A Not-So-Candid CAMERA [1]
Submitted by Diane Farsetta [2] on
CAMERA [3], a lobby group that campaigns against criticism of the Israeli government in U.S. media, had a campaign to impact Wikipedia [4]'s coverage of Israel and Palestine issues. In emails, CAMERA's Gilead Ini stressed that the effort should be secret, and counseled members to avoid "picking a user name that marks you as pro-Israel, or that lets people know your real name." He also instructed members to "always log in" under their user names, so that Wikipedia would not "record your computer's IP address [5]." While directing CAMERA members to certain articles on Israel and Palestine, Ini cautioned that new Wikipedia users should "avoid editing Israel-related articles for a short period of time," so as not to develop reputations as "one-topic editors." A long-time Wikipedia editor, "Zeq," advised CAMERA on its plan. Zeq suggested that some CAMERA members "stay away from any Israel realted [sic] articles," until building up enough support to become nominated as administrators, who help resolve controversies. "We will go to war after we have build [sic] our army," Zeq wrote. After the emails were published, Zeq was banned from editing Wikipedia for one year, for -- in the words of one Wikipedian [6] -- "recruit[ing] meatpuppets from off-wiki to push POV," a point of view. CAMERA responded by "temporarily or permanently" ending its Wikipedia email group, "in hopes that members' personal contact information will not be made public."