Changes

Throughout mid-2008, a number of [[Wikipedia Review]] members joined [[Directory:Gregory J. Kohs|Gregory Kohs]] in a project to methodically enumerate one calendar quarter’s worth (4Q 2007) of edit data underlying the 100 Wikipedia articles about the (then) current [[Directory:United States|United States]] Senators.  [http://spreadsheets.google.com/pub?key=psAWteTSyixEB98YcV-5VEw What they found] was alarming at times. While most vandalized edits were brief in duration and clearly juvenile in content, a substantial portion of edits were plainly intended to be hurtful and defamatory against the Senators — and they lasted for not just minutes, but hours, days, even weeks at a time.

Throughout mid-2008, a number of people interested in analysis of Wikipedia joined [[Directory:Gregory J. Kohs|Gregory Kohs]] in a project to methodically enumerate one calendar quarter’s worth (4Q 2007) of edit data underlying the 100 Wikipedia articles about the (then) current [[Directory:United States|United States]] Senators.  [https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1nsxv8JhN55Szk0pyWT2Tda-0yvbT_hSfGGu4v9xy0nQ/edit?usp=sharing What they found] was alarming at times. While most vandalized edits were brief in duration and clearly juvenile in content, a substantial portion of edits were plainly intended to be hurtful and defamatory against the Senators — and they lasted for not just minutes, but hours, days, even weeks at a time.

 

Using the Wikipedia page [http://stats.grok.se/ traffic tool], the team attempted to interpolate the number of “page views” that each Senator’s article likely witnessed during the damaged edit. The damaged edit that saw the greatest number of page views before correction regarded Senator John McCain: "McCain was born in Florida in the then American-controlled Panama Canal Zone", which lasted for over 3 days, under about 93,000 views where nobody noticed or bothered to correct this obvious error.

Using the Wikipedia page [http://stats.grok.se/ traffic tool], the team attempted to interpolate the number of “page views” that each Senator’s article likely witnessed during the damaged edit. The damaged edit that saw the greatest number of page views before correction regarded Senator John McCain: "McCain was born in Florida in the then American-controlled Panama Canal Zone", which lasted for over 3 days, under about 93,000 views where nobody noticed or bothered to correct this obvious error.

* For nearly 11 hours, the Wikipedia article about Senator Joe Lieberman of [[Directory:Connecticut|Connecticut]] described him as "[http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Joe_Lieberman&diff=next&oldid=169107698 a hideous, coffee-drinking Jew]". The page was viewed about 446 times in this condition before it was corrected.

* For nearly 11 hours, the Wikipedia article about Senator Joe Lieberman of [[Directory:Connecticut|Connecticut]] described him as "[http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Joe_Lieberman&diff=next&oldid=169107698 a hideous, coffee-drinking Jew]". The page was viewed about 446 times in this condition before it was corrected.

== Other cases of vandalism ==

== Access the complete database ==

More than 700 instances of vandalism were found and recorded into a database.  All of the data is available for analysis in a '''[http://spreadsheets.google.com/pub?key=psAWteTSyixEB98YcV-5VEw Google spreadsheet]''' that is open to the public.

== External links ==

== External links ==

* [http://spreadsheets.google.com/pub?key=psAWteTSyixEB98YcV-5VEw Spreadsheet database]

* [https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1nsxv8JhN55Szk0pyWT2Tda-0yvbT_hSfGGu4v9xy0nQ/edit?usp=sharing Spreadsheet database]

* [http://wikipediareview.com/index.php?showtopic=20565&hl=senators Discussion on ''Wikipedia Review'']

* [http://wikipediareview.com/index.php?showtopic=20565&hl=senators Discussion on ''Wikipedia Review'']

* [http://chance.dartmouth.edu/chancewiki/index.php/Chance_News_40#Wikipedia_vandalism_to_U.S._Senators Article within ''Chance News'']

* [http://chance.dartmouth.edu/chancewiki/index.php/Chance_News_40#Wikipedia_vandalism_to_U.S._Senators Article within ''Chance News'']

== Notes ==

== Notes ==

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