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.

[Somey]

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 know! Do they think we're forming a corporation or something? It's ludicrous. (But hardly surprising...)

Besides, their definition of "legal threat" pretty much means anything in which the word "legal" is included in a sentence. Pointing out legislation that might affect the content of an article is a "legal threat." Vaguely noting that the foundation might be sued for libelous content is a "legal threat." The entire WP:NLT policy is just a blinkering mechanism that lets them pretend that nothing they do ever has consequences. That, too, is ludicrous.

In the part of the Wikipedia article about your company, what is incorrect or slanderous?

Looks like much of the dispute was over the relationship of the modern company with the original...? The WP folks would probably have treated them much better if they'd named it "The American Mutant Biology Company" instead. (IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/smile.gif)

Actually, I may use that for my own next company...

By the way, welcome to the forum, Toledo! We were sort of hoping for Cleveland, but I suspect you'll do just fine for now!

[guy]

By the way, welcome to the forum, Toledo! We were sort of hoping for Cleveland, but I suspect you'll do just fine for now!

Welcome from me, too.

Cleveland is in North-East England and Toledo is in Spain - or is this some American joke? (IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/tongue.gif)

[Somey]

Cleveland is in North-East England and Toledo is in Spain - or is this some American joke? (IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/tongue.gif)

How about "I was hoping for Barcelona," then? By all accounts, Barcelona is more fun than Cleveland...

Getting back to the topic at hand, among all the BLP-related discussions on WikiEN-L over the past 48 hours, this thread was mentioned, and if I might be permitted to back-track here a little bit, I think one could certainly interpret "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" as a threat to sue. (Of course, we don't have the same strictures or tendencies to redefine common phrases that WP has, but no matter...)

It's an interesting game, in a way, if I might be permitted to use the term "game" here. On the one hand, if you really want your lawsuit to succeed in actually damaging WP, it's probably best to threaten them over a period of months, during which time you'll be subjected to taunting, hostile edits, gloating, and various forms of insults, much of it obscene. You can use that in your case against them - doesn't matter that it's after-the-fact, because it demonstrates malicious intent.

On the other hand, if you want quick action in dealing with your immediate problem, such as getting libelous or inaccurate info out of an article or even getting a page deleted, it's probably best to file suit right away, without a lot of fanfare, and hope for some high-level intervention. Of course, that assumes you can find a lawyer willing to take on what may become a long-term, high-profile case, and that your case is strong enough to not be thrown out of court immediately on some sort of summary judgement.

I'm not sure what to suggest in AMBC's case... The WikiEN-L postings could be used to demonstrate WP's dismissive and hostile attitudes, but probably not very effectively, I suspect. That whole business about building a studio lot on the Moon, which is probably just a bit of fun they were having, didn't have a disclaimer on it saying "JOKE" - so their reaction to it probably couldn't be used against them.

Then again, it's not funny if you have to explain it, I guess!

[Toledo]

That whole business about building a studio lot on the Moon, which is probably just a bit of fun they were having, didn't have a disclaimer on it saying "JOKE"

Someone who identified himself as a vice president of Biograph clearly did not consider it a joke, and posted: "The property deed on the moon is valid. Branson with Virgin Galactic is looking into it as well. Are you laughing at him too? Check your facts before you discredit."