At yesterday’s party my liberal pal Mike pointed out Wonkette and a story there concerning the Conservative version of Wikipedia.at Wonkette that I promised to link to.
Back in my hiwired days I had a love hate relationship with Wikipedia in particular and Wiki formats in general. I think Glenn Reynolds put it best:
And there’s more on Wikipedia’s problems here. I find it a decent place for casual reference when the subjects aren’t politically charged, but much less useful when they are.
Wikipedia has been accused of liberal bias (among other things) so naturally a competitor; Conservapedia arose still in the wiki format but with different rules. Answering speech with more speech is a good idea but a wiki format is a wiki format and you have to watch out on politically charged content. Well you can’t get more politically charged than this:
For example, say your home-schooled-in-Christ kid needs to do a report on which states would benefit from Dem senators who, tragically, “were unable to complete their terms and were replaced by qualified Republicans by their Republican governors.” Where to go? That homosexual devil box “Wikipedia” surely would be of no assistance, to Patriots!
The screen shot on Wonkette’s page shows the actual entry that was actually posted. Wonkette rightly denounces it and I join them. It didn’t however stay up for long:
This “Article” Was The Work Of An Internet Parodist/Vandal
Conservapedia in no way sanctioned it, and cannot, because of the wiki format, completely stop the work of political terrorists, who are intent upon and dedicated to mocking our conservative, Christian-friendly encyclopedia.
Thank you.
I think the word “terrorist” is a bit much here but the point is made. The real point is any format where a vested interest can edit the stuff shouldn’t be used for anything that might be controversial. (Do you really think that Cuba or China doesn’t monitor their Wikipedia related entries?) You want Dr. Who stuff its fine, you want facts go to Encyclopedia Britannica online.
Da Techguy's (no longer backup) Blog 
The claim that the article was the work of an internet vandal or “terrorist” is almost certainly false. Conservapedia has been down for the past day because of what looks like a database glitch, but before that I checked the history of the article. It was created by a user called QWest and edited by several other editors before it was vandalized. The original version by QWest is substantially the same version Wonkette showed an image of.
QWest appeared last August just after Sarah Palin had been chosen as John McCain’s running mate, and he said he wasn’t in favor of women as leader.
This was taken by someone as parody, but he asserted that it was his honest opinion, and told another user: “I’m sorry you’re in denial about the fact that women are rarely capable leaders.”
On 7 September, he came up with the Obama “My Muslim faith” slip, to which Conservapedia still refers in one or two of its articles.
He later edit warred to put “Barack Obama” into a list of prominent Muslims in the “Islam” article.
He contributed “Abstinence only sex education doesn’t work” to “Liberal Myths About Education” (it’s still there!)
He started the “Obama and Socialism” section to the Barack Obama article.
He contributed “The flagellum” (about the bacterial flagellum), Consciousness , symbiosis and the bat to “Counterexamples to evolution”.
This guy is a hardcore Conservative, not a parodist.
Conservapedia’s administrators are lying. They have not blocked QWest, or even attempted to communicate with him on the wiki over the article.
Sounds like you’ve done your homework, that’s another reason why the net is good since a trail can be left and followed by people who care to trace it. It would be interesting to see if his other edits were as outrageous. If you find that is the case I’ll certainly post on it.
It again makes the point that any kind of Wiki format is only as good as the people who edit it and the people who check the edits.
I’m curious if it would be a violation of federal law. The Wiki because it disavowed it rather fast and pulled it likely wouldn’t be in trouble but the user might be.
Some interesting discussions with a Conservapedia sysop, and the founder of RationalWiki has shown up too. See Confessions of an Accidental Conservapedian. As a long time Wikipedian I find it interesting to see how the different communities contrast.
I must confess I rarely check out the discussion areas on wikipedia, but I rarely as I suggested use it for anything controversial.