Farewell, Wikipedia?
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Bogus boy's departure puts trivia at risk Comment After pressure over the weekend from Wikipedia's Il Duce Jimmy Wales, the encyclopedia's most illustrious fake professor Ryan Jordan has resigned his post at Wikia Inc.â¦
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In our "Notebook:Iraq" blog: how gratitude has gone away.
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(InfoWorld) - Jimmy Wales, founder of the Wikipedia user-generated and edited encyclopaedia, said he expects contributors to the site who claim certain credentials will soon have to prove they really have them. The new policy, which is currently under discussion by the community of users who regularly write and maintain the site, is being considered after it emerged this month that one of Wikipedia's most respected editors didn't hold the qualifications he claimed. The user, who went under the pseudonym "essjay," described himself in an online profile as a "tenured professor of theology" and said he taught both undergraduate and graduate courses in the subject. He also said he held a bachelor of arts in religious studies, a master of arts in religion, doctorate in philosophy in theology and a doctorate in canon law. But it wasn't true. Essjay was actually Ryan Jordan, a 24 year-old from Kentucky, who revealed his true identity when he joined Wikia Inc., the for-profit company run by Wales that seeks to use the community content model to make money. "I decided to be myself, to never hide my personality, to always be who I am, but to utilize disinformation with regard to what I consider unimportant details: age, location, occupation, etc.," he wrote on Wikipedia when questioned about the different profiles, according to a copy of a now-deleted page kept by Wikipedia Watch. Jordan said he lied about his job and educational background in order to protect his identity, but when he was hired by Wales to work at Wikia came clean on who he really was. However, the controversy didn't stop there. Essjay was interviewed for a story in The New Yorker magazine in 2006 so the revelation of his fake profile prompted an editor's note in a recent edition. That spread the controversy well beyond Wikipedia's message boards. Subsequent investigations into his claims on his Wikia profile indicated that some of those could also be false. "It's a bit of a mess," Wales said in an interview in Tokyo. Wales arrived in Japan at the beginning of the week, and plans to stay there a month. "We're not happy about it," he said. "To discover that someone had been deceiving the community for a long time really was a bit of a blow to our trust. Wikipedia is built on the idea of trusting other people and people being honest and we find that in the most part everyone is, so it was a real disappointment." As a result of the problems contributors are now likely to be asked to back up any specific claims they make regarding qualifications, especially when they are relevant to articles being written, edited or altered, said Wales. If editors are using their real name then this can be quite a simple task but for those editing anonymously it could be trickier, he said. "In that case we'll probably just discourage them from prominently featuring their credentials," said Wales. "You know, it's fine if you want to edit and don't want to go through that process but you shouldn't be writing about your credentials unless you can prove them." The revelations came at a bad time for Wikipedia. In recent months the site has been in and out of the headlines for various issues but its credibility is continually being questioned -- not because it's full of errors but because it doesn't know the identity or motivation of its contributors. Wales initially pledged his support for Jordan, and that set off the site's critics. The Wikipedia founder now admits that was a mistake and says he reacted in the way that he did because he didn't initially fully understand the specifics of the case. "I didn't think it was all that important because I didn't realize he was relying on credentials as a professor," he said. "He treated it really as a bit of a joke and the actual credentials he claimed were a bit ludicrous. After the fact you can look back and say, 'Well that was a bit odd,' but I never really looked into it and that was the big mistake that I made in the whole process." Essjay has now given up his work on Wikipedia. At least that's what he said in a final post, but whether Jordan is still at work on the site is impossible to know simply because contributors are anonymous. He also resigned his position at Wikia. For Wales, "The great irony is that he is a fabulous editor and did really an amazing amount of good work." "He spent most of his time reverting vandalism, mediating disputes and was always a very kind and loving and thoughtful person who, you know, anytime people were having a dispute it was always good to see Essjay show up because he was quite good at getting all parties on the same track." Wales said he thinks what's happened is unfortunate for Jordan. "My view is when he first came on the site he made up this persona not really thinking very much about it and not realizing he was going to become very active and respected in the community and then I think he felt a bit trapped," he said. "I talked to him the other day and of course he's not very happy about all of the press coverage. One doesn't want to become famous for something like this but he feels a bit relieved that it's all over so I'm hoping the world will let him grow up in peace and he'll be successful in life." REFERENCES: Wikipedia breaks into U.S. top 10 sites, Feb. 17, 2007Wikipedia has to do what it has to do . . ., Network World (US), Jan. 27, 2007
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"As part of the Jakarta Commons Feed Parser, I have created a Wiki page that details autodiscovery support/non-support, syndication formats, and the common locations of all syndication files across all of the major blogging services:"  Brad created  a great "Hall of Shame" for blog services which don't use autodiscovery or have problems with feed subscription.  Shame. Shame. Shame!
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A beloved franchise comes to an end with the cancellation of 'Enterprise.'
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Web site crops up for New Yorkers who've lost a mitten or glove. Excluding baby-animal sites, could anything be sweeter?
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Yasser Arafat&#39;s increasingly imminent passing from the scene points to the end of a long and complex era that is best left for historians to assess.
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I just woke up in Paris, it's 5:34AM here, but back in California, it still never ceases to amaze me, the day hasn't yet flipped. You guys haven't even gone to bed yet! Now that's amazing to me. What perseverence! Keep up the good work everybody.  I just started posting a couple of twits that really should be a blog post, so let's get started. First at some point, after a suitable period of mourning, I'd like to rasie the issue of what's to happen with Marc Orchant's web presence. Which of course is a way of focusing attention on all of our web presences.  None of us like to think of it, but truth is none of us are going to live forever. Yet if you read this, it's likely that you're creating a digital body that can and imho should continue to exist even after your physical body stops existing. People are humble, no one wants to come out and say their work has any value that's worth preserving past their death, but come on, we know that's not true. If Shakespeare were alive today, he'd be writing on the web. As would Hemingway or Faulkner, Vonnegut or Mailer, John Lennon or Dylan Thomas, Carl Sandberg or Robert Frost. Mozart, Bach and Beethoven. You think there isn't any great literature out there on the web? I wouldn't be so sure about that. What if there is? And what if a baby born today becomes a great creative force? Or what if there's a social disaster like the Holocaust? Did you know that there are preserved diaries from pre-revolutionary America? Writings of ordinary people can be of enormous help to historians. And if we believe in citizen journalism (I do) why not citizen historians? Shouldn't we be thinking out into the future? We should! With all possible humility, I'd like to tell you that a few days after I die my entire web presence will likely disappear. My servers require some attention from me from time to time. The first time that happens, poof, there goes 10-plus years of Scripting News, and all the docs for the OPML Editor and the OPML spec, the XML-RPC site, to name just a few. Anyway, within a couple of months it will all certainly disappear, unless someone pays my hosting and DSL bills. Maybe someone will, but isn't it ridiculous that that's what it depends on? And when my sites disappear so will my uncle's. He died in 2003. His site is still accessible because I keep it that way. When I die, who will will take over for me? I'm sure the world will survive without his writing, but why? If I love the memory of my uncle, and I do, what can I do to reserve a place for him in the archive of the future. It seems such a small thing, but it's most of what remains of his life.  And what of academics, Nobel Laureates and others? I know for a fact that a great university (Harvard) has no plan to protect their web-based work after they pass. It's so ironic that the web offers an archival solution for non-digital work, yet the web information is more fragile than the physical stuff. Preserving our digital heritage is going to require some foresight, some planning, but it seems possible and we surely can do much better. Marc's fate awaits us all. While we're still alive, there's still time to solve this problem. When we're gone, it will be too late. Part of his legacy can be that he helped focus us on this issue, and his life work could be a great test case. Do we want to see his work preserved? And if so, how will it be done? PS: The RSS 2.0 site will likely persist, because I gave it to Berkman, and then used it as a test case to learn about future-safing. It seems likely to continue to exist, knock wood, praise Murphy, as long as Harvard exists.
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It was a verb, it was a noun, it was a Web address -- www.fireronzook.com. Soon after he was hired to coach the Gators, Ron Zook became forever linked to the Web site devoted to his ouster.
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By Nicholas Craig  Blogs, wikis, podcasts. The internet is spawning a strange new language. More importantly, it is also freeing up old ways of working and learning.
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Jimbo: 'I am your spiritual leader' Jimmy "Jimbo" Wales has brought the Wikipedia ethos to his very own internet search engine. But he insists it will be far more trustworthy than search sites offered by Google, Yahoo!, and Microsoft.â¦
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International Business Machines&#39; possible exit from the personal computer business would be the latest step in what amounts to a long goodbye from a field it pioneered and revolutionized.
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I should have known... The idiots want to rule the Reddit I started for Scripting News readers. I couldn't figure out how to delete it, and while trying, I deleted my account, so forget the experiment, and if anyone at Reddit is listening, could you please delete it for me. (I sent an email but there was no response.) Still diggin!
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'The truth shall set you free', claims Wiki rival The Wikipedians among you should take note that your days of punting liberal bias may be numbered. Enter stage right Conservapedia, a "conservative encyclopedia you can trust", which has been enjoying a certain amount of attention stateside for its unashamedly and decidedly non-liberal content.â¦
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Also: Stephen Hawking looking for assistant. Read these stories and more from around the Web on News.com Extra.
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Tycho:  With PAX coming up this weekend (!!!), we didn't really have time on Friday to invest in Virgil's Wikiscanner - that mystical oracle that takes a raw IP range and then excretes a list of that organization's Wikipedia edits.  This is the pulsing, possibly Martian device that dished up last week's awesome Electronic Arts edits.    I wasn't sure if we should feel sorry for them or not - now that EA is situated in the number two slot, does that make them the scrappy underdog? - but I quickly realized it probably doesn't matter.  They can come right out and say "Yes, we edit it all the time," mischaracterize the nature of the edits, and by the time it's on the second page the events in question never happened.  People don't remember anything these days that isn't on the first page of their feed aggregators. In any case, the entire affair is talking place  on Wikipedia.  Kudzu will grow over the propaganda soon enough.    Though time was indeed in short supply, we did fritter some portion of it pawing through ancient email headers, scraping for filth on old enemies.  Or enemies with whom we have resumed talks.  Or enemies who are now friends!  Even people I hope to make enemies in the future by my careless commentary must fall beneath the scanner's baleful eye.    Like a chugging trawler, we hauled up net after net of treasure onto the deck, sifting it on hands and knees.  I'd never expose it, of course - sparking a desperate arms race to find self-serving commentary is a conflict I'm likely to lose.  And with the deep catalogue of nemeses we've inspired worldwide (and even below the world, in the warrens of the pale Gambrya, where hate is eternal) it's not what I'd call a fabulous scenario.  For us, at least; no doubt, our foes have already begun their malevolent harvest.
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An historic name in software will effectively pass into history in February as AOL discontinues development and...