Wikipedia Co-Creator Reveals All: CIA Infiltration, Banning Conservatives, & How to Fix the Internet

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Larry Sanger, thank you for doing this.

I think about you all the time.

Literally, I know it's a little creepy, because I think that Wikipedia is

You can't overstate the importance of Wikipedia in shaping our collective memory.

And a collective memory really is a culture, a civilization.

Who are we?

And Wikipedia is the answer to that question.

Like, who are we?

Oh, it's on Wikipedia.

And it's so embedded in search that I mean, it shapes America.

Wikipedia shapes America.

And because of its importance, it's an emergency, in my opinion, that Wikipedia is completely dishonest and completely controlled on questions that matter.

So thank you for coming back.

And

I'd love to start at the beginning.

Like you, you created Wikipedia.

How did that happen?

And what were your intentions when you did that?

So Jimmy Wales had

registered newpedia.com, the domain name,

and simply had the idea of a free

public contributed encyclopedia.

And

he hired me.

It was like my assigned job to get it started.

That happened in early 2000.

So I worked on Newpedia for about a year and it was going very slowly.

And

so

a friend told me about wikis, and

it was a revelation, this idea that somebody could just put up essentially a bulletin board, a blank bulletin board, invite other people to edit the text in real time, and it would become something actually useful.

And it wouldn't be just a lot of, you know, curse words and graffiti and so forth.

Um, what does wiki mean?

Uh, it actually comes from a wiki wiki web.

Um,

and

that in turn comes from um the wiki wiki taxis at the Honolulu airport, I guess.

What?

Yes, really, yes, like headed by WikiKey.

Yes, I didn't come up with this.

It's it's um Ward Cunningham.

Um, he invented the first wiki in in 1995, I believe.

So basically,

a friend told me about wikis.

I was amazed at

the basic idea and just the thought that it could

work.

And I thought, well, this would be a way to make

the problems with

Newpedia

go away.

Be a lot more articles coming into the system, and then Newpedia could be like the,

you know, beat them into

proper shape.

But it didn't work that way.

Wikipedia,

the Newpedia editors wanted nothing to do with the wiki, anything that was so uncontrolled, essentially.

So it took on a life of its own.

We launched it.

Originally, it was the Newpedia wiki.

And then on January 15, we relaunched on

what year, January 15th.

2001.

2001.

We launched under

wikipedia.com.

So I coined the name Wikipedia and a lot of the other sort of basic jargon, like Wikipedian and various other things.

I came up with a lot of the original policies, like the neutrality policy, which actually started with Newpedia

and

the requirement that original

research may not be

published for the first time in the encyclopedia

and a number of other things, of course.

I should say, for those who don't know, you come from a philosophy background.

Yep.

You're a philosopher, which is kind of a great background for this job.

Why...

Why these policies?

For example, why would you ban the publication of original material on Wikipedia?

It's supposed to be a summary of

what we all take ourselves to know, essentially.

And especially if it's a neutral encyclopedia, then it's supposed to canvass all of the views that

can be found in humanity on every question, essentially, at a very high level, generally speaking.

Of course, specialized encyclopedias can get into the real nitty-gritty.

And

my hope with Wikipedia in the beginning was that eventually it would become that specialized.

So it would be the equivalent of, you know,

bookshelves worth of

articles.

And, well, I guess it did work out that way.

It replaced libraries.

It replaced books.

It replaced

to a great extent.

I think you're right.

For a lot of people.

Yeah.

Basically, for a period until LLMs came out a couple of years ago,

people used Wikipedia to look up quick answers about practically everything.

Actually, I would say until Siri started giving Wikipedia answers quickly, but it was still using Siri.

And for that matter, LLMs, you know, AI chatbots are

also

trained on Wikipedia now.

So it continues to be relevant.

Well, not just relevant.

I mean, of course, its power expands exponentially once it's tethered to this new technology, AI, right?

I think that's a very

safe to say.

I think that's true.

LLMs are trained on a lot of different data, not just Wikipedia, of course.

But there's a lot of questions.

I use LLMs all the time now.

And I can tell you, I've looked up specialized questions and large language models.

Exactly.

I've looked up a lot of questions in theology because I'm into theology now.

And there are some places where I just know

the only source for that particular factoid that I could find online outside of the LLM itself is Wikipedia.

Right.

Right.

So it's institutionalized it.

Google did, of course, did that in the most profound way when it tied its search to Wikipedia, put Wikipedia at the top of its searches.

So these questions, these core questions, like, you know, what do you put on Wikipedia?

What do you exclude?

Questions that you wrestled with 24 years ago.

These are like questions that affect every human being on the planet now.

It's kind of scary thought.

Yeah.

It's scary, but it's true.

And so.

Few things matter more than this from my perspective.

How we understand ourselves and the world around us.

That's like the central human task.

Like, that's that's what we're here to do, is to figure that out and to act accordingly.

And Wikipedia controls that more than any other force, right?

Right.

So I'm not blaming you,

but some people do.

So, but walk us through like how

Wikipedia went from what you created it to be to what it is now.

Like, when did you start to see changes?

What were the debates?

Yeah.

Um,

in the early years, we really did take neutrality seriously.

And it wasn't just a requirement of being unbiased, right?

It was the aim was to bring people together, enable them to work together, even though they were from all parts of the world, different religions, different viewpoints.

Yes.

And then to essentially record their knowledge.

I intended it.

And I think Jimmy Wales is on the record in a few places saying that he intended neutrality as being a way of bringing people together.

Yes.

Right.

Which it is.

Well,

but I want to read

the current definition of neutrality to show you what it has evolved into, which it did very gradually, right?

So here's how the neutral point of view page begins.

All encyclopedic content on Wikipedia must be written from a neutral point of view, N-P-O-V.

So far, so good.

Which means representing fairly, proportionately, and as far as possible without editorial bias.

So far, it's great.

All the significant views that have been published by reliable sources on a topic.

Okay.

So I see two modifiers in that sense.

Two modifiers that are very important.

Significant and reliable.

Yes.

Yes.

And

let me go on because uh if you look farther down on the page they go on to discourage giving equal validity to quote minority view fringe theory or extraordinary claims right so um and that such views should be labeled that way so the neutral point of view policy

essentially

dictates that Wikipedians must write articles in a biased way.

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Well, the inclusion of the term fringe

tells me right away that you're a freaking liar.

A liar, if you use that word, because it's a word like terrorism and so many words, racism, that we can't really define and don't care really to define.

Like, what does that mean?

And if the whole policy turns on the word, then it's fair to demand a precise explanation of what it means, but we never get one.

What is fringe?

They can't tell you.

Fringe is what I don't like.

Fringe is hate speech.

Yes, yes.

Or it's simply a new view that is going to become dominant in 10 years or something.

Happens all the time.

It's like Galileo, fringe character.

It happens all the time in the history of ideas.

No.

Right.

So that's so obvious.

Even a child understands that.

Right.

The key is the definition.

And if you can't come up with a definition, then we have to take the word out because

it can only abet lying.

So how did that get in there?

Well,

um, I think it happened like this.

I think Wikipedia developed

in

sort of in tandem with the development of

media.

So, basically, as media from the founding of Wikipedia 2001 to about 2012 or so

was

became solidified in a

center-left

establishment

standpoint?

So, if you were to read Wikipedia from 2012 or so, 2010,

it read a lot like the New York Times or the BBC.

I remember saying that at the time.

And then, especially around about

2016 and maybe a few years before that,

the media landscape changed almost overnight.

So that once stayed mainstream sources became totally biased, they stated in their own voice that the president was lying and so forth.

Kind of racist.

Racist, exactly.

Tucker Carlson is a conspiracy theorist.

So, for example.

And

that, of course, then was echoed in Wikipedia.

So Wikipedia feels perfectly free to say that Donald Trump is telling lies and that

various pundits are conspiracy theorists.

Here's my question.

I mean, so Wikipedia became a weapon of ideological, theological war

used to destroy its enemies.

Of course, and that's what it remains.

But

someone had to allow that.

And that's so far from what it was created to be.

In fact, it's the opposite.

It's the mirror image of what it was created to be that you have to ask, like, was there a fight over that?

Who allowed it?

Like, if you're getting to the point where you're disallowing, quote, fringe theories or conspiracy theorists or some other term made up by the CIA to hide its secrets.

Someone has to like okay that.

What was that process?

It's a good question.

You can look at it from an organic point of view.

I can't tell you what was going on behind the scenes, if there were any puppet masters that were controlling the process.

I don't know.

What I can tell you is that

over the years, conservatives, libertarians were just pushed out.

They, in many cases,

well,

there is a whole

army of administrators, hundreds of them, who are constantly blocking people that they have ideological disagreements with.

And that's not new.

So if somebody really does become a problem from their

perspective, then they can be simply gotten rid of on a pretext.

It's very difficult now.

It's possible, it's possible, but it's very difficult for conservatives to get into Wikipedia and actually play the game.

But you have to play the game, and that means you

have to walk on eggshells.

So the point is, it wasn't always like this.

Over the years, basically, the left consolidated its power.

The way I like to put it is that,

you know,

the left has its march through the institutions.

And when Wikipedia appeared, it was one of the institutions that they marched through.

The difference is it's brand new.

So like I'm, you know, I grew up in this country.

I've never believed in Harvard.

It's absurd.

I've always thought it was absurd.

I really believed in Wikipedia.

I sent money to it.

I'm on, you can check the records.

I have sent money, like significant money to Wikipedia because I was so thrilled by its existence.

So thrilled.

And so it wasn't always this.

And now it's like the leading source of dishonesty, or I would say, disinformation.

I mean, most topics in Wikipedia seem totally straight to me, but if you go to anything that intersects, any topic that intersects with theology, politics, ideology, power,

and you know something about the topic, and in my case, a couple of topics I have first-hand knowledge, direct knowledge of it, they lie.

They leave out key information.

They load up the top of the entry with either superlatives or insults that are not, they're totally subjective and insane.

Far-right conspiracy theorist.

I mean, with a straight face, like if you're calling someone a far-right conspiracy theorist before even explaining to me who this person is, then you're a propagandist.

You're a liar.

Absolutely.

Yeah.

No, I agree.

I described it as propaganda beginning around 2020.

Before that, I don't know that I would have given it that word.

It was already emerging, you know.

I agree.

No, no, this has happened before our eyes.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Absolutely.

So when did you leave and why?

Oh,

a long time ago.

Yeah.

20, uh, 2002.

So, no, yeah, I was only there for the first two years of the project.

I got it off the ground.

Um, I said a lot of the original policies.

And then, um,

so the company that launched Wikipedia, Bombus Inc., so Jimmy Wales was the CEO of that.

Um, and he had a couple of partners.

So it was my job to start it.

And I did.

And then the bottom fell out of the tech market, you know, that's the

back in 2000.

So they lost a big contract with, I think it was Google.

And so they weren't able to pay people anymore.

I was laid off.

And I decided, I made the decision to, you know, just step back from my role.

I was, I would have been welcome to continue on, but I decided not to basically devalue my professional labor.

But with distance in 2002, I saw that

Jimmy Wales was essentially allowing

troublemakers, leftists, really, to take over.

And

they did.

As early as that, it took them time, I think, to really consolidate their power and create sort of internal processes and institutions and policies that really consolidated their power.

But

yeah.

Who is Jimmy Wales and what's he like?

Jimmy Wales

is

the other co-founder of Wikipedia.

He's got a finance degree.

Let's see.

He comes from Alabama.

He went to a private school in Alabama, I think.

I knew him from

online debating forums about Ayn Rand in the mid-1990s.

I actually met him face to face

on a little junket that I took to visit my uncle.

So I just made a stop over in Chicago when he was living there.

So I met him before.

He hired me to start Wikipedia.

But

he's a very personable person, actually,

if you meet him for the first time and you don't know anything about him.

What are his views?

I don't know, actually.

That's a good question.

I'd like to know.

They used to be

broadly libertarian.

Yes.

But he's now associated with the left.

He has got a lot of lefty pals.

And

so I think he would probably say he still is, you know, a believer in classical liberalism or something like that.

But I don't know if I believe it.

Well, look at the results.

Right.

I mean, it's an authoritarian enterprise and it's a it's a proper, you know, it's his vestia,

but with much greater reach and a much more profound effect.

And it's one of the worst things about our society, actually.

But

let's be fair to Jimmy Wales here.

It isn't clear that he approves of the current approach that Wikipedia is taking.

I've never spoken to Jimmy Wales other than to send him money years ago.

And let me ask you about the money.

So

it's a non-profit, correct?

Yes.

Can you make money from it?

Well, of course.

You know, just like any big non-profit that's raising hundreds of millions of dollars, you know, you you can

essentially transfer money through grants.

And now they are a grant-making institution.

So,

I mean,

I

I certainly don't need to explain to you how

really big foundations work, right?

But money can

change hands, large amounts of money can change hands

through

institutions like the Wikimedia Foundation.

That's the name of the legal entity that owns the platform.

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so can you describe how the process works?

So we've got,

you know, Wikipedia entry on you, let's just say.

How is that?

And I haven't actually read your Wikipedia entry.

I'm sure it's hostile in a subtle way.

It's actually okay.

It's okay.

I've never read my own Wikipedia entry, not one time, because I don't, I don't want to go.

Don't blame me.

Don't want to go crazy because I am an expert on that subject.

So I feel like

I feel like I, you know, could probably compare their description to what I know to be true and it would just make me angry.

And I don't want to be angry, but, um, but I have no doubt that it's hostile.

Right.

It'd piss you off.

Oh, is that true?

Oh, yeah.

I'm pretty sure.

Have you read it?

I think I've read the first paragraph anyway.

Pretty tough, huh?

I think so.

You know what?

I'm not.

I'm not just saying this.

Anyone who knows me knows it's true.

I've never done this before,

but

I'm going to look it up right now and I'm just going to read the first paragraph.

That's good.

I promise I've never.

even know where it is.

Oh, there it is right there.

Oh,

I knew I was going to use the first paragraph.

It basically just says, I'm a conservative political commentator.

Okay.

But I'm a leading voice of white grievance politics.

White grievance politics.

Okay, I thought I was going to be mad.

I'm amused.

I don't even know what that is.

White grievance politics.

Okay, so then you click on white grievance politics and it cites columnist Michael Gersund, who I happen to know.

Not someone who I think has passed away.

I'm sorry.

I don't want to make fun of him.

But he's not

a relying.

I mean, he was an ideologue.

Okay.

Big-time ideologue.

And it quotes his quote, non-primary source needed, it says in brackets, that the Republican Republican Party has been swiftly repositioned as an instrument of white grievance.

I guess it was a column attacking me, no doubt about that.

So

they call me in the first paragraph a leading voice of white grievance politics.

Not how I describe myself.

I've never

thought of myself that way.

I don't really care.

But, and in order to call me, basically, they're calling me a Nazi, of course,

they cite a Washington Post columnist who hated me.

Right.

And that's the citation.

Right.

Yes.

That's that's pretty much it.

If they were following a genuine neutrality policy, then they

they might say that if they if that was what your detractors were really focused on, and perhaps it is, but they would certainly, certainly quote you in response to that.

And they would give examples.

I mean, it wouldn't be ad hominem.

It would be,

you know, quoting me saying, white people are angry.

We have a lot of grievances and they're justified.

Okay.

There he is, you know, espousing white grievance politics.

Right.

Yeah.

I don't think I've done that, though I do think that, by the way.

So maybe I am a white grievance politician, but whatever.

I don't even care.

But it's just interesting.

They don't care either.

The point is

to make you sound scary and Hitler-like.

Right.

No, that's right.

Yeah.

I don't know what white grievance politics is, and I'm pretty sure you're not into it.

I'm actually not into it, yeah.

Yeah, I mean, I do think white people have been completely mistreated and they have every reason to be mad about it, but I don't want them anyone to be mad about anything, and I definitely don't want racial conflict, I've never wanted that, yes.

So, um, but whatever, but that it's not about me, and I'm so sorry I even brought that up.

Uh, and that's all I'm ever going to read in my Wikipedia entry, but um,

that's kind of the point.

How is it allowed to use subjective terms with no clear definition in someone's entry?

Those are, that's a political term.

That's a term of propaganda.

Yeah.

It's a term designed to discredit, not to illuminate or explain, but to attack.

That's very common in political language, if that is political language.

But

how is that?

How is no editor like, wait a second, we don't even just, we don't even define white grievance politics.

How can we accuse someone of engaging in it?

Yeah.

There's a lot of history

there, and we could take it in many different directions.

I mean, we've already talked about the policy that

permits it.

We could also talk about the sources that are permitted.

Like

if

you look at only the sources that are permitted to be used in Wikipedia, so mostly secondary sources, and they are

mostly left-wing or center, generally speaking, there is now a blacklist called the perennial sources page

that contains

lists of dozens of conservative sources that are just not allowed.

And so if the only defenders of Tucker Carlson can be found in those other sources, then you won't be defended in the article about you.

And they will call the article about you neutral.

That's quite amazing.

Who makes the decision on the blacklist?

So there is a reliable sources group, essentially, that debates it.

Now,

there are people who spend the most time,

you know, probably are working full-time for somebody on Wikipedia.

They build up a lot of clout.

What does that mean working full-time for somebody on Wikipedia?

Well,

there are PR firms, just for example,

that

do nothing but edit articles on Wikipedia in order to be able to

insert desired factoids according to

how people pay them, essentially.

So it's a thing.

Oh, yes.

Wikipedia PR firms, essentially.

And this is not allowed officially.

It's called paid editing.

A big no-no.

And if you do do it, then you have to announce yourself.

A lot of people do it and they don't announce themselves, of course.

So my point then, to answer your question, is that there are a lot of people who have built up clout over the years in the Wikipedia system.

And a lot of them have been made into

the leaders of the project.

There are 833 administrators, as they're called.

So these are sort of the rank and file cops.

Then you've got 16 bureaucrats who can name the cops.

And you've got 49 check users.

And these are accounts that can identify the IP address of accounts.

And then there are 15 members of an arbitration committee, which is sort of like the Supreme Court of Wikipedia.

Deals mostly with behavioral issues as opposed to editorial.

So now, here's an interesting.

Do we know who these people are?

That's what I was about to answer.

Of this power 62, because if you add up all of those accounts and there's overlap, there's 62 such accounts.

Only nine, 14.5%,

are named.

So 85% of the most powerful accounts on Wikipedia on the editorial side are anonymous.

So

wait a second.

No, it's true.

So again, these are the people who are shaping Americans' understanding of the world, of their own country, of themselves, of reality itself.

And we don't know who they are because their identities are hidden.

That's correct.

Yes.

They can libel people with impunity as they as they do you.

And

there is no legal recourse because they are anonymous.

And the Wikimedia Foundation enjoys Section 230 immunity, which means it can't be sued in the United States.

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Okay.

So my question is, there's nothing that can be done.

They're protected by 230 immunity.

So they can't be sued into better behavior.

Right.

But presumably they can be shamed and reasoned with.

And

so the first step in that is just asking the question, on what grounds are you keeping the identities of some of the most powerful people in the country secret?

Why can't I know who's making these decisions?

Who's blacklisting entire news organizations on the basis of their politics, for example?

Who's responsible for the slander?

Why can't I know their names?

What would Wikipedia, the foundation, say if I asked that question?

They would say that

according to the policies of the editorial side of their organization, which they're not responsible for,

people can participate anonymously at all levels, right?

So you could be the most powerful person on the editorial side, and you don't need to reveal your identity.

That's it's a matter of policy.

Now,

you know,

talk about a non-answer.

They're hiding their identities because they're allowed to.

Okay, got it.

Well, yes.

But why are they allowed to?

Okay, so I think the answer is basically it goes back to like the

zeitgeist of

1990s hacker culture, when people went on like these funny names,

nicknames, handles,

not their real names.

And that has continued.

It never stopped all across Wikipedia.

People use these sort of cutesy names.

And they like to

portray themselves to the public as just, you know, mop-wielding janitors of the site.

And And of course, it's ludicrous, right?

But it's just,

as far as I can

tell, it's a game that they're playing.

They're putting on the air of being like harmless college students that are only interested in comma placement and that sort of thing.

So why do you need to know my identity and so forth?

But I'll tell you, people, they just haven't pressed them on this question.

Well, and they should be pressed immediately.

And I mean, because just in practical terms, as you said, it's ludicrous.

Who has more effect on Americans or the world's understanding of history?

The seven history departments of the Ivy League or Wikipedia?

It's not even close.

It's not even close, not in the same universe.

Yes.

But if all of a sudden every history professor at Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Columbia, Dartmouth, Cornell, et cetera, decided, I'm not telling you my name

as I teach your kids about the Renaissance or whatever,

we would say that's freaking nuts.

Of course, you have to know your name.

Right, right.

And, you know, traditional

media organizations, they name their editors and their journalists, of course.

They have real-world reputation to live up to.

And if they do bad reporting, then

they can be fired.

They experience career consequences.

And that simply doesn't happen on Wikipedia.

Now, you know, people, they can mess up on Wikipedia and be kicked out.

They can lose their administratorship, whatever that happens, I suppose.

But it's not real world consequences, is it?

Not really.

No, it's not.

And I, so here's, okay, so I'm sort of getting to one of my core concerns,

which you've made me think is something to be concerned about, which is the influence of intelligence agencies on the work product of Wikipedia.

It's very obvious to me, having been around that world a lot,

that they're influencing some of the answers, some of the entries on Wikipedia is just like super, super obvious.

It's part, it's part of the propaganda campaign, which is the real war, the info war.

Um,

and like you must have thought of that when you were building this thing, like man, you know, the intel agencies could get involved and start changing the way people understand what they did, for example.

Uh, no, you didn't, you never thought of it, no, I had no such idea, not in 1901, in 2000, uh, 2002.

No.

I mean,

I was a babe in the woods.

Yes, it wasn't until like, I think it was 2006, 2007, Virgil Griffiths did master's research.

He came up with a tool called Wiki Scanner that enabled people to look up

the IP addresses of people who had done edits

and like who had edited which articles.

And so they were able to find a whole bunch of edits coming from Langley.

No.

Oh, I didn't even know that.

No, it's true.

Not to brag, I could just tell by reading it.

Like, because I know what that is.

I since have learned differently and learn much better.

I don't have the background that you have,

but

it's also very clear to me what we are told about the way that intelligence works now is that,

of course, there's the old-fashioned cloak and dagger spying going on, but

a large part of their remit of intelligence today

is to manipulate public opinion in various ways.

And

Wikipedia is like just a gold mine for the intelligence agencies of the world because

it's like a one-stop shop.

You know, you can just like type in the things that you want people to believe, I suppose.

Now, how that works, like which agencies are involved, how the heck should I know?

You can tell by reading it.

You can tell instantly by reading it some of what's going on.

I mean, you never know the whole story, of course, but it's super obvious to me.

Some of the players in this, very obvious, and they're the big ones, of course.

So, um, but I, my question, and everything you've said makes sense.

My question, however, is like, how is this allowed?

So, if you're not allowed to edit Wikipedia for pay on behalf of, say, a PR agency,

how are you allowed to do it on behalf of an intelligence agency?

That's a good question.

I actually

asked Elon Musk and

the president to,

you know,

use Doge or other government resources to investigate what

United States employees were actually editing Wikipedia and, you know, perhaps

stop that.

I don't know.

Maybe, maybe we shouldn't.

Maybe there's reasons, legitimate reasons for government employees to do this.

But

at least Elon Musk did retweet that

and got a lot of support.

Did anyone do anything about it?

What's that?

Did anyone do anything about it?

Not to my knowledge, except now there is a congressional investigation.

I don't know if my tweet had anything to do with the start of that.

I don't think so.

I think it had more to do with the reporting of Ashley Rinsburg.

And,

well, of course, Israel,

and I would add,

Hindus

are

very bothered with the way that their ethnic groups are treated

in Wikipedia.

And

both of them, both a whole bunch of Jews and a whole bunch of Hindus have been after me in the last couple of years saying, you've got to speak out.

You've got to help us.

You know, and I've said, well, I don't really know a lot about the situation.

I mean, there isn't a whole lot that I could do.

Will they be accused of Indian or Israeli grievance politics?

Probably not.

That's it.

No, sorry.

Just thinking, like,

no,

that was a bitter, sardonic aside.

No, excuse me.

I take that back.

I don't want to be a grievance person.

You know, of course.

But the answer, what you're really saying is people who are organized have a way to push back against the lying.

For sure.

For sure.

I think that

if

like Israeli intelligence, for example, got together and made a real concerted effort to

fight against

this group of

40

Muslim activists

that Ashley Rinsberg

identified, they might be able to make some inroads.

What do you think?

You think they might be able to do that?

They might.

It really depends.

It's possible.

I'm just throwing that out there.

Yeah.

Here's the thing.

I actually think

concurrently, we're going to talk about the nine theses here, I assume.

So

I would like to encourage people to at least test the waters.

Don't like, don't go to Wikipedia.

and be a jerk and get yourself kicked out right away because they will kick you out for sure if you're if you are not playing by the rules but go there and

maybe not all at once, but you know, over the next few weeks, make some

real efforts to do to make good faith edits to Wikipedia and build up some credibility within the community.

You can make a difference there.

I think it's a good idea

to give it a try.

You know, one thing that has never been tried

is to simply

get all of the libertarians and all of the conservatives

and the Jews and the Hindus and the Christians and whoever else has grievances against Wikipedia, organize them.

Yes.

And descend on Wikipedia and actually try to make a change.

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That never occurs to most conservatives.

Their first instinct is to,

I'll speak for myself.

My first instinct is to run away.

I don't want to deal with this.

It's horrible.

I hate to hate these people.

And And this is my internal monologue.

And if I'm mad enough, we should start something better.

It never occurs to your average conservative to

take back the institution that's been perverted and corrupted.

It never occurs to them.

Well, maybe I should, I don't know, try to join the faculty at Harvard and stop lying, you know,

or why don't I fix Wikipedia?

And I think that's you're right.

Yeah.

So

I think it was either the first or second interview that you did did of me was in 2019 when I started something called a social media strike.

And

it actually went pretty well, but it always struck me that, first of all, I could have followed it up.

And second of all, it could have been much bigger, like if I had.

organized it properly, but it was

mostly just me and my blog, you know, and still there were like a half a dozen or 10 different media sources that covered this social media strike.

So maybe we should organize something similar with regard to I think part of the problem is that most non-liberals have just no patience for bureaucracy.

Right.

And liberals, because they, you know, as Ted Kaczynski famously wrote, the whole point of liberalism is safety and numbers.

These are people who are hollow and afraid inside.

And so they seek each other out and they create these institutions so they can feel safe.

And non-liberals just don't feel that way at all because they're not, you know, because they believe in something and they're

not ruled by fear.

And so the average conservative, when told to sit through like a PTA meeting or join the Wikipedia, you know, editor's process or something like that

goes crazy.

Can't deal with it.

Right.

Right.

Do you notice this?

Yes.

And there's another

sort of practical practical

problem that stands in the way of this.

You're not allowed to do what's called brigading on Wikipedia.

So brigading means organizing editing of a particular article off the wiki.

So if you're caught doing this, then you can be

you can be blocked.

So if I were to tell everybody to go to the article about Larry Sanger,

and please don't do that.

But if I were to try to organize that like on this show right now, then I might be blocked for brigading.

But it's cool for like Saudi intelligence or Mossad or the CIA to do it.

For sure.

I mean, this is so bonkers.

For sure.

Okay.

No, it's got it.

Yeah, got it.

And it's so obvious.

I mean,

it's an obvious thing for them to do.

They wouldn't be doing their job if they weren't doing doing it.

Right.

Right.

I mean, they're supposed to be shaping public opinion.

That's part of their remit is the intelligence committee community now.

Right.

Yeah.

And

the way to shape

public opinion, one of the main ways is to make sure that Wikipedia reads the way you want it to read.

And yes, then they can organize secretly behind the scenes and they do.

Yeah.

There's such a lot.

I mean, I just happened to know some of the topics.

Like, I was there for not many things, but some things.

And you read about,

you know, something that you just happen to have direct knowledge of, and it's the account of it is so intentionally distorted.

It's such a lie.

And then people you know, you read about it, it's like, wait, I remember when you had a DUI arrest or, or whatever, and it's gone.

If they can't even keep the paid PR people out,

then that suggests to me that the people who edit Wikipedia are probably making money on this.

Like the fastest way would just be to bribe them, right?

If you are really good at playing the Wikipedia game and you're like one of these, this power 62 and you're not in the pay of somebody, then you're just leaving money on the table.

That seems obvious to me.

Well, and if we can't even know their names, then what would be the disincentive?

And that would be one of the reasons why we don't know their names.

And that actually is one of the main reasons why I say we should know their names.

So I'm just calling on Wikileaks, you know, or Julian Assange, where are you?

I cannot agree.

I don't, I, I don't, uh,

I don't think that we should dox the, the Power 62.

Um, this is what I call.

By dox, what do you mean?

Does that mean like home address or does that just mean name?

Name.

A name is enough.

That would be doxing them.

Okay.

Um,

In the Wikipedia system, they are

basically anyone who reveals their name and they don't want their name revealed would be immediately blocked for doxing.

And it would be a permanent block for sure.

So it's a very serious offense on Wikipedia.

So I am not encouraging people to do this.

Okay, that's fair.

I respect the fact that you've thought about this a lot and much more than I have, and you're decent.

Um, and so you're probably right.

I'm just frustrated, but I wonder: is there it seems to me knowing the names of the people making these decisions is in the public interest?

That's for sure.

These are not just random Twitter users, okay?

They're shaping history, they are the authors of history, certainly the gatekeepers of history.

So, and they're libeling.

We need to talk about that.

Well, they certainly are, you know, obviously.

And I say this as Mr.

Wake Grievance Politics.

They I can't, yeah.

They certainly have libeled a lot of people I know.

Yes.

Literally libeled, like saying things that are untrue about them.

And there's no recourse, right?

So this is the problem, right?

John Siegenthaler Sr.

called me up in 2005.

He's a newspaper editor from Tennessee.

Exactly.

He was a longtime publisher and editor of the Tennessean, one of the founding founding board members, I believe, of USA Today.

So very important newspaper man.

And kind of a center-left liberal, I would say.

Right.

And he,

the article about him said that he had been under suspicion of being responsible in some way for the assassination of RFK.

And he was livid, of course, because he had actually like worked worked on RFK's campaign and things like that.

And he blamed me.

And like, I kind of didn't, you know, blame him for doing so.

And

he opened my eyes to just how reputations can be harmed by people's Wikipedia articles.

And I have heard from dozens and dozens, maybe over a hundred different reasonably famous people since then

with grievances about the Wikipedia articles.

And they're like at their wit's end.

They know I'm long gone from Wikipedia and they don't know what to do.

Right.

So I've kept abreast of

this issue on Wikipedia quite a bit.

And it bothers me because I take sort of personal responsibility.

I feel personal responsibility, which is one of the reasons why I came up with the nine theses in the first place.

But was just so like, what did Siegenthaler do?

Like, was he able to get that off Wikipedia?

He was able to get satisfaction.

I don't think he got an immediate response and

immediate reversal,

but

reasonably quickly.

But I...

I can't remember if it was before or after they had changed his article that he called me, but he wanted me me to know, right?

And I don't blame him.

And another time, Philip Roth, the famous journalist,

Philip Roth, the novelist?

The novelist, yes.

He contacted me also and was complaining that

the story of the origin of the inspiration of the human stain was wrong on Wikipedia.

He had gone to the Wikipedia talk page and said, hi, I am Philip Roth,

and you've got the story wrong and here's the real story.

And they said, sorry, we can't use that.

You're a primary source.

I mean, it's ridiculous, of course.

I mean, just what kind of person do you have to be to

like

to take that sort of

disrespectful stance to somebody like Philip Roth

and to

twist your own rules in that way for almost petty reasons.

There's a lot of petty power players on Wikipedia, I find.

And I believe that the people behind this,

they hide behind their anonymity.

So there is no legal recourse when somebody is seriously libeled.

So that, you know, their career is damaged.

I've heard from people whose careers were materially damaged.

Oh, well, I'm

sure I'm one of them.

By Wikipedia.

Yeah.

Yeah.

My recourse has just been to, you know, stay

cheerful, focused on God and my family, you know, like not get mad, I think is kind of the only, that's the only thing I've been able to do about it.

And not read it.

Don't marinate in that.

But I don't think it's just petty power.

It's like global power because

they're aligned with Google, the biggest search engine, the search monopoly that dominates English language search completely, has a monopoly on it.

And they have somehow made a deal with Google that allows them to be the top search results.

So, for example, I just Google myself for the first time ever.

And Wikipedia is the first result.

Now, why would Wikipedia be the first result on me?

I still work.

I still have a job.

So, like,

why would that be number one?

Why would a bunch of anonymous editors get to be the first result on my name?

Because they have a deal with Google.

Well, I can explain it.

You very well could be right.

Historically.

I'll bet my house on it, but.

Right.

Well,

look,

in the early days, Wikipedia was the only source of information on a whole bunch of topics.

For sure.

Okay.

And then the way that the Google algorithm worked back then,

if you ended up being the first source for a lot of topics, then your

Google PageRank score was higher.

And so Wikipedia just shot to the top of Google's PageRank algorithm.

At least this is the story they tell, right?

And so one of the reasons why Google or Wikipedia rather took off so quickly

is this

feedback loop that it had with Google, right?

So, you know, Wikipedia would write 100 articles that never had any coverage by Google before.

They would appear on Google.

People would search for those topics and they would come to Wikipedia.

And then the number of contributors would expand and lather

repeat.

And there was exponential growth.

Well, so I think we're saying the same thing.

I mean, you're describing the mechanism by which

Wikipedia is the guaranteed first response to any query on a fact about a person or history.

Right.

I mean, that's to say it doesn't matter kind of what

the mechanism is.

It's the result is the same.

Yes, yes, yes.

And they know that.

Yes.

And I guess what I'm saying is, if there was an actual deal from the beginning, it would be from the beginning.

And I wouldn't rule that out.

I'm enough of a conspiracy theorist

to say that's that's not totally impossible.

In fact,

how many startups can you say

were the first reviews by any news source was the New York Times and MIT Technology Review.

But those were the first reviews that were published by any mainstream source of Wikipedia.

Amazing.

Yeah, that was in September of 2001.

So we were immediately on the establishment's

corporate.

Well, I mean, Wikipedia is a servant to the ruling class, obviously,

which is corrupt.

So Wikipedia is itself corrupt, the most corrupt.

Yeah, you can't over and I must say my last editorial comment that I want to get to what we can do to make this better, but and you've written extensively about it, but my last comment is that when people grouse about the media or corrupt news media, they're always referring to like companies that really don't matter, like CBS or NBC or CNN or Fox News.

It's like, who cares?

They're all going away.

They're totally discredited.

Everyone knows that.

And they won't even be here in 10 years.

Wikipedia has a much greater effect on how people understand the world than any of those media outlets.

Wikipedia is a media outlet and it's never included in the list of corrupt media outlets.

And that just bugs me.

Well, could it push back slightly?

Of course.

People our age and older still do take CNN and

NBC and all the rest very seriously.

So, no, not the conservatives, but basically centrists.

My mother votes Republican and she still watches the mainstream media and

it still defines her reality, essentially.

So it's a generational thing.

It is.

I'm just saying that the actuarial tables tell us that this is...

Yeah.

It has a limited shelf life.

So

that's it.

And just looking forward, extrapolating forward, you know, 10, 15, 20 20 years,

you know, that stuff is not meaningful.

Digital media is very meaningful, and Wikipedia is the most meaningful.

That's my only point.

And I just think that someone should say that out loud.

I agree.

No, I think that's true.

It's probably

Wikipedia by itself is

more influential, more influential than the New York Times or any other single media source.

And it works in tandem with the New York Times.

Right.

Any chance of getting the New York Times blacklisted at Wikipedia?

See, you laugh.

I don't think so.

Well, I know for a fact that I'm more honest than the New York Times.

I mean,

take a live tech test.

I really believe that I am, but I'm blacklisted and they're not.

So like, I just think that's not neutral,

whether I'm right or wrong.

Okay.

You have,

you know, following the example of our beloved German monk 500 years ago, written some theses that you want to nail to the front door of Wikipedia.

That's right.

What are they?

All right.

Let's go through the list.

All right.

This should take about five minutes, maybe.

So take your time.

This is, I just want to restate if you're coming to the video right now.

Right.

This is the creator of Wikipedia explaining how Wikipedia can be saved from corruption.

Yes.

Nobody has ever actually

made a thoroughgoing reform proposal of Wikipedia.

This is the first time anybody has done that, and it's certainly the first time I have done that.

There's been a lot of piecemeal reform proposals, but this is thoroughgoing.

And I'm trying, just as Luther did, I'm trying to start a conversation, right?

So this is not a I hope this starts a reformation.

Do I hope this starts what Luther started?

Right.

A return to honesty.

We'll be the

Protestant Wikipedians.

Okay.

So

the nine theses begin this way.

Number one,

end decision-making by consensus.

So Wikipedia pretends to make difficult editorial decisions based on a process they call consensus.

But it's a sham

because

this allows ideologues to silence dissent

by falsely claiming,

in effect,

unanimous agreement.

But of course, there isn't unanimous agreement.

So the scientific consensus on climate change would be a perfect example of this.

It would be a very good example.

So the consensus, I say, as a description of

how they arrive at difficult editorial decisions should be abandoned.

Now, what they replace it with, that's a good question.

But let's begin there.

And

decision-making by consensus, because it allows an aggressive faction to overwhelm the skeptical faction.

Exactly.

It's really a cynical

institutional fiction.

It has to end.

They can't call what they're doing consensus anymore.

That's not a consensus at all, especially if they claim to be an open global project.

Period.

All right.

Period.

Thank you.

I agree.

Number two, enable competing articles.

So this is a little bit out there, but I think it's a good one.

Since true neutrality is impossible, as we've been discussing under the current editorial monopoly, Wikipedia should allow multiple competing articles written from different declared perspectives, each striving for neutrality within its own framework so let the people write alternative articles and and for this let me quickly tell you about what i think that's not far out no

it really should be a great idea yes i mean why not just allow you know there can be multiple articles titled donald trump right so you could have

you know special report on fox news or you could have the cbs evening News, then you could also have Joe Rogan because that's what alternative media is.

Right, right, right.

Why not?

And people can decide what they believe.

Yes.

So,

fine.

Number three,

abolish source blacklists, which we've already talked about this quite a bit.

Wikipedia maintains a list of perennial sources, which serves as an ideologically one-sided blacklist of media sources.

All right.

um

so you can i ask what the what is the justification for that and like internally we just don't believe them they're not real what are the criteria for determining

authenticity of a news source that's pretty much it no sorry my opinion they they well they don't say it's just their opinion you say they say as a matter of objective fact we have

right

um i gotta start doing that you know studies show the new york times lies, therefore, you know, I'm just banning it.

Well, you would think that

that would hold some weight with an objective analysis.

Well, definitely, I can tell you.

Yes, yes.

Yes, yes, yes.

Okay.

So you can't cite the New York Post, Fox News, or you on Wikipedia as a source.

So I am making the modest proposal that this blacklist blacklist should be abolished.

It was established in 2017.

It's fairly new.

Right after Trump.

What's that?

The year Trump gets inaugurated.

That's right.

They decide that we're just not going to hear from certain news organizations just because

objectively they're bad.

Wikipedia may not cite the, well, for example, the New York Post.

And

we should actually investigate whether that decision was made at about the time that the Hunter Biden laptop story was breaking, right?

Is this public, by the way?

Can I go on the Wikipedia site and find out what's blacklisted?

Sure.

Just type in perennial sources, Wikipedia, into any search engine, and the first result will be this page.

And it names them the blacklist.

Oh, of course.

Yeah, it's all color-coded.

Green.

Do you have the list?

Do you mind if I do that really quick?

Go right ahead.

Okay.

So it's, let me just do, I'm testing your thesis.

So it's perennial.

Oh, yeah.

Source.

Yeah.

List

Wikipedia, right?

Well, you're doing that.

I'll give you some fully approved sources.

New York Times, Washington Post, CNN, The Nation, Mother Jones, Glad.

Come on.

These are all green lit, fully green lit.

Okay.

The blacklisted sources are Breitbart, Daily Caller, Epoch Times, Fox News, New York Post, The Federalist.

So you can't use those as sources on Wikipedia.

Oh, wow.

Well, they've got, of course.

So is red, I'm looking at it now.

Yes.

Red means it's blacklisted.

You cannot cite it as a source of facts.

Maybe as a a source of opinion, but generally that works out.

Anti-defamation league gets a green light.

Only for some.

Yes, if you're actually reporting about

the Arab

Israeli conflict.

Yes, yes.

Okay.

You may not cite them.

Interesting.

So

you can't find the Jewish perspective on the war so easily anymore on Wikipedia.

yeah Catholic hierarchy celebrity this is interesting yes there's a serious academic encyclopedia of Christianity um that is uh not allowed on Wikipedia I was surprised to find that counter punch is not allowed oh they're naughty they're naughty daily caller not allowed of course

oh you started daily mail not yeah I did start it um I've got nothing to do with it now but I did start it That's interesting.

Well, this is kind of incredible.

Okay.

I never hear about this.

And we don't know who made this decision.

Mr.

X,

the name of his account.

Now,

it's edited, of course, as Wikipedia pages are by a whole bunch of other people.

Life site news not allowed.

Right.

Of course, the pro-lifers.

Yeah.

That's interesting.

I'm going to see if this.

Okay.

Well, why does no one talk about this?

Oh, Sputnik, of course, not allowed.

Talking.

Search me.

I don't know why people aren't talking about it.

It's obviously huge news.

I think

it's simply embarrassing for the left.

And so the left aren't going to report about it.

And the right has been reporting about it.

TV Guide allowed.

The UNS review, not allowed.

TV Guide, totally cool.

UNS.

V Dare not allowed.

This is so funny.

This is amazing.

Okay.

All right.

You've amused me deeply.

Okay.

I'm so sorry.

I just had, I'm sorry for the

it's just, it's all so incredible to me.

Okay.

Uh, so number three.

Right.

All right.

Shall I go on then?

Yes.

And I will not interrupt.

I just can't.

So to conclude the discussion of number three,

the blacklist should be abolished.

Diverse sources should be cited

with acknowledgement of how different groups assess their credibility, if necessary.

Exactly.

Yeah.

Okay.

Number four, revive the original neutrality policy.

Wikipedia must return to genuine neutrality by refusing to take sides on controversial issues, even when one view dominates Wikipedia,

well, academia and

mainstream media.

So

I suppose that one is fairly straightforward.

And we've already discussed it quite a bit, that the neutrality policy right now

defines neutrality in terms of what are called significant views

and the reliable sources.

And significant views are significant views according to the faculty members of Hobbit and things like that.

And if

your view is held only at conservative seminaries, for example, or other bastions of conservatism, then they're not significant.

At least that's how it's treated on Wikipedia right now.

So that needs to be,

Wikipedia should be a big tent as it used to be, enabling many, many different people to come together, you know, in a big, I just think of it as like old-fashioned liberal kumbaya.

You know, people should be able to come together and

talk to each other from radically different points of view and just make sure that their views are all respected on the same page.

Yeah, it shouldn't just be the most reactionary views, NBC, Harvard,

you know, only the most kind of stalwart defenders of this broken project.

Yes, right.

It shouldn't just be the College of Cardinals voting here.

Right.

So, in my opinion.

Okay.

Yes, yes.

There's a good way to characterize the currently

only permitted viewpoint on Wikipedia, and that is with

the acronym GASP,

which stands for Globalist, Academic, Secular, and Progressive.

And each one is necessary.

And together, they just give a perfect picture of the viewpoint of Wikipedians today, of most Wikipedians.

Do they know that they're like representing, selling the views of, say, the Aspen Institute or the Atlantic Council Council or the CIA or the Washington Post Editorial Board, like such a tiny minority of the globe's population,

but the most powerful people in the world.

Like they are the Praetorian Guard protecting the powerful.

Do they see that?

I think they do.

I think a lot of, of course, it's a fairly big group of people, you know, in the single digit thousands of regular editors these days.

I think a lot of those people do know that and they take pride in it, frankly.

Wow.

Yeah.

In oppressing the rest of the population on behalf of the richest and most powerful.

They don't think they're doing that, but yeah.

That's exactly what they're doing.

Yeah.

By lying to people, you oppress them.

Yeah.

Right.

All right.

Then number five.

So just a little throat clearing here, a short

little proposal.

Repeal ignore all rules.

So

there is a policy called ignore all rules, which I came up with

in the first few days of the project.

Originally, I meant it as a joke to encourage newcomers, right?

So, like, if rules make you nervous and like you're not sure what to do, then just ignore them and go about your business.

That's essentially what I said.

Yeah.

Okay.

It's a good rule for responsible, honest people.

And this became essentially a cargo cult.

You know, over the years, people started using this to shield insiders from accountability.

So

I made this rule, and so I now declare that it should be repealed.

How has it been used to protect corruption?

Well,

generally what happens is if somebody can't think of a covering rule in a special case, but it just seems plausible to the people who are working on an article.

This really ought to be against the rules or whatever.

Just ignore all rules and they'll just say that.

And they usually say it in a kind of tongue-in-cheek way, but in a way that's serious enough to actually have an effect.

Right.

But

a lot of

lesser contributors,

they wouldn't be able to get away with that sort of thing.

So there is one guy who said

at the height of COVID, if there is one serious application of ignore all rules, it should be now.

We should be able to ignore all the rules regarding whatever

in order to get people to believe that COVID is serious and they should be jabbed.

And that's the only answer to it.

Yeah.

So basically we should, if you, when you ignore all rules, after a while, you're ignoring all principles.

And they're doing it again in the service.

Selectively.

Yes, selectively, in the service of like the most powerful people in the world.

Right.

Okay.

Number six, reveal who Wikipedia's leaders are.

I said that number one.

I like that one.

Yes.

So Wikipedia's most powerful editors remain overwhelmingly anonymous despite wielding enormous influence over one of the world's most powerful media platforms, these leaders must be publicly identified for accountability and given liability insurance

as, you know,

as

volunteers of nonprofits often are.

So there's no reason why they shouldn't do this.

If you're wielding real power, I think it's, and by the way, I like anonymity online a lot of the time because I think it helps the underdog tell the truth.

And so I am for anonymity on social media, for example.

I don't think you should have to register with the government to give your opinions, just to be clear.

But if you're wielding real institutional power, I think it's fair to require people to say who they are.

Just like Supreme Court justices have to give their real names.

Right.

Right.

It's, it's, uh, it's a no-brainer.

If there is one thing that might get the attention of the mainstream media, it seems to me it might be this one.

I don't think it's widely known that 85%

of the

most powerful accounts on Wikipedia are anonymous.

How is that allowed?

No, I know.

I couldn't agree more.

It's just disgusting.

And by the way, there are consequences to having your identity known, I can tell you.

And they're not great.

On the other hand, you know, that's the price that you pay for having influence.

I don't know.

That's fair.

Right.

And by the way, I don't want those people to be doxxed.

I'm going to say it again.

And I'm not saying that the people who are there should be forced to reveal their identity or anything like that.

They can resign.

I grant.

And then new people can be brought on board.

And then maybe, if necessary, you could pay them a little stipend for their trouble.

They've got, they're raising, I think, something like $200 million a year now, right?

It's a huge amount of money.

Because I said, I was a donor.

Yeah, now I get it.

Yeah.

Okay.

Let the public rate articles.

That's number seven.

Wikipedia should implement a public rating and feedback system allowing readers to evaluate articles.

They can't do that now.

We call it that.

That's the comment section, but they don't have a comment section.

They don't have a comment section.

They don't have any sort of rating section.

There are no metrics that they can use.

They've metricized everything, you know, books on Amazon and, you know, thumbs up on

X and,

you know,

YouTube and whatnot, but not Wikipedia.

And if there's one of them.

I've never thought of that.

What's that?

I've never thought of that.

That's so smart.

Yeah.

Well, and

look,

if there's one place where an actual rating system would matter and actually be important, it would be Wikipedia because we, I think you and I agree that Wikipedia does have some decent articles.

That's right.

Great articles.

Yeah.

And you want to learn about the Falkland Islands?

You want to learn about some bird species?

Yeah, it's amazing.

That's why it's so frustrating.

Yes.

So, so, I mean, wouldn't it be nice if there were some independent reviews, independent of Wikipedia, that

would,

you know, give the public

a notion of whether they can actually trust the information.

And I actually think that you should be able to identify and even rate the raters and say, okay,

these accounts who have rated the Trump article very highly are mostly Democrats.

And those that rate the article very poorly are mostly Republicans.

And then

there should be a system that would enable you to go and learn what the best articles are,

especially if they're competing articles, again, from anybody's point of view.

Yes.

I love that.

Would be nice.

Let's see.

Thesis number eight, end indefinite blocking.

Wikipedia's practice of blocking accounts permanently is unjust and ideologically motivated.

So

I did a little personal investigation last June.

In a period of two weeks, 47% of the blocks that had been done by Wikipedia were indefinite, which means permanent.

And you can sort of understand some of them because you're re-blocking the same people who have already been blocked because they made new accounts.

Those are called sock puppets.

It's still a very, very high number,

right?

And they do, as I have said, block willy-nilly, and they will block permanently.

I mean, there are people online who complain that they were blocked for making grammar corrections, you know.

I've seen, I don't know, three or four cases of just that.

I quote a few in the essay.

So each of these theses, by the way, has a whole essay to go with it, which I very carefully wrote over the last nine months.

And where can interested people find that?

They can find it on my user page on Wikipedia.

So just go there.

I don't know if it'll be on the user page, or maybe it will be linked from the user page, but it'll be on Wikipedia itself.

So I actually want to take the debate to them.

You know, I still have an account in good standing for now.

We'll see if they block me over this.

I'm not sure.

But I would like to start a debate there.

So that's why I've posted it there.

I also have a version of the nine theses on my blog.

And

it's identical, but it also has links to archived versions of all the resources that I cite.

So they can't take anything down without people knowing.

Let's see.

So

I think that basically indefinite blocks should be extremely rare.

They should require multiple administrators to agree because right now one person can, for arbitrary reasons, practically block another account,

an account in good standing that might have had like thousands of edits

without really any meaningful recourse, right?

So at least let's have a panel of people convened if you want to block somebody permanently.

And

of course, you should be able to

appeal your permanent block, if you are permanently blocked

every maybe three, six, maybe 12 months, right?

So the idea is it's only fair to give people the opportunity to say, well, I've reformed.

I'm not going to do what I've done

before.

People,

you remember

the movie Escape from Alcatraz?

Yes.

There was a character in it

who's befriended by Clint Eastwood's character, who's this great painter.

And he makes a painting of the warden.

The warden sees a copy of this as he's snooping around in a cell.

And

it's an unflattering picture of the warden.

So

that man's

his painting supplies are taken away by the warden.

And they have so few joys in this place.

It's like living death.

And so

the painter then commits suicide.

A lot of people feel very strongly about Wikipedia because it is a significant hobby.

In some cases, you know, in the way that like I play Irish fiddle, that's like my, one of my big hobbies.

And I don't know, you're fly fishing, I guess.

If you were to take this away

from people forever, you know, just disallow them, then, you know, it.

It can be really upsetting to people.

One person, there's a story I quote in the essay of a guy who came close to suicide when his account was blocked.

And you know how they responded?

They responded, Wikipedia is not therapy.

There's an essay to this effect.

You know, Wikipedia is not therapy.

No, it's cruelty.

That's basically what they're implying.

Yeah.

Okay.

Right.

It's a right.

It's a way to hurt people.

So that should stop.

They should be nicer, frankly, to the people who are spending so many hours on

the system.

Number nine, adopt a legislative process.

So

if you take all eight

together, you might very well ask, how can these changes be made?

So Wikipedia is extremely institutionally conservative.

It's hard to change from within.

Yes, the DMV, I noticed.

Yes.

So what I propose is that because they lack any method of major reform, there is nothing like an editorial council on Wikipedia.

Because it needs major reform now, especially, it needs an elected

editorial legislature with real powers, powers to implement reforms established through Wikipedia's first constitutional convention.

So Wikipedia should treat itself as a kind of polity, which until now has been a strange mixture.

For years and years, I have said this.

It is a strange mixture of oligarchy and anarchy, right?

Like America itself.

Right.

So, and what they really need to do is have a serious

constitutional convention, take their own governance, editorial governance, seriously.

And I'm not saying this would be run by the Wikimedia Foundation.

It would be run by the volunteers.

Of course, the Wikimedia Foundation would pay for the Constitutional Convention and also for, you know, the travel expenses of people who later come together in an editorial assembly, which would meet face to face, right?

Because these people have to be identified, one person, one vote.

And for that matter, I also say that

if you vote for the people in such an editorial assembly, then you have to be identified, not necessarily publicly, but to someone to ensure that there is indeed only one person, one vote.

Because right now, that's one of the big problems about voting in the Wikipedia community.

Because Wikipedia is anonymous, it's only too possible for people to run multiple sock puppets, or they run separate accounts that they pretend belong to different people, right?

And then that gives them more than one vote.

That's not fair.

No.

Yeah.

So it should be,

the editorial assembly, I'm saying, should be run face-to-face.

You know, it can meet in different places in the world.

And,

you know,

people could be paid a stipend

for both travel and just like an ordinary legislature.

I would donate to that.

I would donate to that.

I donate in a real way to that because what you're, I think what you're really saying, which is what Martin Luther was really saying, is this is really serious.

This is worth reforming because it matters.

Yes, it really matters.

It's not all bad.

By the way, the idea of Wikipedia is a beautiful idea, an important idea.

You know, broadcasting truth at scale, like that's just always a good thing.

Right.

And so it's worth saving.

It's imperative to save it.

And like running it like out of your garage without the safeguards that you've described just makes you prey, of course, to the worst people in the world, PR firms, intelligence agencies, paid liars.

Right, right.

I think that if there is one of all of these theses, if there is one that

the mainstream media and governments around the world might be able to get behind, it is this idea that they need to get their house in order and start

have a council of people that take responsibility for the shape of policy.

That's exactly right.

That's exactly right.

I mean, because like if you don't like Google, you could say, well, it's Sundar Pashai's fault.

If you don't like any publicly traded company, at least you can identify the person making the decisions or responsible for the decisions.

But here you have this shadowy,

incredibly influential institution

and there's no request.

You can't even be mad at someone because you don't know who they are.

Right.

Larry Sanger, I so appreciate the seriousness with which you take this, the brilliance that allowed you to create this in the first place.

And I hope that people listen to you.

I hope they understand how much it matters.

Thank you.

I appreciate it.

Thank you.

Good to see you again.

I guess it's the third time we've done an interview.

I don't know.

Fourth, actually.

Fourth.

Okay.

Okay.

I care about this.

So I hope other people start to care too.

Second time

in person.

So, yes.

You're making me feel crazy.

I'm obviously obsessed.

But there's a reason I am, and it has nothing to do with me.

It has to do with history and the collective memory, which is another way of saying your civilization.

It can't exist unless it understands itself.

I appreciate your interest and support.

I'm very grateful for it.

Well, I mean it.

Thank you very much.

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