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.
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.
So long as reliable secondary sources exist, Wikipedia will exist.
And if not, the idea of a centralised information collection is unkillable
Physicists say otherwise. Its death is in fact inevitable.
Will he start working for conervapedia now?
Good work by wikipedia. Always good to get the trash out.That is very much the definition of snowflake behaviour.
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.
Yeah… The Post isn’t much of a shocker. It’d be more of a shocker if it were NYT.
And when there’s nothing to sell today, they’ll drum up some shit for a sale tomorrow
Part of Larry Sanger’s statement
“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…”
Does this guy think Wikipedia is run like a country
Faux News melts their brain and breaks who they are as people
Does this guy think Wikipedia is run like a country
He should blame the guys that found the website for the structure of the rules governing it.
Reality has a liberal bias.
Leftist, even
Colbert used the term in a more traditional sense, as opposed to how it’s sometimes used now as an insult by harder leftists.
The more traditional sense is the global definition.
I knew you knew that, my comment was more for the passers-by who may not even be old enough to remember that it was a Colbert quote.
I like how we all make comments for chat now, but there’s probably only like what a thousand people who comment on lemmy regularly?
We have no idea how many lurkers, with registered accounts or not.
We are more numerous than you think
👍
It’s not an insult. It’s the widely accepted term for the ideology of the bourgeoisie. They self-describe as liberals. That’s been the usage of the term since its coining; USAmericans just decided to only use it to describe more left-leaning liberals rather than all liberals. If it’s used as an insult, it’s between communists accusing another communist of not being a communist, not because liberalism is inherently a pejorative. Like if a right-winger calls someone a communist as an insult, it’s not because communism is a pejorative, it’s because it’s a non-communist accusing another non-communist of not being not-communist enough.
Discussions about potential bans are supposed to remain open for at least 72 hours. While consensus that Sanger had violated Wikipedia policies was clear, Sanger was banned at some point before that deadline. He was then briefly unbanned, and then again indefinitely banned once 72 hours had elapsed and the discussion about the ban closed.
There is clearly some extreme bias on Wikipedia when they can’t even follow this very normal and regularly practised rule
Wikipedia also has a well-known and well-exercised rule called the Snowball Clause. Basically, if consensus is clear early, don’t waste others’ time or let further harm occur while you’re waiting for a procedure to reach a foregone conclusion.
In the ban discussion, you can see a clear consensus developing very early that Sanger was, by his own admission on external platforms, NOTHERE to build an encyclopedia. He further doubled down on his position in the discussion thread for his own banning, and even intimated that he was rejoining Wikipedia with the express purpose of gathering enough meatpuppets to change Wikipedia’s policies. The Snowball Clause is even mentioned in that discussion; basically, had Sanger and his meatpuppets been allowed to continue to edit for those three days, the damage to the encyclopedia could have been significant.
They literally gave him three days.
youre right, execute the editors.
He was then briefly unbanned, and then again indefinitely banned once 72 hours had elapsed
What else were they supposed to do? Give him a get-out-of-jail-free card for a procedural mistake that they already rectified?
Give him extra time to make up for how long the early ban was? Or maybe give him an extra 24h as a courtesy? I dunno, lol
To do what? They had established that he was performing activities that needed to be stopped, he’s not owed more time to do those activities in.
Was he even blocked from doing anything useful for those several hours?
You have 72 hours to make your case, he had plenty of time to do so before those 72 hours were up, even with the incorrect ban. Another fee hours isn’t gonna make a difference.
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.
where is that survey source you got, i seriously doubt it, almost every right winger criticizes the site as not being right wing enough.
To right-wing extremists, everything in the world seems left wing.
anything they dont like, or make them thinks uncomfortable of the contrary to thier beliefs.
User survey shows the editors hold left-wing and right-wing beliefs about equally
all i found was that self-responses are preponderantly left/center-left: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2024-04-25/Recent_research
![Political position of Wikipedia users, based on responses to the survey question "In political matters, people talk of 'the left' and 'the right.' How would you place your views on this scale, generally speaking? [You position on the left-right scale]" [sic], with the answer hint "The scale goes from 1 (left) to 10 (right)." Visualization of data from: Cruciani, Caterina; Joubert, Léo; Jullien, Nicolas; Mell, Laurent; Piccione, Sasha; Vermeirsche, Jeanne (2023-12-01), Surveying Wikipedians: a dataset of users and contributors’ practices on Wikipedia in 8 languages doi:10.34847/nkl.4ecf4u8m, see also m:Research:Surveying readers and contributors to Wikipedia (June/July 2023 survey of Wikipedia readers and contributors in 8 languages)](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/f0/Political_position_of_Wikipedia_users_%282023_Wikipedia_survey%29.png/960px-Political_position_of_Wikipedia_users_%282023_Wikipedia_survey%29.png)
reality has a well known left-wing bias
If you base something on facts, it will be left leaning. Right leaning has a higher value in loyalty, authority, respect, and spirituality. They will deny facts if they have to in order to prioritize their other values. Right leaning people tend to be more likely to be on time, have cleaner desks, and speak more formally to someone they deem a “superior”. Left leaning often could give a rats ass about authority, and respect is only given once it’s earned.
All that to say, facts and reality are more left leaning by nature. Given many religious folks will deny nature’s history for their spiritual beliefs.
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.
And why do you think that is?
Because right-wingers can’t handle reality. So they have to come up with “alt-facts” to keep their worldview from collapsing.
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.
editors hold left-wing and right-wing beliefs about equally
source? i’d doubt that unless you’re defining liberals as right-wing here
And in the left Lemmy communities is known as ‘nato-pedia’ for his Western pov bias
problem is the use has a large ultra right and centerist groups but the actual left is small but growing in recent days.
If you asked 1000 randomly picked Americans “should the wealthy elite own your surplus labor value?” you’d find a lot more agreement with leftist views than you’d think. The ultra-right is a big chunk but it’s not the majority, the dedicated core is just well organized and most westerners are ignorant about what they are actually voting for so it appears more popular.
I would expect them to be confused and suspicious of the term “surplus labor value”. If not, then education has a problem.
Looking at the primary victories in NYC recently is a good sign to come.
even these im not sure I would not call left of center. they are not looking to get rid of capitlism they just want to have taxes and regulation and social safety nets.
There isn’t any difference between DSA’s vision for socialism and your’s*, it’s just NYC-DSA is building a movement on a municipal level.
A city can’t abolish capitalism on it’s own, it can however build a social democratic infrastructure that allows for a larger shift.
*Assuming you want socialism and aren’t some tankie who yerns to die in a pointless revolution so the capitalist class can be replaced with the capitalist class (ML)
It is better than typical Democrat center right bullshit.
yeah im not complaining its just so crazy how far the overton window has went. And its true that many democrats today could have run as a rupublican in the 70’s and 80’s.
I blame Bill Clinton for moving that window. Him and Trump moved both their political parties astray into where they are today.
reagan “democrats”. Clinton just responded to what the people where telling politicians in elections.
“Reality has a well-known liberal bias.” --Stephen Colbert
In the end conservatism is only appealing to those in power. And people with power work every day to ensure everyone else has none.
What’s funny is that Jimmy Wales, who has described himself as an objectivist, is far from “leftist” or “liberal” himself. But unlike this asshole, he is principled.
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.
Or gets swallowed by a sinkhole, eiþer would be fine.
Well, the poor sinkhole would then suffer from very bad digestion issues, and that is not something to joke about!
You almost wrote a comment without a thorn, but you just couldn’t help yourself
why is guy being bullied for writing what all can understand
These reactionaries will never be happy until literally everything is a fascist propaganda outlet. Not content with all mainstream media and social media, wikipedia and other community information hubs must fall next
exactly. there may be genuine improvements Wikipedia could make, but as long as there’s a rabid pack of chuds making demands that change happen, I’ll support Wiki taking it slowly and deliberately. Anything that pisses off those fuckwits has to be good for humanity.
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.
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
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It would be deranged and far from a good thing if online moderation and dispute adjudication decided to use a criminal model of trying to prove a person’s guilt
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The real life criminal justice system is the opposite of unbiased and fair
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Karl Popper has entered the chat
Hmm I wonder if Sanger knew better. I wonder if there was any smoking gun posted online that would prove this.
“Wikipedians are now debating whether my proposed WikiProject Intellectual Diversity should be permitted to become an official WikiProject (club/group of editors),” Sanger said on X on Friday and linked to the Wikipedia talk page about the issue. “Lots opposed. Also lots in favor.”
“Can I still join the movement?” one person replied to Sanger on X.
“Let’s just say that if I answer that question one way or another, the playground moms who rule Wikipedia might block me,” Sanger responded.
shocked_pikachu
He’s not really a founder; he didn’t even have anything to do with it.
And he’s a right wrong fascist so banning him is a good thing.
To me, Larry Sanger always struck me more as an Ideas Guy. Specifically, the kind of an Ideas Guy who didn’t always have the best ideas. He keeps dissing Wikipedia, but just look at the absolute trainwrecks his supposedly better other projects turned out.
