Although manipulating the sources cited is a great way to manipulate Wikipedia. You have to recruit 10-40 people to act as a group of editors to manufacture concensus across topics. Or you can just create a website or series of press releases.
“Hey, this small-town museum has an article about a historical event. It must be true. Link it at the bottom.” Or “well, this local newspaper article says it is happened, so into the article it goes.”
Even more effective, especially for political groups, is just publish dozens of supportive articles, while miring competing articles in edit wars and the bureaucracy that comes with it. For sources, just cite expert books that are favorable. It’s not easy, but hiring or recruiting 10-40 editors is trivial for political entities.
They have firms whose job it is to hire out editing wikipedia pages on contract. It is not new or much of a secret. Idk the mechanics involved I don’t see why they would need that many anyone can change it with a source, there are groups that edit their own pages easy enough, politicians get caught doing it, circumstantially caught, regularly.
Having a number of different editors allows manipulating the discussion and concensus protections built into Wikipedia.
Depending on the topic, it may not be necessary. A complimentary article about a new technology product or company founder just takes a few press releases that get picked up. Manipulating world events and leaders requires more coordination.
There is an entire world of constructing studies to arrive at a predetermined conclusion, planting articles, etc like you mention. Wikipedia edits are small potatoes compared to the faked science corporations construct to further their interests. Nothing is too false for them. In 5 years nutrition labels will give the daily recommended value of glyphosate a food contains.
It’s even more structural than that. You can control functionally all editors by controlling the academia and media. Wikipedia is necessarily a reflection of the biases of the editors and the sources they peruse. Misogynistic bias in your society, media and academia will lead to a misogynistic Wikipedia. Racist bias in your society, media and academia will lead to a racist Wikipedia. Anticommunist bias in your society, media and academia will lead to an anticommunist Wikipedia.
For example, western Wikipedia editors have been quick to deprecate Chinese state media sources such as CGTN or Russian such as RT (not complaining about the latter), but even after the horrifying complacency in genocide in Gaza, the BBC is still widely accepted.
Although manipulating the sources cited is a great way to manipulate Wikipedia. You have to recruit 10-40 people to act as a group of editors to manufacture concensus across topics. Or you can just create a website or series of press releases.
“Hey, this small-town museum has an article about a historical event. It must be true. Link it at the bottom.” Or “well, this local newspaper article says it is happened, so into the article it goes.”
Even more effective, especially for political groups, is just publish dozens of supportive articles, while miring competing articles in edit wars and the bureaucracy that comes with it. For sources, just cite expert books that are favorable. It’s not easy, but hiring or recruiting 10-40 editors is trivial for political entities.
They have firms whose job it is to hire out editing wikipedia pages on contract. It is not new or much of a secret. Idk the mechanics involved I don’t see why they would need that many anyone can change it with a source, there are groups that edit their own pages easy enough, politicians get caught doing it, circumstantially caught, regularly.
Having a number of different editors allows manipulating the discussion and concensus protections built into Wikipedia.
Depending on the topic, it may not be necessary. A complimentary article about a new technology product or company founder just takes a few press releases that get picked up. Manipulating world events and leaders requires more coordination.
There is an entire world of constructing studies to arrive at a predetermined conclusion, planting articles, etc like you mention. Wikipedia edits are small potatoes compared to the faked science corporations construct to further their interests. Nothing is too false for them. In 5 years nutrition labels will give the daily recommended value of glyphosate a food contains.
It’s even more structural than that. You can control functionally all editors by controlling the academia and media. Wikipedia is necessarily a reflection of the biases of the editors and the sources they peruse. Misogynistic bias in your society, media and academia will lead to a misogynistic Wikipedia. Racist bias in your society, media and academia will lead to a racist Wikipedia. Anticommunist bias in your society, media and academia will lead to an anticommunist Wikipedia.
For example, western Wikipedia editors have been quick to deprecate Chinese state media sources such as CGTN or Russian such as RT (not complaining about the latter), but even after the horrifying complacency in genocide in Gaza, the BBC is still widely accepted.