Wikipedia professor is actually 24yr old college drop-out

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http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/03/06/wwiki106.xml

Wikipedia, the online encyclopaedia, has been plunged into controversy after one of its most prolific contributors and editors, a professor of religion with advanced degrees in theology and canon law, was exposed as a 24-year-old community college drop-out.

The editor, who called himself Essjay, was recruited by staff at Wikipedia to work on the site?s arbitration committee, a team of expert administrators charged with vetting content on the online "free encyclopaedia that anyone can edit".

But no-one apparently vetted the credentials of Essjay, who claimed to be a tenured professor of religion at a private university and contributed to an estimated 20,000 Wikipedia entries.

In fact Essjay was actually Ryan Jordan, a 24-year-old from Kentucky with no advanced degrees who used texts such as Catholicism for Dummies to help him correct articles on the penitential rite or transubstantiation.

He was unmasked after the New Yorker magazine ran a long feature on Wikipedia last summer that referred to Essjay’s contributions to the site and how he would spend up to 14 hours a day editing, "correcting errors and removing obscenities".

The piece described him as a "professor of religion with a PhD in theology and a degree in canon law" and noted he was serving his "second term as chair of the mediation committee" which rules on disputes over information posted on the site.

But last week Essjay was forced to resign after a noted critic of the online encyclopaedia contacted the New Yorker and told the magazine his biographical information was fake.

"He holds no advanced degrees," the New Yorker stated in an editor’s note. "He has never taught."
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More fire for the Wiki-skeptics to play with, but other than that it has no effect on the grand scheme of Wikipedia.

Pretty funny though still. The powers of the Internet!
 
A slight tangent, but it really upsets me how teachers won't let us use online sources for papers. I mean in my C++ class our tests are on PAPER.

Sometimes I feel that if teachers had it their way we'd be chiseling math problems into stone tablets.
 
I wonder if he made any money while doing that?

Anyway, as long as he was doing it correctly, who cares? :p
 
"Internet. Serious Business." is now more true than ever :|
 
This is so gonna hurt Wikipedia's reputation and credibility.
 
Next week: Conservapedia professor is actually Kim Jong Il.
 
It's not as if a degree in religion gives you any knowledge anyway. :sleep:
 
so I should stop using wiki as a source?
 
DeusExMachina said:
Conservapedia's probably throwing a party as we speak.
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Pfft. Conservapedia isn't even in Wikipedia's ballpark - they can't dream to compete or even be considered anything but the sack of shit they are.

This is a blow to wikipedia, yes, but who cares? Things like this happen all the time. Wikipedia remains one of the largest, most successful projects ever to be undertaken on the internet, and it's done remarkably well.

I don't see why you'd criticize it anyway; it's not like they aren't aware of the problems inherent in the concept, and their safeguards against abuse are fantastic.
 
theotherguy said:
It's not as if a degree in religion gives you any knowledge anyway. :sleep:
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A degree in religion is literally a degree in made up-sh*t, who made up-the most sh*t, what the sh*t was about, and where is is in the book of sh*t.
 
lol. what i meant was that no academic institution considers it as a credible source. its great for finding reference links though and for looking up various topics.
 
Shasta said:
A degree in religion is literally a degree in made up-sh*t, who made up-the most sh*t, what the sh*t was about, and where is is in the book of sh*t.
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A degree in theology is still a degree, which means you've learned a lot of transferrable skills. So yeah, it's a bit useful.
 
how is th is gonna hurt wikipedia's cred? It's not like he's the one who writes the site's content.
 
ComradeBadger said:
A degree in theology is still a degree, which means you've learned a lot of transferrable skills. So yeah, it's a bit useful.
Click to expand...

Also allows him to add to theological articles professionally, it's very useful for being a wiki admin to have.
 
ComradeBadger said:
He contributed to around 20,000 articles...
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You know a slight layout edit can be classed an a contribution.

Also to the people that seem upset that Uni's and other places don't take wiki as a credible source, I don't see what the problem is. Almost every wiki page has links to their cited sources.
 
Cormeh said:
Me too. You don't have to have a degree to be knowledgable - look at the taxi driver who won mastermind. :D
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Haha, it's true. I like to think I'm rather knowledgeable considering I've only graduated from High School!

Ok, I'm really not THAT knowledgeable, but more so than 90% of the doofus' that fly out of college these days.
 
Uncyclopedia is the best wiki ever ..far better than wikipedia or conservastupidpedia

observe:

on Half-life

Uncyclopedia said:
In Black Mesa, Gordon meets several mutha****as that help him and Da Posse do some weird stuff and shit. He met Barney Calhoun, who was dressed in a shit-ass purple dinosaur outfit with an RPG7. Barney helped the Krew get some PCP and crack to help them fight the motha****in zombie Preps and Jocks. Gordon also met Alyx Vance, a fly-ass hot biatch who looks like a black Halle Berry (shut up foo Halle Berry is white). And lastly he also met the G-Man, whom he later found out that dis motha****a had a sexually transmitted disease and G stands for Gonorrhoea.

All in all, it's pretty much like Columbine but without the pipe bombs.
Click to expand...


quotes on Half-life

“We're actually brothers. Our only difference is both of his parents are white and both of mine are black.”

~ Morgan Freeman on Gordon Freeman



“...”

~ Gordon Freeman on half-life





Half-life 2

Half-Life 2, also known as Three-Quarters' Life (because a second half-life is technically equal to half of the first, thus 1/2 + 1/4 = 3/4) is a "super 1337" first-person shooter game that is a sequel, oddly enough, to the game "Half-Life 3." Because of this unusual order of game titles in this series, many hardcore gamers commited suicide, believing that time and space has reversed, and that they will eventually turn back into sperms.


After 31 years in development and endless hours of forced labor by small orphans in Canada, the game was successfully released to the lucky 5% of the fans who have not killed themselves in the fury of confusion. Unfortunately again for the product's developers, the remaining fanbase have turn old and senile due to the fact these people were the only gamers who bothered to wait all those long years and the 3,568 announced delays of Half-Life 2's release. Of the 5%, 65% of that group have lost their vision due to health problems and/or the lenghty stay in the basements of some relative's house for almost all their lives. Or prehaps due to the intake of several gallons of Mountain Dew. There are two types of public distribution for this game. One involved the usage of an online program called "Steamy Crap." This program decided whether or not the customer is worthy of receiving the product he/she already paid for. In order to make this decision, "Steamy Crap" forced the user to undergo certain trials to see if he/she has mental stability and strengh. The customer had to survive while watching 80 minutes of homosexual pornography, 75 minutes of a movie involving sexual acts done to animals and, lastly, the same 80 minutes of homosexual pornography previously seen but with the music of the Backstreet Boys played loudly in the background.
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http://uncyclopedia.org/wiki/Half-Life_2
 
CptStern said:
Uncyclopedia is the best wiki ever ..far better than wikipedia or conservastupidpedia

observe:

on Half-life




quotes on Half-life

?We're actually brothers. Our only difference is both of his parents are white and both of mine are black.?

~ Morgan Freeman on Gordon Freeman



?...?

~ Gordon Freeman on half-life





Half-life 2



http://uncyclopedia.org/wiki/Half-Life_2
Click to expand...

I feel so dirty acutally laughing at some parts of that ;(
 
Shasta said:
A degree in religion is literally a degree in made up-sh*t, who made up-the most sh*t, what the sh*t was about, and where is is in the book of sh*t.
Click to expand...

It's also a sign that you're far more knowledgeable than the average person on an institution that has dominated much of humanity's history and development. You and I may view religion itself as mostly silly, but it's still one of the most powerful social, political, and moral forces on the planet, if not the most powerful.
 
And most powr-hungry, you forgot about that. Remember 5th century, when Christianity became mandatory in the late Imperium Romanum, with penalty of death instituted for worshipping "pagan" gods?

Plus:

Essjay said:
...I *am* sorry if anyone in the Wikipedia community has been hurt by my decision to use disinformation to protect myself. I'm not sorry that I protected myself; I believed, and continue to believe, that I was right to protect myself, in light of the problems encountered on the internet in these trying times. I have spoken to all of my close friends here about this, and have heard resoundingly that they understand my position, and they support me. Jimbo and many others in Wikipedia's hierarchy have made thier [sic] support known as well...
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Trying times? Protect himself?

Um... *hides screaming bullshit detector*.
 
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