Tech & Biz

Wikipedia Bans Church of Scientology

by Jordan Yerman | May 28, 2009 at 05:22 pm

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Wikipedia has banned edits to its articles from the Church of Scientology, which Wikipedia accuses of altering editable content to push its own agenda. This is the first time such a high-profile organization has been banned from the site.

The Church of Scientology has not commented; it's unclear whether those editing were acting under orders from higher up in the group, or acting on their own, but a certain degree of organization was apparent.

Closing out the longest-running court case in Wikiland history, the site’s Arbitration Committee voted 10 to 0 (with one abstention) in favor of the move, which takes effect immediately.

The case is the confluence of perceived neutrality, sock-puppeting, and ban evasion.

One admin tells The Reg that policing edits from Scientology machines has been particularly difficult because myriad editors sit behind a small number of IPs and, for some reason, the address of each editor is constantly changing. This prevents admins from determining whether a single editor is using multiple Wikipedia accounts to game the system. In Wikiland, such sockpuppeting is not allowed.

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slimmey

at 01:51 on May 29th, 2009

Such cults and corrupting ideas should be banned, with the justification of going against the human race. Not only scientology, but idealistic thoughts that obvious can harm the human dignity should be scrutinized with deep skepticism and doubt.

Perhaps they say scientology do help people, but not based upon the good of the man, but upon how much money you have in your pocket.

truthoriented

at 21:05 on May 28th, 2009

Wikipedia obviously has been strict with so many things. One of which is on how it will maintain its business model.

The more controversy one's page at Wikipedia creates, the better are the prospects for it to earn through donations, and even for free publicity, whether positive or negative. In the end, it is Wikipedia that wins. It does look very complex but like any business model, whether television networks or any media enterprises, its adherence to tenets of fairness, balance, accuracy, is sometimes sacrificed.

tikun

at 06:17 on May 29th, 2009

and who is to decide what should be banned and what not?

Paschen

at 18:17 on May 28th, 2009

i could think of a few more groups that would do that and may end up causing far greater banning then just this one.

The problem may not be simply the site that concerns their description, more so other sites that are critical of them may get hit by doubtful edits as well.

tikun

at 00:57 on May 29th, 2009

This is done continuously at Wikipedia. As long as there is self-interest at stake there will be revisionist history created.

Paschen

at 01:39 on May 29th, 2009

The video does not seem to work. ??

Paschen

at 06:23 on May 29th, 2009

That is actually a very good question Tikun.

Jordan Yerman

at 10:01 on May 29th, 2009

Practically speaking, the site admins decide. In this case, nobody shut down and Scientology sites, but blocked them from posting on a site which was not their own.

I can't imagine that this is the end of the story, though: the Church of Scientology is very, very well-organized, and will likely be unwilling to give up on editing Wikipedia.