Unaccredited degrees -- how tag-teaming worked

[thekohser]

In real life, Wikipedia user "TallMagic" appears to be Bill Huffman.

I know who administrator "Orlady" is, in real life, but it's probably not important to disclose that here and now.

Bill Huffman has spent over 10 years on the Internet, railing against unaccredited degree institutions, or "diploma mills". Specifically, he so antagonized one Derek Smart, that Smart pursued legal action against Huffman, including getting some of Huffman's websites taken down, as they were rife with personal libel.

On one Wikipedia article, about Washington International University, TallMagic was intent of making sure the article said that WIU was "operating illegally" in the state of Pennsylvania. Orlady was his administrative back-up, because (you guessed it) she shares a passionate dislike of diploma mills. Together, they would make Wikipedia their personal site for "let's bash diploma mills, because they deserve it".

Orlady and TallMagic at one time zeroed in on a State of Oregon website that indicated that WIU had been "operating illegally" in the state of Pennsylvania.

The problem is, that information was wrong. So, Oregon removed the mistake from their website.

You would think that that would mean the misinformation should come down from Wikipedia, but no. Orlady and TallMagic made themselves absolutely dependent on an Archive.org snapshot of the Oregon site, peppering many Wikipedia articles with the same shoddy source -- a web image of a defunct page that had contained known errors. In fact, at one time there were 11 Wikipedia articles containing the phrase "operating illegally", and 8 of the 11 had been entered by Orlady.

There are no legal records, no announcements from the PA Attorney General, no announcement from the PA Dept of Education, and no news sources that explicitly state that Washington International University is or ever was "operating illegally" in the state of PA. What happened is that Oregon had misinterpreted a news story that said the PA State Dept of Education was opening an "informal investigation" into "complaints" about the WIU. That's not "operating illegally", as anyone with even an 8th-grade education should understand.

Anyway, eventually, it became clear (surprise, surprise) that crusader Bill Huffman had been running a sockpuppet farm. His very lenient punishment was to have been limiting himself to just one account going forward. Instead of taking his lumps, he instead decided to storm off in a snit.

Of course, if you think Bill Huffman no longer edits Wikipedia at all, I have a bridge in Brooklyn that you may be interested in purchasing. And, if you believe Orlady's claims that she and Bill just "happened" to occasionally work together on articles related to unaccredited institutions, take a peek at this cross-analysis of their mutually-edited articles.

As for Orlady? She's still a Wikipedia admin. And she's still in love with how the State of Oregon documents unaccredited institutions, adding more citations pointing to their site, even as recently as yesterday. You have to hand it to her -- she's consistent.

[Volunteer Marek]

...

Orlady and TallMagic at one time zeroed in on a State of Oregon website that indicated that WIU had been "operating illegally" in the state of Pennsylvania.

The problem is, that information was wrong. So, Oregon removed the mistake from their website.

You would think that that would mean the misinformation should come down from Wikipedia, but no. Orlady and TallMagic made themselves absolutely dependent on an Archive.org snapshot of the Oregon site, peppering many Wikipedia articles with the same shoddy source -- a web image of a defunct page that had contained known errors. In fact, at one time there were 11 Wikipedia articles containing the phrase "operating illegally", and 8 of the 11 had been entered by Orlady.

...


As for Orlady? She's still a Wikipedia admin. And she's still in love with how the State of Oregon documents unaccredited institutions, adding more citations pointing to their site, even as recently as yesterday. You have to hand it to her -- she's consistent.

Mmmm... I got to call you out on something here Greg. In the early part of your post you describe Orlady and TallMagic inserting a faulty reference associated with State of Oregon, which may or may not be true (let's say it is). You end the post however, by linking to Orlady inserting, recently, valid references, although also associated with the State of Oregon, specifically this: http://www.osac.state.or.us/oda/unaccredited.aspx. That don't look like a Web Archive page of a faulty page, but a legitimate resource. Not the same thing.

The stuff about the sock puppeting and tag teaming is in all likelihood all true.

[thekohser]

Mmmm... I got to call you out on something here Greg. In the early part of your post you describe Orlady and TallMagic inserting a faulty reference associated with State of Oregon, which may or may not be true (let's say it is). You end the post however, by linking to Orlady inserting, recently, valid references, although also associated with the State of Oregon, specifically this: http://www.osac.state.or.us/oda/unaccredited.aspx. That don't look like a Web Archive page of a faulty page, but a legitimate resource. Not the same thing.

That's a valid point, and I wasn't trying to be deceptive. She's fine to keep using the current Oregon page, if she's comfortable with the fact that in the past, they published a libelous legal accusation about an entity. For her, that one source is plenty reliable, and so she doctors as many Wikipedia articles as possible with references to it. That's all I'm saying.

Clearly, 203 links to that source was not enough yesterday, so she upped it to 204.

[Cla68]

Mmmm... I got to call you out on something here Greg. In the early part of your post you describe Orlady and TallMagic inserting a faulty reference associated with State of Oregon, which may or may not be true (let's say it is). You end the post however, by linking to Orlady inserting, recently, valid references, although also associated with the State of Oregon, specifically this: http://www.osac.state.or.us/oda/unaccredited.aspx. That don't look like a Web Archive page of a faulty page, but a legitimate resource. Not the same thing.

That's a valid point, and I wasn't trying to be deceptive. She's fine to keep using the current Oregon page, if she's comfortable with the fact that in the past, they published a libelous legal accusation about an entity. For her, that one source is plenty reliable, and so she doctors as many Wikipedia articles as possible with references to it. That's all I'm saying.

Clearly, 203 links to that source was not enough yesterday, so she upped it to 204.

I have been involved in this to some degree, mainly in trying to get Huffman to stop using the talk page of the Derek Smart article to suggest pejorative edits to it. I suspect that Orlady knew that Huffman was abusing multiple accounts and may have helped try to cover for him. I haven't looked into sufficiently, however, to reach a definitive conclusion.

[Retrospect]

These diploma mills are a fucking scam and fraud and should be stopped. By comparison a little bending of WP:RS and WP:NPOV is small beer. Why even discuss it?

[thekohser]

These diploma mills are a fucking scam and fraud and should be stopped. By comparison a little bending of WP:RS and WP:NPOV is small beer. Why even discuss it?

Well, for starters, duping consumers into buying needless products is not a crime (see Pet Rock, e.g.); while libeling an organization as "operating illegally" is a crime. Sorry that you can't see this distinction. Hey, maybe Huffman is hiring (assuming you are unemployed, right)?

[Vigilant]

Come on, now.

Diploma mills are a net negative for society.
They charge the students for worthless instruction (usually running up massive student loan debt) and give the eventual employer an under-qualified employee.

[thekohser]

Come on, now.

Diploma mills are a net negative for society.
They charge the students for worthless instruction (usually running up massive student loan debt) and give the eventual employer an under-qualified employee.

Now, you come on, now. What kind of instruction was a traditional, accredited institution going to be able to impart on a student so gullible as to acquire a degree from a diploma mill, anyway? Equally, any employer so lazy as to not check the credentials of a college they've never heard of on the job candidate's resume, probably deserves just such an employee. "But, sir, I told you I received my degree from Trinity Southern, and that's not a lie."

Meanwhile, increasingly we see accredited institutions churning out degrees to unemployable graduates who clearly have not ascended to some imagined higher plane of intelligence and skill, and the not-likely-to-be-repaid loans associated with that sort of "education" are probably 500x the magnitude of a diploma mill's. Are you telling me the apes who were turning over cars up at Penn State, in anger that their football coach was fired for not doing more to stop a known pedophile in their midst, are more authentically prepared for the job world than some hard-working Kenyan immigrant who actually ran a farm for 15 years, but needed a diploma to get a decent-paying management job at a chicken-processing plant?

(Yeah, I kind of went off the rails there. I'll step down now.)

[dogbiscuit]

Of course, what Greg(ory) demonstrates is the Wikipedia fallacy of NPOV, where when he argues for the sourcing rules to be strictly applied, we get the response that as the subject is something that is disapproved of, it is fair enough for Wikipedia to be gamed. That's slippery slope stuff because who decides what is ok (Scientology comes to mind, where my understanding is that Wikipedia has decided that it is ok to be biased).

[EricBarbour]

"Biased", meaning they have "editorial standards" of some kind, of course.

But of course they don't. And they don't care. Wikipedia is not an "encyclopedia" precisely because they don't proscribe things
up-front, like pseudoscience, mysticism, wacko political views, etc. Instead, they play moronic popularity contests and use
backstabbing and manipulation to "make editorial standards". None of it is written down explicitly, but anyone who disagrees
with it, even slightly and for intelligently arguable reasons, is immediately demonized and cast out. That is not an "editorial
standard", that is a bunch of schoolyard bullies deciding what "science" and "politics" are. You don't even know what the
"standards" are, much less how to conform to them. By the time you do figure them out, you've been banned as a "disruption".

I'll take Wikimedia projects more seriously, when they put down something resembling a usable set of content standards for
"knowledge". Such as real encyclopedias used to conform to: pro-science, pro-knowledge, neutral to religious belief but not
controlled by a single set of beliefs. Neutral to corporations, neither manipulated by them nor condemnatory of them.

I suspect Greg Kohs could live with that, but I know damn well that certain Wikipedia insiders, like Jayjg, would rather tear
the whole thing down than to "reform" it in that manner.

[Vigilant]

Come on, now.

Diploma mills are a net negative for society.
They charge the students for worthless instruction (usually running up massive student loan debt) and give the eventual employer an under-qualified employee.

Now, you come on, now. What kind of instruction was a traditional, accredited institution going to be able to impart on a student so gullible as to acquire a degree from a diploma mill, anyway? Equally, any employer so lazy as to not check the credentials of a college they've never heard of on the job candidate's resume, probably deserves just such an employee. "But, sir, I told you I received my degree from Trinity Southern, and that's not a lie."

Meanwhile, increasingly we see accredited institutions churning out degrees to unemployable graduates who clearly have not ascended to some imagined higher plane of intelligence and skill, and the not-likely-to-be-repaid loans associated with that sort of "education" are probably 500x the magnitude of a diploma mill's. Are you telling me the apes who were turning over cars up at Penn State, in anger that their football coach was fired for not doing more to stop a known pedophile in their midst, are more authentically prepared for the job world than some hard-working Kenyan immigrant who actually ran a farm for 15 years, but needed a diploma to get a decent-paying management job at a chicken-processing plant?

(Yeah, I kind of went off the rails there. I'll step down now.)

I hear you.
Are you saying that over the normal distribution for outcomes for each set of institutions, that the set of accredited universities will do worse per dollar spent than the set of unaccredited universities?

I think that's a position that will require an extravagant defense on your part...

[EricBarbour]

Are you saying that over the normal distribution for outcomes for each set of institutions, that the set of accredited universities will do worse per dollar spent than the set of unaccredited universities?

I think that's a position that will require an extravagant defense on your part...

In some cases, he might have a point. Have you see the law-school class action case?
Some of the oldest, best-regarded law schools in America are being sued, by their own students.
Because they went around telling all and sundry that a law degree was an automatic "ticket to wealth".
Complete with absurd starting-salary figures, to induce young people into taking the LSAT and
going deeply into debt in order to get a diploma, and "supposedly" go to work for a big law firm, then
immediately start raking in millions.

What happened instead: too many people went into law school, the US fell into a deep recession, and
when they came out, found the job market for new attorneys was already saturated.

Those schools were all accredited. New York Law School dates from 1891. Is that a "diploma mill"?

Nowadays you see things like "law school is a sucker's bet" and "It Is Now Completely Clear to Everyone That Law School Is for Suckers".

There are obvious diploma mills, yes. But often the situation isn't all that cut and dried.

[thekohser]

I hear you.
Are you saying that over the normal distribution for outcomes for each set of institutions, that the set of accredited universities will do worse per dollar spent than the set of unaccredited universities?

I think that's a position that will require an extravagant defense on your part...

Thank you for hearing me.

I don't know much what to think any more. I studied at accredited universities for over seven years. I am now working very successfully in a business setting that has almost nothing to do with what I studied in college or graduate school. Probably 90% of what I needed to know to do my current job successfully, I learned either in high school or from experts in the post-collegiate workplace or seminar settings. Don't get me wrong -- I learned an incredible amount in college and grad school, and I loved it... it just (mostly) didn't end up applying to market research work for a Fortune 100 media company.

I've conducted hiring interviews with younger people with Bachelor degrees in Business or Marketing, with MBAs to boot. Yet, they can't readily demonstrate to me (or others) what they hope to offer our company. They don't seem able to talk about a past project or challenge that truly motivated them. The person-to-person "fit" is not only not there, it's sometimes downright off-putting.

I think there's a financial crisis looming that will dwarf the housing bubble collapse. It's rooted in student loans, which now account for more debt than the US credit card industry. And guess what? When it comes to student loans, unlike consumer loans and mortgages, bankruptcy can't even protect the lendee from repayment obligation.

[Vigilant]

I hear you.
Are you saying that over the normal distribution for outcomes for each set of institutions, that the set of accredited universities will do worse per dollar spent than the set of unaccredited universities?

I think that's a position that will require an extravagant defense on your part...

Thank you for hearing me.

You are most welcome

I don't know much what to think any more. I studied at accredited universities for over seven years.

Preach it!

I am now working very successfully in a business setting that has almost nothing to do with what I studied in college or graduate school.

Can I get an, "AMEN!" ?

Probably 90% of what I needed to know to do my current job successfully, I learned either in high school or from experts in the post-collegiate workplace or seminar settings.

Hallelujah!

Don't get me wrong -- I learned an incredible amount in college and grad school, and I loved it... it just (mostly) didn't end up applying to market research work for a Fortune 100 media company.

I don't think that this outcome is that uncommon. I've got a few degrees that are sort of tangentially related to the work I do. Once you have five years experience, the degrees are mostly ignored. I haven't been asked for a long, long while.

I've conducted hiring interviews with younger people with Bachelor degrees in Business or Marketing, with MBAs to boot. Yet, they can't readily demonstrate to me (or others) what they hope to offer our company. They don't seem able to talk about a past project or challenge that truly motivated them. The person-to-person "fit" is not only not there, it's sometimes downright off-putting.

Oh, yes. I've been on both sides of the interview table extensively.
Interviewing to hire is probably the hardest to acquire and worst understood skill out there.
The sheer number of resumes and interviews that you have to endure to get a person who can think on their feet is depressing.

e.g.
Q: "Here's an open ended problem I'm currently working on. How would you go about attacking this?"
A: "uuuuuuh. ummmm. uhhh"
Q: "Thank you for coming in."

I think there's a financial crisis looming that will dwarf the housing bubble collapse. It's rooted in student loans, which now account for more debt than the US credit card industry.

This is a distinct possibility, given the lax oversight and lack of prosecutions for fraud during the mortgage crisis.

And guess what? When it comes to student loans, unlike consumer loans and mortgages, bankruptcy can't even protect the lendee from repayment obligation.

Well aware.

[thekohser]

It might be worth mentioning here that the woman I consider to be the real-life operator of the Orlady account recently (November 2012) lost her elected position in her local government. And she lost by a very large margin, coming in last place of the five candidates vying for three seats. The voters replaced her with a much more youthful, energetic, anti-establishment candidate. Then Orlady took to blogging and blogging and blogging about how "the system" robbed her of her council seat.

Boo hoo... too much time spent on Wikipedia, and not enough time serving your electorate, Orlady?

[Notvelty]

It might be worth mentioning here that the woman I consider to be the real-life operator of the Orlady account recently (November 2012) lost her elected position in her local government. And she lost by a very large margin, coming in last place of the five candidates vying for three seats. The voters replaced her with a much more youthful, energetic, anti-establishment candidate. Then Orlady took to blogging and blogging and blogging about how "the system" robbed her of her council seat.

Boo hoo... too much time spent on Wikipedia, and not enough time serving your electorate, Orlady?

When I read the original post, I was certainly with your choice to not disclose the identity of the individual. Aside from being an administrator, "Orladay" did not seem to have advanced permissions and her choice of target was institutions that could take care of themselves.

However, now that I hear she (I assume) was an elected representative, I pause. Surely what an elected representative does is even MORE important than some douche playing king of the castle on wikipedia? Shouldn't they be the first linked to their wikipedia activities?

After all, if it were something to be proud of, then it would be a benefit to them.

[thekohser]

I should add that out of five local races in her district (3 council and 2 board of education seats), plus the state House and Senate races for her area, all of the incumbents were re-elected except Orlady.

She called the results "surprising" and that she "didn't understand" them.

[Tarc]

I should add that out of five local races in her district (3 council and 2 board of education seats), plus the state House and Senate races for her area, all of the incumbents were re-elected except Orlady.

She called the results "surprising" and that she "didn't understand" them.

That is quite astounding really, esp if she was of the same party as the incumbents who cruised in, as voters these days tend to just pull the lever for their preferred "D" or "R".

[Ming]

I don't see any evidence that WIU is anything but a mechanism for generating academic "credentials" for foreigners, most of whom I suspect are gullible dupes. Besides its website, one can easily discern that it's old address in King of Prussia is just a room or two in a house, and that its new contact address is a "virtual office" (i.e., a Potemkin company). You can find news articles denouncing it, and it gets mentioned in a book on the subject for the lawsuit the real Washington University filed against it to force it to change its name. Besides, Ming has some experience with real on-line classwork. It takes a hell of a lot of infrastructure, and just as many people, to support it. This place obviously doesn't have either. If one went with secondary sources, what they say is that his place is a scam.

So tell us, Greg: what's your interest in concealing the truth about this con job? I don't see any reason not to tell the truth about it, or failing that, not say anything at all. The pretense that it is anything equivalent to places that DO offer legitimate on-line instruction is just not an honest presentation; and Ming is sorry, but the analogy to a novelty toy like the pet rock is just not convincing.

[thekohser]

...If one went with secondary sources, what they say is that his place is a scam.

So tell us, Greg: what's your interest in concealing the truth about this con job?

I haven't concealed any truth. WIU never "operated illegally" in Pennsylvania. Orlady wanted Wikipedia to say that WIU had "operated illegally" in Pennsylvania.

I don't care if the place is a scam. If it never operated illegally, but Orlady kept publishing that it had, that's libel. I don't like libel. I would have thought that Ming doesn't like libel, either.

[Ming]

...If one went with secondary sources, what they say is that his place is a scam.

So tell us, Greg: what's your interest in concealing the truth about this con job?

I haven't concealed any truth. WIU never "operated illegally" in Pennsylvania. Orlady wanted Wikipedia to say that WIU had "operated illegally" in Pennsylvania.

I don't care if the place is a scam. If it never operated illegally, but Orlady kept publishing that it had, that's libel. I don't like libel. I would have thought that Ming doesn't like libel, either.

Well, looking at it from that perspective: Ming's standard of "operating illegally" would be some sort of legal action. So yes, Ming personally wouldn't accept such a list from another state as evidence, if it were put to the test; he would expect that there would be some specific legal action in Pennsylvania to serve as evidence (e.g. a cease-and-desist order). But then, Ming is a big believer in primary sources for that sort of claim.

[Tippi Hadron]

...If one went with secondary sources, what they say is that his place is a scam.

So tell us, Greg: what's your interest in concealing the truth about this con job?

I haven't concealed any truth. WIU never "operated illegally" in Pennsylvania. Orlady wanted Wikipedia to say that WIU had "operated illegally" in Pennsylvania.

I don't care if the place is a scam. If it never operated illegally, but Orlady kept publishing that it had, that's libel. I don't like libel. I would have thought that Ming doesn't like libel, either.

Well, looking at it from that perspective: Ming's standard of "operating illegally" would be some sort of legal action. So yes, Ming personally wouldn't accept such a list from another state as evidence, if it were put to the test; he would expect that there would be some specific legal action in Pennsylvania to serve as evidence (e.g. a cease-and-desist order). But then, Ming is a big believer in primary sources for that sort of claim.

Pardon my curiosity, Ming, but are you a graduate of Teh Skool of Camelbinky? Not saying that I don't find your contributions *amusing*, but you may want to add more substance to your style.

As for "Orlady", I doubt any self-respecting woman would ever come up with such a stupid nym. Then again, I'm also convinced that Fae is secretly doing Fred Phelps's work. Surely, nobody in their gay mind could be this thick and obnoxious without pursuing another, far more sinister agenda.

[Zoloft]

I should add that out of five local races in her district (3 council and 2 board of education seats), plus the state House and Senate races for her area, all of the incumbents were re-elected except Orlady.

She called the results "surprising" and that she "didn't understand" them.

Sometimes voters notice. Who knew?

[tarantino]

As for "Orlady", I doubt any self-respecting woman would ever come up with such a stupid nym. Then again, I'm also convinced that Fae is secretly doing Fred Phelps's work. Surely, nobody in their gay mind could be this thick and obnoxious.

Orlady = Oak Ridge lady. It dates back to her DMOZ days.

[EricBarbour]

She lost her reelection? Good. I wonder if it was because she spent far more time fighting with people on Wikipedia than
she spent working for her constituents, and they realized she wasn't doing anything. (That blog of hers is a joke IMO.)

Now, if someone would just report her Wikipedia grinding to her daytime employer.

[Tippi Hadron]

As for "Orlady", I doubt any self-respecting woman would ever come up with such a stupid nym. Then again, I'm also convinced that Fae is secretly doing Fred Phelps's work. Surely, nobody in their gay mind could be this thick and obnoxious without pursuing another, far more sinister agenda.

Orlady = Oak Ridge lady. It dates back to her DMOZ days.

Women of Wikipedia, I weep for you. We're not all Orladdies, Durovas, Stierches, Gardners, Limas and Rosceleses. Gents, please don't blame us for not staying around while this is the standard we're supposed to live up to. Just…no.

[lonza leggiera]

...

Orlady and TallMagic at one time zeroed in on a State of Oregon website that indicated that WIU had been "operating illegally" in the state of Pennsylvania.

The problem is, that information was wrong. So, Oregon removed the mistake from their website.

You would think that that would mean the misinformation should come down from Wikipedia, but no. Orlady and TallMagic made themselves absolutely dependent on an Archive.org snapshot of the Oregon site, peppering many Wikipedia articles with the same shoddy source -- a web image of a defunct page that had contained known errors. In fact, at one time there were 11 Wikipedia articles containing the phrase "operating illegally", and 8 of the 11 had been entered by Orlady.

...


As for Orlady? She's still a Wikipedia admin. And she's still in love with how the State of Oregon documents unaccredited institutions, adding more citations pointing to their site, even as recently as yesterday. You have to hand it to her -- she's consistent.

Mmmm... I got to call you out on something here Greg. In the early part of your post you describe Orlady and TallMagic inserting a faulty reference associated with State of Oregon, which may or may not be true (let's say it is). You end the post however, by linking to Orlady inserting, recently, valid references, although also associated with the State of Oregon, specifically this: http://www.osac.state.or.us/oda/unaccredited.aspx. That don't look like a Web Archive page of a faulty page, but a legitimate resource. ....

But if you click on the link you will get redirected to the home page of the Oregon Student Access Commission, which provides no support whatever for the claims it is being used as a reference for. The URL used in the WP article appears to be out of date. I suspect the page which Orlady mistakenly thought the link would take you to was this one.

Update: The page originally cited would appear to have been this one. October 5th, 2012 was the last date on which the wayback machine was able to find a copy. On its subsequent crawls, from October 15th 2012 onward, no page was found at the given URL.

[Vigilant]

As for "Orlady", I doubt any self-respecting woman would ever come up with such a stupid nym. Then again, I'm also convinced that Fae is secretly doing Fred Phelps's work. Surely, nobody in their gay mind could be this thick and obnoxious without pursuing another, far more sinister agenda.

Orlady = Oak Ridge lady. It dates back to her DMOZ days.

Women of Wikipedia, I weep for you. We're not all Orladdies, Durovas, Stierches, Gardners, Limas and Rosceleses. Gents, please don't blame us for not staying around while this is the standard we're supposed to live up to. Just…no.

Ha!

You forgot Risker, the dumbest person on ARBCOM (and that's saying something).

[Tarc]

Now, if someone would just report her Wikipedia grinding to her daytime employer.

Honestly, what business is that of yours? That's the kind of creepy stalking stuff that gives critics-of-Wikipedia a bad name.

[EricBarbour]

Honestly, what business is that of yours?

Our taxes are paying her salary. That makes it my business.

[Tippi Hadron]

Ha!

You forgot Risker, the dumbest person on ARBCOM (and that's saying something).

My bad. ;) Oh, and Shell Kinney. Ugh.

Then again, I also forgot to mention the good ones, like Alison (worship!) and Slim Virgin. I know The Virgin is getting a lot of bad press around here, but she's also done a lot of good over there, at least in my book. On the whole, she's probably more one of us than one of them.

I guess what bothers me so much is that the behaviour of the worst of WP's high-visibility women makes us bog-standard women feel like we have to take sides or behave outrageously to make you guys see that not all of us are power-hungry man haters. Trust me, I'd rather find myself tied up in Fae's "pleasure" dungeon than subscribe to Gardner's and Stierch's divisive idea of feminism. World of Wikipedia is very much at odds with reality. Robert Clark Young aka Qworty pretending to be a woman and getting away with it at first? That would not have worked anywhere else but on WP.

[Zoloft]

Ha!

You forgot Risker, the dumbest person on ARBCOM (and that's saying something).

My bad. Oh, and Shell Kinney. Ugh.

Then again, I also forgot to mention the good ones, like Alison (worship!) and Slim Virgin. I know The Virgin is getting a lot of bad press around here, but she's also done a lot of good over there, at least in my book. On the whole, she's more one of us than one of them.

I guess what bothers me so much is that the behaviour of the worst of WP's high-visibility women makes us bog-standard women feel like we have to take sides or behave outrageously to make you guys see that not all of us are power-hungry man haters. Trust me, I'd rather find myself tied up in Fae's "pleasure" dungeon than subscribe to Gardner's and Stierch's divisive idea of feminism. World of Wikipedia is very much at odds with reality.

I applaud your anger, but sadly now want to open a Wikipedia-based MUD (T-H-L) dungeon.

On a more serious note, could Wikipedia's abysmal uptake of women editors be in part caused by the awful female role models already present?

[lonza leggiera]

... ...

And she's still in love with how the State of Oregon documents unaccredited institutions, adding more citations pointing to their site, even as recently as yesterday. You have to hand it to her -- she's consistent.

Mmmm... I got to call you out on something here Greg. In the early part of your post you describe Orlady and TallMagic inserting a faulty reference associated with State of Oregon, which may or may not be true (let's say it is). You end the post however, by linking to Orlady inserting, recently, valid references, although also associated with the State of Oregon, specifically this: http://www.osac.state.or.us/oda/unaccredited.aspx. That don't look like a Web Archive page of a faulty page, but a legitimate resource. ....

But if you click on the link you will get redirected to the home page of the Oregon Student Access Commission, which provides no support whatever for the claims it is being used as a reference for. The URL used in the WP article appears to be out of date. I suspect the page which Orlady mistakenly thought the link would take you to was this one.

Update: The page originally cited would appear to have been this one. October 5th, 2012 was the last date on which the wayback machine was able to find a copy. On its subsequent crawls, from October 15th 2012 onward, no page was found at the given URL.

Scrub all that. I should have checked the date on Greg's post before assuming that I had the correct understanding of "yesterday". When Orlady added the URL to that link, it was still current. It was updated by Doug Weller 3 months after it died. My apologies to all for the blunder.

[Tippi Hadron]

On a more serious note, could Wikipedia's abysmal uptake of women editors be in part caused by the awful female role models already present?

Most definitely. And, of course, that's unfair in a way. I'm sure there are a few perfectly sensible women improving articles about people and subjects they care about. AnnaFrodesiak comes to mind. But the moment you dip a toe into drama or DYK territory, you will have to deal with the worst of womankind. Stierch is a prime example. She has proven time and again that she lacks empathy and life experience. But her callousness and dedication earned her a job with the WMF and a WP biography. Oh, and she's an admin, too, so it's all good, right? Let's not forget that this is the woman who voted to keep the Donkey Punch animation when it was first nominated for deletion in 2011. I don't see myself in that camp. Would you like me to go on? Also, why do you think some of the most annoying high-visibility women chose WP nyms containing the word "lady"? Orlady (T-C-L), LadyofShalott (T-C-L)... Then again, WP probably plays host to more fictitious Lords, Sirs, and Masters than Debretts, so I guess it's par for the course.

[EricBarbour]

Stierch is a prime example.

Stierch is THE example. She runs the "Gendergap" list like a little dictator. A place dedicated to discussing Wikipedia's problem with
encouraging women to participate, but a place where you can't actually bring up Wikipedia's problems without being censored by
Ms. Stierch. People don't pay her enough attention, because they tend to watch noticeboards, and she's not a regular noticeboard troll.

In her own special way, she's just as corrosive and destructive as Ironholds or Russavia. She's just not as "entertaining" as the hardcore
nuts, so Wikipedia critics don't watch her activities closely. She's like Sue -- a "token female" and an experienced backstabber.

I will bet you that Sarah never appears on the #wikipedia or #admin IRC channels. They would tear her apart.