Wikipedia firmly supports your right to identity fraud
Now this is very sad.
As Slashdot reports, someone calling himself “Essjay” was interviewed for last year’s New Yorker article about Wikipedia. At the time, he gave The New Yorker the same story he gave to the Wikipedia community: he was a tenured professor of theology with some very impressive degrees. Recently he revealed that he had been using a fake identity, and The New Yorker apologized to its readers (see the bottom of the article, “Editors’ Note”) for having reporting his lies as fact. It turns out that, far from being an overeducated religious thinker, he is (if we believe his latest story–skepticism is obviously warranted) 24 years old and degreeless, a kid named Ryan Jordan. He also apparently thinks his lie was pretty clever, as well as quite morally justified, as edits on his user page show. Now, this is pathetic, and yet more evidence of the broad moral decline of Western civilization and all that is holy, but in itself is no big deal. No doubt Wikipedia’s ranks are chock full of people who have misrepresented themselves. That’s not big news, if you know much about Wikipedia.
No, the fascinating and tragic thing is Jimmy Wales’ reaction. The New Yorker reported that he said: “I regard it as a pseudonym and I don’t really have a problem with it.”
Jimmy, say it ain’t so.
Of course, the moniker “Essjay” is obviously a pseudonym. But Essjay’s invented persona, as the New Yorker described it, or in other words his lies about being a different person, cannot be regarded as a pseudonym by anyone who knows what “pseudonym” means. A pseudonym, or pen name, is just a name, not an identity. Responsible publications that permit pseudonyms don’t permit misrepresentation of the actual qualifications of the person with the pseudonym. That would be a breach of the readers’ trust. That of course is why The New Yorker felt it had to apologize.
For Jimmy not to “have a problem with” Essjay’s identity fraud is essentially for him to declare: you can falsely claim all sorts of credentials you like on Wikipedia, and not have them. Truth-telling about yourself really doesn’t matter on Wikipedia, and credentials (of course) don’t matter either. Perhaps we already knew this. But nothing has ever more eloquently illustrated it.
As if to underscore just how much contempt he, and apparently Wikipedia officially, has for real identities, accurate self-representation, and (of course) for credentials, Jimmy recently appointed Essjay to the Wikipedia Arbitration Committee. (I would have expected Jimmy to have been stripped of such powers after stepping down as head honcho. Why am I not surprised that he still has them?) This is in addition to Essjay’s recent hiring as a Wikia “community manager.” The Arbitration Committee sits in judgment on ill-behaving Wikipedians. It would be bad enough if Wikipedia had allowed Essjay to remain on the Arbitration Committee, had he already been there; but, if what has been reported is true, Jimmy put Essjay there deliberately and by fiat after his revelation. Jimmy apparently doesn’t just not have a problem with identity fraud, he quite firmly supports it.
There’s something utterly breathtaking, and ultimately tragic, about Jimmy telling The New Yorker that he doesn’t have a problem with Essjay’s lies, and by essentially honoring Essjay after his lies were exposed. As Blogworld quite rightly said, “By his [Jimmy’s] actions or lack thereof … and [by] his words he is endorsing fraud.” I’ve become increasingly disillusioned by Jimmy’s behavior, but this I simply wouldn’t have expected. It’s one thing to revise history self-servingly. But this new incident seems self-destructive on a level beyond previous incidents. Doesn’t Jimmy realize that this could well blow up in his face–that it could well be picked up by the news media and severely damage not only Wikipedia’s reputation, but Wikia’s bottom line (since Wikia is, still, Essjay’s employer)? The media is already making some noise (the story broke yesterday) and it’s likely only to get hotter. The media now loves a good Wikipedia scandal. Since this one has such a compelling narrative line, and a “you can’t make this stuff up” quality to it, how can tech reporters resist? And how can respected observers of the scene then fail to draw some obvious conclusions, as the blogosphere is already doing in its usual vigorous way? Doesn’t Jimmy know that this has the potential to be even more damaging to Wikipedia than the Seigenthaler situation, since it reflects directly on the judgment and values of the management of Wikipedia?
Well, perhaps Jimmy doesn’t realize these things; or perhaps he does, and he doesn’t care. The Wikipedia community could facilitate such a lackadaisical attitude. Wikipedians have plainly become a very insular group: they have their own mores and requirements, which are completely independent of the real world. Indeed, that’s what this story is about, after all: real-world identities and credentials are rejected as unnecessary by Wikipedia. How could Wikipedia fail to become insular with that attitude? So, in Jimboworld, it is actually more important that he “make a statement” articulating Wikipedia’s contempt for real identities and credentials than that he take a stand against fraud. Insularity often fosters bizarre inversions of values; that’s why insularity is bad.
Well, let it be a lesson to all of us. Let’s try our best to keep it from happening on Citizendium. I shall try my level best to make sure that it doesn’t. That’s one reason that I have plans for term limits (including for myself) and sortition rather than election. Since this time around I’m the boss, at least for a time, and since we are setting up some sensible ground rules, perhaps we have a chance. But we musn’t be complacent: it’s easy and natural for people working in groups to become that insular. It happens all the time. Maybe it’s the usual way of things. But that doesn’t mean we can’t avoid it ourselves, if we try.
UPDATE: as I discuss in a new blog post, Jimmy Wales has asked Essjay to resign. But little else is explained.
You’re right about the insular — and sometimes warped — morality that has developed on Wikipedia. When I raised some concerns about the ramifications of this incident on Jimbo’s talk page, I was told to “get over [my] moral snobbiness” and rebuked thus: “I’ll say it again, ’cause you seem to have missed it. Wikipedia has no honesty policy about personal details. You are acting like we do.”
Some of the participants in the discussion seem honestly not to understand how this could have any ramifications in the real world. And that disturbs me even more than the revelation of Essjay’s deception.
—Josiah Rowe
Comment by Josiah Rowe — March 1, 2007 @ 7:07 pm
Larry, I can’t say I’m particularly confident Citizendium is going to blow up, but this is precisely why I’m hopeful it does. I am concerned about insularity here at Citizendium too. Insularity, as you know, breeds an “us versus them” mentality which when compounded with a desire to get rich creates an especially noxious brew. Stir in a little fame and a lot of power… Voila! Wikipedia! How is Citizendium going avoid these same pitfalls in the (I’m sorry) unlikely event it takes off?
I too am especially offended Wales’ response. You know this guy:
Is he really this phony and arrogant? Or have I misjudged him?
Comment by AaronF — March 1, 2007 @ 8:17 pm
“No, the fascinating and tragic thing is Jimmy Wales’ reaction.” That was exactly what I thought when I read the Slashdot story. And then the more I read about it, the worse it got. As it turns out, “Essjay” not only made up these fake credentials, he actually used them in some instances to try to bolster his credibility. And yes, Jimmy Wales apparently *knew* that it was all a lie when he appointed him to the Arb Com. And to this day “Essjay” has, among other powers, the power to view the IP addresses of all contributors, a power which is quite limited due to the obvious privacy issues.
Comment by Anthony — March 1, 2007 @ 8:27 pm
The Wikipedia community is not likely to “facilitate” any realisation of what is right for Jimbo. As Josiah points out, it has mostly tried to silence anyone who questions the rightness of lying about credentials.
Larry, you’re a philosophy man. You probably have already thought about Ralston Saul’s notion that corporations are amoral. Wikipedia is much the same. It seems to think that the standards of morality that apply “outside” simply don’t apply “inside”. Its processes often reflect a disregard for decency that wouldn’t play in the outside world.
Does Jimbo really think it’s okay to lie about your credentials if you are a big contributor? Does he think it’s all right to try to give weight to your arguments on the wiki with your false doctorate? I can understand and appreciate the notion that arguments, not degrees, should prevail (a reason I think your project is a bad idea, all in all; professors are not always right, even though they are on the whole going to be righter than most). But Essjay has more than once used his fake academic credentials as a tool in wikisquabbles, and as has been noted, as a means of impressing a real academic, who did want their charges to cite the wiki in their papers.
Jimbo’s comments on the matter just don’t make sense. “Dr Zen” is a pseudonym. “I have a doctorate in divinity” is a lie. There is a difference. I *really am* Dr Zen. It’s not the name my ma and pa gave me, but that’s because I want to be anonymous. “Ryan Jordan” would have stuck with Essjay, and no harm is done. But he didn’t. He didn’t just use a false name. He created a whole false identity. And lied about why (he was not receiving death threats when he began to claim a doctorate — he wasn’t even an admin, let alone a figure of hate; besides, WP doesn’t have that many whackos to share out among admins that a not particularly controversial gnome would attract so many).
Comment by Dr Zen — March 1, 2007 @ 8:51 pm
[…] Also, Larry Sanger (co?-founder of Wikipedia) has written an excellent blog post. […]
Pingback by Cyde Weys Musings » How to deal with liars on Wikipedia? — March 1, 2007 @ 9:15 pm
Jim W lied about an admin’s alleged checkuser request to determine if a famous author/reporter had created his own wikipedia entry among other things, see —-> http://antisocialmedia.net/?p=37
Jim and the hive will say anything to protect the inner circle of admins working for him.
Comment by Eliot Ness — March 1, 2007 @ 10:04 pm
Oh, this is rich, from the very powerful Wikipedia and Wikimedia higher-up http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Gmaxwell who is apparently live-in lover (or was at one time) with Wikipedia board member Kat Walsh (see http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User:Gmaxwell&diff=96407906&oldid=29556782 ).
He says,
“Can you expand on the point of “casts a shadow not only upon himself but on the project”? In my view it does more to cast doubts on other projects such as Citizendium whos models depend on the work of experts than it does to cast doubt on this project. I’ve never seen any study which showed any significant dependence on disclosed experts on Wikipedia. –Gmaxwell 04:45, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
From: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Community_noticeboard&diff=112005298&oldid=112004969
Comment by Stephen Ewen — March 2, 2007 @ 1:42 am
Do you guys see how this will be *more* of a problem on Citizendium? On Wikipedia there’s no clear benefit to being credentialed. It may have helped Essjay get where he is, but like Larry says, credentials aren’t necessary on Wikipedia. On the other hand, Citizendium gives you a real reason to lie because your position is determined by those credentials. No matter how rigorous your screening process is, some will get through. The easiest way as I see it is to simply impersonate a real with real credentials.
Comment by a/c — March 2, 2007 @ 3:08 am
a/c, indeed we do require proof of bona fides when it comes to editor (and constable) positions; we’ll soon be announcing what we will require of authors (something the constables have been discussing for a few weeks). But, of course, you’re right that occasionally a few will get through. But the problem as I see it isn’t with Essjay. It’s with the management and community’s reaction to Essjay. When they not only fail to ban him, not only fail to fire him, not only fail to roundly rebuke him, not only defend him, but actually promote and (in some quarters) even celebrate him as a local hero, that says something truly dumbfounding about Wikipedia. I suppose even I didn’t realize that things had gotten quite that bad. But apparently they have.
If someone attempts to impersonate a real person, and is found out, not only will we instantly ban the person, we will help with any legal cases against the person engaged in identity fraud.
Furthermore, we will do our best to prevent this from ever happening–consistent, of course, from having a reasonably open project in the first place. By automating the registration system better than what’s now in place (we’re now spec’ing it out), we can make the whole process both fairly reliable and efficient.
Comment by Larry Sanger — March 2, 2007 @ 6:30 am
[…] The Essjay scandal occasions a little announcement. […]
Pingback by Citizendium Blog » Our registration policy - how we check identities — March 2, 2007 @ 9:38 am
Hey, Doc. I would assume that if someone “Pulls an Essjay” on Citizendium, that just like a real publication, their edits will be scrutinized (perhaps by an assigned team) and either undone or verified (and marked as so in discussion pages)?
Comment by Jason Scott — March 2, 2007 @ 10:20 am
Jason: yep. That virtually goes without saying.
Comment by Larry Sanger — March 2, 2007 @ 10:46 am
I would have agreed with you (that it goes without saying) but this whole thing has once again reminded me how far afield of journalistic/academic practices Wikipedia travels; it is quite obvious that there’s going to be no such checking of Essjay’s previous work, and additionally, people are unhappy he’s recieving any reprimanding at all and don’t see “what the big fuss is”. This would be fine, if Wikipedia didn’t, out of the other side of its mouth, pretend to the throne of being “better” than encyclopedias, newspapers, and other reference sources.
I dropped one of my word-bombs again, if you have time:
http://ascii.textfiles.com/archives/000329.html
Comment by Jason Scott — March 2, 2007 @ 11:12 am
Larry, you badly need to read Jimmy’s extended response: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment/Essjay#View_of_User:Jimbo_Wales
You know what? Read the whole thing. Your headline is profoundly inaccurate…
Comment by David Still — March 2, 2007 @ 11:36 pm
UPDATE: Jimbo has posted a new statement on his user talk page, in which he says “my past support of EssJay in this matter was fully based on a lack of knowledge about what has been going on.” and says that he has asked Essjay “to resign his positions of trust within the community.” Jimbo’s statement does not address the off-wiki implications of Essjay’s deception, but it does at least treat the matter with the seriousness it deserves.
Comment by Josiah Rowe — March 2, 2007 @ 11:39 pm
Yes, Jimbo replied on his userpgae, but a user there has pointed to evidence of prior statements by Jimbo indicating disingenuous in the reply:
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:Jimbo_Wales&diff=112282076&oldid=112281864
Comment by Stephen Ewen — March 3, 2007 @ 2:04 am
Jimbo’s (predictable) real concern appears to be that Essjay “used his false credentials in content disputes”, pointing to his concern to further “check diffs” of Essjay.
Jimbo claims he did not understand this matter to be one “of violation of people’s trust” and that his “past support of EssJay in this matter was fully based on a lack of knowledge about what has been going on”.
Oh c’mon.
And this seems to point to something indicate otherwise: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:Jimbo_Wales&diff=112282076&oldid=112281864
And when Jimbo claims he did not understand this matter to be one “of violation of people’s trust”, which “people” is he talking about? Only Wikipedians who may have been bluffed by a pull of false credentials? Apparently so, which only confirms the insularity of the system.
Does Jimbo feel Essjay violated the trust of The New Yorker reporters to whom Essjay lied? On this he is silent and it speaks loudly. How about to The New Yorker’s many, many readers? Again, on this he is silent and it speaks loudly.
I fail to see anything of real substance in Jimbo’s talkpage response that would falsify Larry’s assertions here.
Comment by C.M. Jones — March 3, 2007 @ 2:35 am
Jimbo is a terrible fraud and a worse liar. He knew very well about Essjay’s deceit long before now. He actually promoted Essjay right after it became public. The is someone who should be resigning at Wikipedia - Jimbo. He just doesn’t know how to run a project.
Comment by Naveed — March 3, 2007 @ 4:39 am
[…] to want and it doesn’t seem unreasonable at all. Be sure to also see Larry Sanger’s take on all this. 6 Comments so far Leave a […]
Pingback by Lux et Veritas — March 3, 2007 @ 5:44 am
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:Jimbo_Wales&diff=112270687&oldid=112270647
It turns out he is very much against the faking of credentials; he had been in India without reliable Internet access and it turns out he was only given half the story. He knows the whole situation now, and is ashamed.
Comment by James — March 3, 2007 @ 12:41 pm
Where in his statement, James, do you find evidence that he is “very much against the faking of credentials” or that he is “ashamed”?
Personally, I am not particularly impressed by his reply.
Comment by Larry Sanger — March 3, 2007 @ 1:07 pm
Jimbo Wales and/or others in Wikia have been aware of the situation since they started paying Essjay 6-8 weeks ago. I’d be pissed about faking a doctorate, which I consider excessive to protect privacy (faking state, initials and age should be plenty). But even a cursory inspection (check his 1st and 4th edits ever) after knowing that should have lead to serious questions. Especially since Essjay represented WP to the public on several occasions, including to an actual professor. That should have set off alarm bells at least a month ago.
Comment by ZachPruckowski — March 3, 2007 @ 6:47 pm
It would appear that Essjay has removed himself from Wikipedia.
Comment by ZachPruckowski — March 3, 2007 @ 7:16 pm
Thank you for the link to my post on this Larry. This is the first I have heard about your project. Looking forward to learning more about it.
Comment by Rick Calvert — March 5, 2007 @ 6:23 am
Essjay Goon Squad
Admins such as Essjay ran goon squads targeting, blocking, harassing, editors who knew too much. The checkuser system was handled by this fraud. Has anyone looked into whether this guy had any knowledge nor skill to verify sockpuppets. This proven fraudster was trusted with handling private info. When he lost some argument and risk being exposed, he would claim the opponent was trolling and get his goon squad to block/ban him. Essjay used irc (primarily) to communicate and scheme to bump off his opponents. In order to avoid radar and any potentially bad publicity, he got his loyal crew (which he presumably) had a hand in promoting to admins to do the ‘dirty work.’ One such member of his enforcement crew/goon squad is Steel359 (I am not sure if he/it is a sockpuppet Essjay). Efforts to delete his history is part and parcel of this group to hide their connection to this exposed fraudster. [
Comment by JohnDoe — March 5, 2007 @ 6:30 pm
To cut to the point, the real question is whether Jimbo should resign as well.
Comment by David — March 6, 2007 @ 8:41 pm
So, anyone want to take bets on how long before he pops up with a new name and gets promoted to the same positions of power all over again?
Comment by dzd — March 7, 2007 @ 8:34 am
[…] I’m beginning to wonder if Larry is a master-puppeteer like Jason Calacanis, making provacative remarks to cleverly draw attention and links to Citizendium, and playing us Wikipedia bloggers like a […]
Pingback by 12 Great Wikipedia Blogs and Resources « ValueWiki Blog — March 8, 2007 @ 1:57 pm
[…] have told me about in recent weeks (I’ll let them come out with it, if and when they wish), his behavior in the Essjay scandal, and now this shameful libel — apparently not. Perhaps I should have pointed out the facts […]
Pingback by Citizendium Blog » Wales’ comments on Wired.com — May 8, 2007 @ 12:14 pm
It seems hypocritical that Wiki always goes on about evil “sockpuppets” and “meatpuppets”. But the arbitration committee to rule and often ban alleged sockpuppets included a proven fraud like Essjay. So it is not altogether true that Wiki supports “identity fraud” — only identity fraud for cronies!
Comment by Kritiko — July 6, 2007 @ 11:14 pm