Larry Sanger, one of Wikipedia’s cofounders, was banned from editing the site indefinitely after other editors determined he was canvassing, or in other words, calling on his followers off platform in order to influence Wikipedia’s content.

Sanger has spent more than a decade criticizing Wikipedia for what he claims is an ideological, left-wing bias on a variety of topics, and on X has framed this recent ban as further proof of everything that’s wrong with Wikipedia. The New York Post took that bait and last night published an article with the headline “Left-leaning Wikipedia blocked founder from editing site—after he campaigned to make it more balanced.”

Wikipedia editors obviously reject that framing and say that Sanger was banned for wielding his followers to sway discussion and decision making on Wikipedia. The discussion that led to the decision to ban Sanger concluded with what an editor called a “clear consensus” to ban Sanger.

  • HAL_9_TRILLION@lemmy.dbzer0.com
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    1
    ·
    26 days ago

    In the kangaroo court in which a mob ousted me, Wikipedia’s administrators showed that they don’t appear to value details like formal charges, a designated prosecutor, basic decorum, distinction between prosecution and judge, dispassionate adjudication, and so forth

    These hypocrite fucks always rail off at the mouth about how abused they are… and it’s always just to get their foot in the door. Once they run the show, they rewrite history, dole out all the abuse they want and face zero repercussions. Intolerant shits that the rest of us simply must tolerate. Well go fuck yourself Larry Sanger. The world doesn’t need more right-wing bullshit.

  • antonim@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    1
    ·
    26 days ago

    Sanger was laid off from Wikipedia early on, started a competitor site that failed, and then returned to Wikipedia not so much to contribute but to rail against the project, his only credentials being setting up some of the crucial rules for the site two decades ago. It was really pathetic, like an ex pestering the other one years after the breakup, unable to move on. I hope he finds a better hobby now.

  • Folstar@lemmus.org
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    1
    ·
    25 days ago

    Accusing a site of being left bias then turning it into a right wing shithole has, sadly, worked time and time again. Let’s hope Wikipedia can keep holding out.

  • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    1
    ·
    25 days ago

    Sander hasn’t been a part of the Wikipedia project since 2002.

    He launched a competing project - Citizendium - which flopped. Also, the Digital Universe Encyclopedia web project, which went nowhere. And Encyclopedia of Earth which also failed to launch. WatchKnowLearn and Infobitt did a bit better, but neither became household names.

    Basically, he’s been bouncing in and out of middling projects for the better part of 25 years. And I suspect this string of failures hasn’t been particularly good for his ego.

  • NOT_RICK@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    1
    ·
    26 days ago

    I’m not sure the NYP took the bait, they’re more like the bait shop; more than happy to sell whatever the right wing outrage machine is selling on a given day.

  • Bread@thelemmy.club
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    0
    ·
    25 days ago

    It’s a little sad that he’s still messing with that site. It’s been years since I’ve used it for anything. It’s incomplete and heavily biased.

    • ComradePenguin@lemmy.ml
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      0
      ·
      25 days ago

      How is it biased? Biased towards truth? If you have proof of it lying or misrepresenting something, then you just have to prove it and I am sure they or you will be able to change it.

      • Bread@thelemmy.club
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        0
        ·
        25 days ago

        They will not let you change it. They gate keep who gets to edit things intensely.

        • ComradePenguin@lemmy.ml
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          1
          ·
          25 days ago

          For good reason, there is a lot of interest in implementing actual bias.

          Israel/Palestine/Gaza is examples of this.

          Do you have any examples of bias? Or wrong information?

    • innermachine@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      0
      ·
      25 days ago

      Wikipedia is a great start point. You read the wiki, then check the references. Just like reading the news, you should never take one source at face value! Engage your ✨ CRITICAL THINKING ✨

      • Bread@thelemmy.club
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        0
        ·
        25 days ago

        Wikipedia is pointless. You can ask any AI your question and ask for sources. It’s more reliable than wikipedia.

        • ilinamorato@lemmy.world
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          0
          ·
          25 days ago

          Not sure if troll or…

          …ok, I’ll bite. This is maybe the stupidest thing I’ve ever seen. You know that Wikipedia comprises one of the largest publicly-accessible sets of meticulously-curated natural-language data on the planet, right? And so when you’re training up a new model, you’re naturally going to start with that massive, freely-available repository?

          Every major AI model has been trained, at least partially, on Wikipedia. This insane viewpoint is essentially saying that you don’t think Wikipedia is reliable, but if some linear algebra chews it up for a few minutes, then it’s ok. You’re turning up your nose at tap water, but drinking your inside dog’s urine.

          • Bread@thelemmy.club
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            0
            ·
            25 days ago

            Do you know how many living people are unable to get probable lies about themselves removed from wikipedia? Wikipedia is barely better than just taking random reddit comments as truth.

            • ilinamorato@lemmy.world
              link
              fedilink
              English
              arrow-up
              0
              ·
              edit-2
              25 days ago

              Gonna need a source for that, boss–

              1. Wikipedia’s intense scrutiny of sources and requirements for reliable citations are actually one of the reasons that Sanger started his malformed crusade.

              2. If there’s actual, provable lies about a notable person in the encyclopedia, then there should be actual, provable truths to combat it; and any Wikipedia editor can update the article in question to correct the record. If an edit war emerges, a community discussion can take place wherein the person in question can have their say. Wikipedia isn’t the wild west, and any reasonable argument that it is died twenty years ago.

              –but even if those two things weren’t true–it’s literally impossible to remove misinformation from AI models. I’m not saying that to be dramatic or overstate the problem. When a model is trained with misinformation, the misinformation becomes a part of the model; the entire corpus of everything it was trained on is baked into the neural network on a fundamental level, and humans can’t manipulate it manually. Which means you can’t remove any datapoint from the model without excising it from the training data and then retraining a whole new model.

              So now not only are you drinking your dog’s urine, you’re claiming that the tap water is too yellow. Even if your assertion’s true, your alternative is demonstrably worse.

  • nialv7@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    0
    ·
    25 days ago

    The thing is Wikipedia isn’t even left-wing. User survey shows the editors holds left-wing and right-wing beliefs about equally. And Jimmy Wales, the founder, is an Ayn Rand reading “objectivist” for crying out loud.

      • Captain_Patchy@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        0
        ·
        25 days ago

        reality has a well known left-wing bias

        No, it’s just that the right-wing has become accustomed to lying it’s ass off to get what it wants.

        • Tollana1234567@lemmy.today
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          0
          arrow-down
          1
          ·
          edit-2
          24 days ago

          also verifiable facts, and sciences contradicts right wing beliefs. plus having the dirty laundry of every prominent right winger as well. trump has a HORDe info about him, as did other R president.

    • Tollana1234567@lemmy.today
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      0
      arrow-down
      1
      ·
      24 days ago

      where is that survey source you got, i seriously doubt it, almost every right winger criticizes the site as not being right wing enough.