Fake Wikipedia

Link to Wired article

In class on Monday we were presented with the reading by Andrew Keen from his book, The Cult of the Amateur. One concept in particular that was talked about in class and in this book was that of a noble amateur and a concept of something known as the Web 2.0. Keen believes that these noble amateurs and the use of the Web 2.0 “threaten to turn our intellectual traditions and institutions upside down.”

He defines and amateur as a hobbyists, knowledgeable or otherwise, someone who does not make a living from his or her field of interest, a layperson, lacking credentials, a dabbler. He states that these amateurs on the internet are being praised for being amateurs and not because of their expertise. The Web 2.0 is also a concept that was discussed heavily in class. The Web 2.0 is web based meaning that it runs completely on the web. Such as Outlook mail, facebook, java applets or Half Life. IT is also built completely on social networking and collaborative content creation. Overall it can be said that the Web 2.0 is one of the biggest marketing gimmicks out there. Keen argues that this is what is ruining America are these amateurs out there that are acting like professionals and taking away from what the true essence of a professional is. This can be seen in the example with Wikipedia and the user “Essjay.” He claimed to be a tenured professor of theology with four academic degrees, but in reality was a 24 year old high school graduate with no academic background. There has been a lot of skepticism by the public and Keen makes this known that posts on Wikipedia cannot be relied upon because of these amateurs that are able to post anything they want.

An example of this can be seen with the news article I have selected where someone out there pulled a similar stunt compared to Essjay and Wikipedia. While Essjay was posting frequently on Wikipedia a similar incident happened in 2005. A man made a fake post linking John Seigenthaler, a journalist, to the assassination of JFK. The post was made by Brian Chase as joke with a fellow co-worker. After Seigenthaler caught word of this outlandish post of the internet he went looking for the man who did it. Brian eventually confessed to the incident and actually resigned from his job that he was currently at. Brian claimed that he did not realize that Wikipedia was used as a serious resource and for Seigenthaler a close friend of the Kennedy family, this was something all too serious. Thus, pulling into question the same points that Keen was making regards to these amateurs being able to post anything on the website. Seigenthaler actually blasted Wikipedia and its credibility in an article in the USA Today. He does not plan on taking criminal actions against Brian, and is not supporting more regulations on the internet, but he said, “Wikipedia is inviting it by its allowing irresponsible vandals to write anything they want about anybody." This is exactly the kind of situations that Keen is talking about and this example goes right along with the act of amateurs being able to edit Wikipedia at their own will.