Wikipedia fanboys attempt to gaslight Lemmy mods into suppressing an anti-Wikipedia discussion

[Ognistysztorm]

Wikipedia fanboys attempt to gaslight Lemmy mods into suppressing an anti-Wikipedia discussion thread which is all about Wikipedia versus ANI and the fact that Wikipedia has "doxxed" the editors in sealed cover to the court.

https://old.lemmy.world/post/23535522

The attempt to brigade:

https://old.lemmy.world/post/23537807

Look at how pissy "PhilipTheBucket@ponder.cat" (not an email address, it's a user handle which denotes an account "PhilipTheBucket" on another federated instance "ponder.cat") is when facing criticism of Wikipedia.

He generally shows most of the signs of the misinformation accounts:

Wants to repeatedly tell basically the same narrative and nothing else
Narrative is fundamentally false
Not interested in any kind of conversation or in learning that what he’s posting is backwards from the values he claims to profess
I also suspect that it’s not a coincidence that this is happening just as the Elon Musks of the world are ramping up attacks on Wikipedia, specially because it is a force for truth in the world that’s less corruptible than a lot of the others, and tends to fight back legally if someone tries to interfere with the free speech or safety of its editors.

Anyway, YSK. I reported him as misinformation, but who knows if that will lead to any result.

Edit: Number of people real salty that I’m talking about this: Lots

Just for the record, to any journalists and anyone else lurking here, whether coming from Facebook, X, Reddit, Quora, and Bluesky, here's a screenshot showing that their pathetic brigading attempt done out of probable hissy-fit has now resulted in a childish implicit death threat which was sent to the inbox.

Capture.PNG (45.74 KiB) Viewed 25916 times

There are people who thinks that PhiliptheBucket is indeed throwing a hissy-fit over nothing:

Then why are you trying to be cute and not call out the username (or usernames if they are using alts)? This doesn't identify jack, just says that someone exists doing something nonspecifically bad towards wikipedia.

As important as Wikipedia is, there are a ton of legitimate problems with the site and community moderators. Some of the drama that comes out of there is downright otherworldly. Without examples it's hard to take what you're saying seriously.

Edit: Either there's enough direct screenshotted evidence that this needs to be a specific call for admins to ban this person, or this just comes across as absurd escalation of some stupid internet debate.

Second edit: it's wikipediasuckscoop

Do we really need a warning for someone so obviously biased? Next you'll be warning us that madthumbs might have some reservations about the usefulness of linux.

The tone of gaslighting and sophistry suggest the possibility that PhiliptheBucket is one of the toxic gatekeepers/editors who have everything to lose if Wikipedia fails and the knowledge market undergoes a soft-reboot.

[ericbarbour]

The tone of gaslighting and sophistry suggest the possibility that PhiliptheBucket is one of the toxic gatekeepers/editors who have everything to lose if Wikipedia fails and the knowledge market undergoes a soft-reboot.

You are probably correct: Mr. Bucket is almost certainly a WP insider, and an especially toxic and arrogant one. Take your choice of which one. Chances are good that we will never know who that actually is.

Having never looked into the Lemmy community, I can't say much more. It's a federated network and that always means heavy socking, brigading, name-calling, lying, and assorted dirty tricks. I've seen some incredible craziness on Mastodon servers that make 4chan or Kiwi Farms look tame--just left-leaning instead of right.

[journo]

No opinion on genderdesk's allegations as it's out of my wheelhouse, but

Given Wikipedia is basically just Reddit's wiki, I don't think Wikipedia critics in general will have success on reddit-clones

Quora is where people are most receptive by far

[Ognistysztorm]

No opinion on genderdesk's allegations as it's out of my wheelhouse, but

Given Wikipedia is basically just Reddit's wiki, I don't think Wikipedia critics in general will have success on reddit-clones

Quora is where people are most receptive by far

Things have started to change on Reddit though. Because of PIA5 Wikipedia has now essentially alienated the Jewish community along with some of the mainstream left like /r/worldnews and Ritchie Torres. Talking about Wikipedia problems is now a "preaching to the choir" on conservative circles already; if they lose the last remaining supporter base among the liberal progressives then it'd have no choice but to go under, replaced by better forks like Justapedia and namu.wiki.

[journo]

Things have started to change on Reddit though. Because of PIA5 Wikipedia has now essentially alienated the Jewish community along with some of the mainstream left like /r/worldnews and Ritchie Torres. Talking about Wikipedia problems is now a "preaching to the choir" on conservative circles already; if they lose the last remaining supporter base among the liberal progressives then it'd have no choice but to go under, replaced by better forks like Justapedia and namu.wiki.

It's going to be replaced by Google Gemini or some adjacent Google AI project. I have no secret information about that, but it seems obvious.

[Ognistysztorm]

Apparently that is not the brigader's first rodeo after all.

https://old.lemmy.world/comment/14155877

having seen them repeatedly target other users, spin up new instances, and keep on doing it, I have no compunction about calling this shit out

[Ognistysztorm]

A kind commenter has revealed by message that this is probably Philip's account, confirming the claim that it's not his first rodeo.
https://lemmy.world/u/mozz@mbin.grits.dev

[Ognistysztorm]

So Philip threw another hissy fit which gives off the vibe that he's losing the argument.
https://old.lemmy.world/comment/14161130

Kiss my ass. The form 990s show all salaries for developers, administrative staff, executives, and all. You picked the one year when the CEO made $789k, instead of $200-400k, and then claimed that the CEO making four times the engineer salaries is "bleeding the foundation dry" and eating up the whole $186M they brought in that year, or something. The CEO makes about double what the developers make, in most years, and the developers have competitive salaries. Good. That's how it should be.

This is how modern social media propaganda works. One person says wikipedia is kowtowing to fascist governments and doxxing its members. That turns out to be bullshit, but during the discussion someone else says that $300 million "excess" went missing and no one knows where it went, implying that someone is skimming off money and we shouldn't be donating because the whole thing is corrupt. That turns out to be bullshit, but during the discussion someone else says that wikipedia is slanting all its coverage to a pro-Western, pro-Israel slant and covering up the truth through a narrative enforcing task force. That turns out to be bullshit, but during the discussion, someone else combs through their financials and finds out that the CEO is making some money, and uses phrases like "bleeding the foundation dry" or "all while content is created by volunteers."

Get the fuck out. Stop coming up with new bullshit to use to attack wikipedia. I don't care if the CEO made $700k. I hope it doubles, and I hope they use my $10/month to make it happen. Wikipedia is doing great stuff, and the vigor with which this variety of transient Lemmy villains is popping out to use this various array of bad-faith bullshit to attack them only demonstrates to me that they're doing something right.

In response, someone said this:

Yikes, wow! Totally not an unhinged response. You seem hyper-focused on whatever what said today and assume everything is related to it. I haven't even read Musk's statements because his opinions don't mean anything to me. In reality, concerns with Wikipedia's financials are nothing new. One of the OG posts highlighting concerns circulated in 2016 (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Gu ... has_Cancer) and has continuously been updated with each new year's disclosures. I believe I first saw it when the author did a Q&A on r/IAmA, 8 years ago (link). In sum, nothing has been done to change course and spending has only increased. In reality, the Wikipedia Foundation and Endowment have over $400-million in assets and core functionality should be able to continue indefinitely. I want to see Wikipedia succeed, and I think it could easily be set for lifetimes if managed appropriately. Looking at core responsibilities (internet hosting), there is no reason why Wikipedia can't thrive on their investment income. I can only assume those encouraging Wikipedia's current path hope for someone with a bigger checkbook to come by and bail them out (with strings attached, of course).

This basically confirms that Philip's a Wikipedia fanatic at least.
https://old.lemmy.world/comment/14171081

You said I sound hostile. Stuff like this is why. I've been dealing with maybe 5-10 different people who all have some kind of different reason of bending their way around to the conclusion "and so Wikipedia sucks." I don't think spending money that's coming in, on paying people to do Wikipedia work, spells doom for Wikipedia. I don't think that makes any sense. And, there's been such a variety of "and so that's why Wikipedia sucks" comments I've been reading that all don't make any sense if you examine them, that it's made me short-tempered to any given one.

I like Wikipedia. I think it's good.

[ericbarbour]

You said I sound hostile. Stuff like this is why. I've been dealing with maybe 5-10 different people who all have some kind of different reason of bending their way around to the conclusion "and so Wikipedia sucks." I don't think spending money that's coming in, on paying people to do Wikipedia work, spells doom for Wikipedia. I don't think that makes any sense. And, there's been such a variety of "and so that's why Wikipedia sucks" comments I've been reading that all don't make any sense if you examine them, that it's made me short-tempered to any given one.

I like Wikipedia. I think it's good.

Only a cultist talks like this.

[Ognistysztorm]

You said I sound hostile. Stuff like this is why. I've been dealing with maybe 5-10 different people who all have some kind of different reason of bending their way around to the conclusion "and so Wikipedia sucks." I don't think spending money that's coming in, on paying people to do Wikipedia work, spells doom for Wikipedia. I don't think that makes any sense. And, there's been such a variety of "and so that's why Wikipedia sucks" comments I've been reading that all don't make any sense if you examine them, that it's made me short-tempered to any given one.

I like Wikipedia. I think it's good.

Only a cultist talks like this.

Yup, they're feeling like as if I had insulted their family or their religion. That could be one of the gold materials for congressional investigations though.