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Wikipedia testing new policy to stop spread of false information -- chicagotribune.com
Wikipedia, the online encyclopedia that has drawn some decidedly juvenile pranks, is looking to impose discipline with new restrictions on the editing of articles.
The latest changes come as Wikipedia tries to balance credibility and a desire for openness.
While anyone still can edit entries, the site is testing pages that require changes to be approved by an experienced Wikipedia editor before they show up.
If the site's users respond well to the test run, the new restrictions will apply to all entries for living people in the next few weeks.
The idea is to block the kind of high-profile vandalism that has marred some pages.
In recent embarrassments, Democratic Sens. Robert Byrd and Edward Kennedy were declared dead by rogue editors.
Still, Wikipedia risks discouraging legitimate editing if restrictions on changes or additions become too burdensome, such that articles won't get better or keep up with events. That may be especially true on more obscure pages with fewer active volunteers to approve edits in a timely way.
Aware of the risks, Wikipedia has set the criteria for "experienced editor" status relatively low. Users who are registered for a few days can OK the changes, said Jay Walsh, a spokesman for the non-profit Wikimedia Foundation, which runs the site.
A more uniform system for filtering changes on Wikipedia represents a step back from the site's original philosophy, which called for harnessing the collective knowledge of volunteer editors without any major restrictions.
But it is not the first time Wikipedia has attached strings.
The same flagging process, for example, has been imposed on all entries in the German-language Wikipedia for more than a year. On the English site, too, high-profile pages that are likely to be defaced have been tightly restricted.
Separately, the Omidyar Network, a philanthropic investment group started by eBay founder Pierre Omidyar, said Tuesday it is committing $2 million over two years to the Wikimedia Foundation to support Wikimedia's key goals of bringing free educational content to people around the world.
The word "roach" entered American English from a Mexican Spanish slang word for marijuana (the name "marijuana" itself originated in Mexican Spanish), or a cigarette stub of marijuana, or tobacco adulterated with marijuana: cucaracha ("cockroach"; see also the folk song La Cucaracha.) In Spanish, tabaco de cucaracha refers to adulterated tobacco generally.[1][2]