thank you also for your suggestons.



This post has been edited by biographco:

[anon1234]

From AN/I:

Over on anti-Wikipedia whinefest Wikipedia Review, somebody claiming to be associated with American Mutoscope and Biograph Company, or at least the modern company that has taken on this name in imitation of an unrelated early-20th-century movie company, is ranting and making legal threats, which of course are being warmly received over there, as is any anti-Wikipedia rant no matter how crackpotted. Among the things this guy apparently wants to sue over is our insistence on not considering his company the direct successor to the "classic" one, in the absence of any references outside of his own site that states such a connection in contrast to the many references that cite the original company being out of business by the 1930s. *Dan T.* 16:51, 31 March 2007 (UTC)

:This happens pretty often at WR; they do nothing but whine and complain. I don't think that there's anything we can do, anyway. WR is way out of our jurisdiction. Comments? PTO 18:46, 31 March 2007 (UTC)

::I guess its the wiki media foundation that should deal with this if anyone, not that any of WR's legal threats ever actually come to anything. Making legal threats is a poor substitute for pursuing legal action. Worth putting the article on one's watchlist though, SqueakBox 18:57, 31 March 2007 (UTC)

Typical distortion. I notice they are associating the legal threats as coming from WR proper, but we are not an organization with the ability to file lawsuits as a group, but rather a message board in which many people from diverse groups can post. I still feel my advice to Biography Company is completely accurate, in that Wikipedia does respond appropriately to companies that make serious and properly argued legal filings regarding defamation and distorted article portrayals (and in such cases Wikipedia will remove the offending material), although Wikipedia doesn't take legal threats (remember: words are cheap, deeds are dear) seriously unless you make them on Wikipedia proper which will then result in a quick ban.