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Wikipedia Cabal Rewriting History

Jake PurcellFriday, December 7, 2007
This post is part of Push the Third Button Twice, a ~2 month adventure where I would write parody articles based on the news as it happened — in 15 minutes or less. The posts are credited to my a fictional "staff", but they're actually all me. I apologize in advance.

Online collaborative encyclopedia Wikipedia came under fire Friday amid accusations a small group of editors have abused their authority and have broken many of the fundmental rules of the site, including a plot to rewrite history for personal gain.

“We have many documented cases of individuals altering articles against site policy,” said Elle Ellis, an investigative reporter for The Register.  “Some are harmless, like saying Beethoven was Billy Joel’s piano teacher and secretly fathered Louis XVIII of France.  But others are obviously untrue.”

Ellis says the most disturbing case of abuse was when senior contributor Stanislaw Van Der Meer  edited his own write-up to suggest he was the nephew of Microsoft founder Bill Gates, and that he ran a charity to provide vaccinations to children in Africa.  A link on the Wikipedia article lead to a PayPal donation page, where visitors were encouraged to “Save the Kids From Poleo [sic]”.

However, using archaic techniques Ellis referred to as “telephoning people”, the Register was able to determine that Van Der Meer is actually a graduate student at the University of Amsterdam, and acts as the Treasurer of an off-campus group known as the “Weedmasters”. When reached for comment, the president of Weedmasters told PTTBT: “Duuuuuuuuuude… your voice is so tiny, it’s like I could squish it under my thumb!”

The Wikipedia Cabal refused an interview for this story, saying only that they “adhere to the strictest levels of professionalism  in the maintenance of Wikipedia, despite allegations to the contrary.”  They also threw doubt on Ms Ellis’ claims by referring us to her write-up, which outlines her history of pedophilia, armed robbery and wire fraud convictions.  Ms Ellis declined to explain the paragraph about her involvement in a sex-change doomsday cult in Guatemala in the 1990s, leading many to believe she is persecuting the Cabal for no reason.

Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales refused comment on this story, citing “another IRS tip-off I just don’t need”.

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