Saturday, June 25, 2005
Wikiporky
An avalanche of pornography has forced the Los Angeles Times to abandon an experiment in free-form editorials. Last Friday, the newspaper introduced an online feature it called a "wikitorial." Readers were invited to contribute to an editorial, "War and Consequences" on the Iraq war, using an open-source software that allowed multiple users to write and rewrite a single Web page. The model was based on Wikipedia, the online encyclopedia where anyone can add facts or update information.
The original essay argued for the U.S. to set goals for training Iraqis to replace U.S. troops in Iraq and for the firing of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld if those goals were not met. But within two days, the paper was forced to shut the feature down after some readers repeatedly saturated the site with foul language and pornographic images. The wikitorial software allowed readers to post without checking by editors, who could remove posts only after they appeared. Initially a web master was assigned to keep the site clean, but the task quickly became overwhelming when obscene material kept pouring in. It just goes to show that porn supply is infinite. The site shutdown announcement didn't clearly show the position favored by porn writers, but I think they were "pro-Bush."
- posted by Woofwoof @ 2:32 AM
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Heh heh heh. I watched the actual wikipedia entry on Ratzinger as he became pope - now that was funny, stuff would pop in (essentially he's the Anti-Christ) and be zapped almost immediately by the other Wiki folks.
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