Friday, July 24, 2009

Catapulting The Wikipropaganda?

The awards for most editing of Wikipedia by government agencies is in.

Check out where your favorite government agency has placed in the scramble to be editor in chief (numbers in bold = how many edits the top ten government editing departments made):
1. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (nasa.gov) 6,846

2. Department Of Veterans Affairs (va.gov) 4,210

3. Forestry And Fire Protection (ca.gov) 4,148

4. Dept Homeland Security (dhs.gov) 4,081

5. Information Systems U.S. House Of Representatives (house.gov) 3,736

6. National Institutes Of Health (nih.gov) 3,019

7. U.S. Courts (uscourts.gov) 2,869

8. U.S. Dept. Of Agriculture (usda.gov) 2,435

9. City Of New York (nyc.gov) 2,404

10. Salem Public Schools (ct.gov) 2,398

11. U.S. Dept Of Justice (usdoj.gov) 2,189

12. Information Services Division (nd.gov) 2,140

13. U.S. Senate Sergeant At Arms (senate.gov) 1,809

14. Federal Aviation Administration (faa.gov) 1,706

15. NOAA Aircraft Operations Center (noaa.gov) 1,590

16. Dotrspavolpe Center (dot.gov) 1,566

17. Lawrence Livermore Laboratory (llnl.gov) 1,456

18. U.S. Dept. Of Labor/Employment Standards Admin (dol-esa.gov) 1,449

19. U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (epa.gov) 1,449

20. Internal Revenue Service (irs.gov) 1,290

21. National Park Service (nps.gov) 1,214

22. Library Of Congress Information Technology Services (loc.gov) 1,142

23. Social Security Administration (ssa.gov) 1,134

24. U.S. Patent And Trademark Office (uspto.gov) 1,097

25. Virginia Information Technologies Agency (Vita) (virginia.gov) 1,047
(Democratic Underground). Well if that doesn't give you a warm and fuzzy feeling that the government is making sure you know the right things, I do not know what will (perhaps the science police?).

8 comments:

  1. The CDC isn't on this list! Of all the agencies, you would think they have the largest interest in science...

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Last I checked the CDC is not part of the government.

      Delete
  2. The fact that you were able to access this info and publish it is a success story of Wikipedia. Now, go count how many Tom, Dick and Harry's posted updates.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Yes, Dredd Blog values Wikipedia very much and quotes from it often.

      As we do from journals, books, newspapers, magazines online sources, offline sources, individuals, and any other worthwhile source of information.

      The point made in this post, several years ago now, is that propaganda likes these places too, but one can trace propaganda ... not in order to fear it ... but in order to follow it back to its sources.

      Additionally, most editing done on Wikipedia is arguably well intentioned, but to keep it that way we must continue to watch.

      Delete
  3. Regular readers here learn a lot about the very shocking history of propaganda in America. Here is an example post: Link

    ReplyDelete
  4. ZOMG the biggest researchers in the country are updating wikipedia! What has the world come to!

    People are idiots if they think the main purpose of NASA updating a wiki entry is for propaganda. Granted it does happen. You would be stupid to believe it's 100% propaganda.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. This post happened several years ago, early in the Obama Administration.

      NASA in the past, before the time of this post, had been influenced by White House politics, especially with regard to global warming.

      That reality is less so now, but it is not 0% yet. It would be stupid to believe it is 0% now.

      Keep watching.

      Delete
  5. A House of Representatives Account was recently blocked for improper editing: link

    ReplyDelete