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Facebook test adds Wikipedia information to search results
Facebook is testing a new feature that displays factual information from Wikipedia in some search results, the company confirmed to TechCrunch. The feature was first reported by Social Media Today, which cited Twitter users who spotted it.
AI can automatically rewrite outdated text in Wikipedia articles
It's good to be skeptical of Wikipedia articles for a number of reasons, not the least of which is the possibility of outdated info -- human editors can only do so much. And while there are bots that can edit Wikipedia, they're usually limited to updated canned templates or fighting vandalism. MIT might have a more useful (not to mention more elegant) solution. Its researchers have developed an AI system that automatically rewrites outdated sentences in Wikipedia articles while maintaining a human tone. It won't look out of line in a carefully crafted paragraph, then.
Wikipedia comes back online in Turkey after multi-year ban
Access to Wikipedia in Turkey has been restored after a nearly three-year ban, which saw the site blocked after it refused to remove content tying the country to terrorist groups. The ban, which was imposed by Turkey in April 2017, came about after it concluded that Wikipedia was running a "smear campaign" against the government. It subsequently leveraged a law that permits the banning of any website deemed a national security threat.
Wikipedia wins its battle against censorship in Turkey
Two years ago, Turkey banned Wikipedia after the site refused to remove content tying the country to terrorist groups. That decision was reversed today in the nation's highest court, which called the ruling a violation of freedom of expression, and ordered the site to be unblocked. The timeframe isn't clear, but it's likely that Turkish citizens will soon be able to access the community-powered encyclopedia.
Wikipedia co-founder wants to give you an alternative to Facebook and Twitter
Two years ago, Wikipedia co-founder Jimmy Wales launched Wikitribune, an online publication meant to combat fake news with original stories by reporters and "citizen journalists." Wikitribune never really caught on, so now, Wales is shifting gears. Wikitribune is relaunching as WT:Social, a social-networking site and news sharing platform. He hopes it will be an alternative to Facebook and Twitter.
Wikipedia references now include book previews hosted by the Internet Archive
Wikipedia is an incredible resource, but the accuracy of claims published on its pages is sometimes called into question. To improve the site's credibility and usability, the Internet Archive is working to make references easier to follow by linking them to digital copies of books.
The North Face gamed Wikipedia to boost Google searches
Apparel giant The North Face apparently resorted to some less-than-scrupulous tactics to ensure its gear stood out in search results. The Wikimedia Foundation reported that The North Face and its ad agency Leo Burnett Tailor Made admitted to having "unethically manipulated" Wikipedia for the sake of a campaign. In a video, the two firms said they switched Wikipedia photos with their own to ensure that North Face would show at the top of Google when people searched for adventure. It claimed that it had been "collaborating with Wikipedia," but the site denied this -- it even pointed to the companies boasting that they avoided attention from Wikipedia moderators.
After Math: Goodbye, Grumpy Cat, whoa oh oh
Terrible news, everyone! The internet's favorite maladjusted kitteh has gone to the Great Cat Tree in the sky after succumbing to a urinary tract infection earlier this week. She -- yes, Grumpy Cat was a girl -- will be missed. Likewise, Cray Supercomputers' independence, Japan's phone number system and China's access to Wikipedia have come to similar ends over the past seven days.
China is blocking Wikipedia in every language
China has blocked Wikipedia to varying degrees over the years, but now that censorship appears to be farther-reaching. A recent Open Observatory of Network Interference report has shown that China started blocking Wikipedia in all languages sometime in April, not just the Chinese-language version as has been the case since 2015. The Wikimedia Foundation told AFP that it hadn't received any notices regarding the block.
YouTube's fact checking linked the Notre Dame fire to 9/11
YouTube's fact check panels were supposed to help debunk conspiracy theories, but they just backfired in an unfortunate fashion. The internet giant has disabled the algorithmically-provided panels on live videos of the Notre Dame de Paris cathedral fire after at least one video displayed a fact panel for the 9/11 terrorist attacks, implying that the coverage was a fake news story about the New York City tragedy.
Former Senate IT worker pleads guilty to doxxing senators on Wikipedia
One former Senate worker is about to face harsh consequences for a doxxing campaign. Jackson Cosko has pleaded guilty to stealing multiple Senators' personal information from the Senate's network and publishing it on Wikipedia, including Mitch McConnell, Lindsey Graham, Orrin Hatch and Mike Lee. He admitted to being angry after he was fired from his systems administrator job at Sen. Maggie Hassan's office in May 2018, and conducted an "extensive computer fraud and data theft scheme" as revenge between July and October.
Blockchain Wikipedia is a dish best served cold
"You really shouldn't be interviewing me. I don't want to fuck it all up again." We're standing in a greenroom for panelists at StartEngine ICO 2.0, a blockchain conference held in Santa Monica, California, in April 2018. Mahbod Moghadam grabs me and insists, "Really, don't interview me. Do this interview entirely on Larry Sanger." Moghadam, 36, the co-founder of lyrics annotation and media site Genius, is referring to Larry Sanger, 50, the co-founder of Wikipedia. Both were ousted from their respective sites -- Moghadam was forced to resign, Sanger was laid off -- and in the years since, both have traded shots with their intellectual spawn. They're now executives at Everipedia, a blockchain-based encyclopedia and competitor to Wikipedia. In the past year, Everipedia has achieved several milestones. It raised $30 million from Galaxy Digital. It decentralized and became the largest project on the EOS blockchain. As of January 2019, Everipedia is the largest English-language encyclopedia to ever exist -- though, as Wikipedia notes, the majority of articles are clones of Wikipedia articles. Moghadam mills about the greenroom, sunglassed and ebullient. He tells panelists that they'll receive a wiki page afterward or that they already have a wiki. He explains the slang meaning of "Chad": a tall, suave, alpha-looking guy, which most crypto-attendees are decidedly not. "And then 'Thot' is the female version of Chad," he jokes. Finally, an usher arrives to escort the group out. "Wish me luck," Moghadam says, and walks onto the stage.
Google Translate will help Wikipedia fill its non-English websites
Google is helping the Wikimedia Foundation achieve its goal of making Wikipedia articles available in a lot more languages. The Foundation has added Google Translate to its content translation tool, which human editors can use to add content to non-English Wikipedia websites. Those editors can take advantage of the new option -- "one of the most advanced machine translation systems available today," the foundation called it -- to generate an initial translation that they can then review and edit for readability in their language.
Wikipedia fixes 9 million broken links thanks to the Internet Archive
Wikipedia has millions of articles across numerous languages, and that makes it a pain to ensure the links to third-party sites are up to date, if they can work at all. What are you supposed to do if an important reference stops working? You can relax, it seems -- the Internet Archive has 'rescued' 9 million previously broken Wikipedia links by caching them in the Wayback Machine and other archive services. The team accomplished the feat by using a bot to search for broken links in articles and automatically restore those links with archived versions.
European Wikipedia sites go dark to protest copyright reform
If you check Wikipedia's Spanish and Italian editions while in Europe, you'll find yourself facing a wall of text and no means to access its articles. Both pages have gone dark ahead of the European Parliament's final vote on the controversial EU Copyright Directive, which is the first time the region is updating its copyright laws since 2001. The online encyclopedia and other privacy groups are protesting two of the directive's proposals in particular. First is Article 13, which requires websites to filter user submissions and check them against copyrighted work. The other is Article 11, which will require websites to pay a fee to link to news publications or to use snippets from their articles.
Google search showed ‘Nazism’ as a California Republican Party ideology
As California gears up for its primary, many of the state's Republicans are fuming over how Google described their party in its search results. Those searching for "California Republicans" or "California Republican Party" would have found a result that listed "Nazism" as one of the party's ideologies along with "Conservatism," "Market liberalism," "Fiscal conservatism" and "Green conservatism." Vice News spotted the listing and Google removed the label following a query from the publication.
Wikipedia adds page previews to prevent endless link clicking
If you absolutely love spending your Friday nights going down rabbit holes on Wikipedia (don't judge), then this week's news from the Wikimedia Foundation may be a bit of a mixed bag for you. If you hover over a link on Wikipedia, you'll now see a new page preview, which allows you to explore related topics on the site without leaving the entry you're currently viewing.
Wikipedia had no idea it would become a YouTube fact checker
YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki said during a SXSW talk this week that the company would be making a more concerted effort to stem the spread of misinformation on its site. Specifically, YouTube plans to start adding "information cues," including text boxes that link to third-party sources like Wikipedia, to videos covering hoaxes and conspiracy theories. But in a statement, Wikimedia Foundation has now said that neither it nor Wikipedia were told about YouTube's announcement ahead of time. "In this case, neither Wikipedia nor the Wikimedia Foundation are part of a formal partnership with YouTube," the company said. "We were not given advance notice of this announcement."
YouTube CEO talks misinformation, creators and comments at SXSW
YouTube's presence at SXSW 2018 extended beyond its Story HQ, a space where it turned ads into videos that feel more like art. The company's CEO, Susan Wojcicki, was part of a panel at the event titled "Navigating the Video Revolution in the Digital Age." There, she talked about a wide range of topics, including experiments for YouTube's comments section and how much money creators are making. But the biggest news Wojcicki dropped on stage was about a new feature she called "information cues," which will help fight hoaxes by linking viewers to articles on Wikipedia that debunks those.
Wikipedia ends no-cost mobile access for developing countries
The Wikimedia Foundation launched Wikipedia Zero in 2012 with the hopes of democratizing information through a simple concept: cellular carriers in developing countries would offer access to its crowdsourced knowledge without charging data fees. However, it appears to have run its course. The organization has discontinued Zero with plans to phase it out through 2018. Wikimedia has stopped forming new carrier partnerships, and will let its existing alliances end over time. There has been a "significant drop off" in involvement since 2016, Wikimedia said, and that participation is necessary to keep Zero alive.
