Larry Sanger, one of Wikipedia\u2019s cofounders, was banned from editing the site indefinitely after other editors determined he was canvassing, or in other words, calling on his followers off platform in order to influence Wikipedia\u2019s content.\u00a0Sanger has spent more than a decade criticizing Wikipedia for what he claims is an ideological, left-wing bias on a variety of topics, and on X has framed this recent ban as further proof of everything that\u2019s wrong with Wikipedia. The New York Post took that bait and last night published an article with the headline \u201cLeft-leaning Wikipedia blocked founder from editing site\u2014after he campaigned to make it more balanced.\u201d\u00a0Wikipedia editors obviously reject that framing and say that Sanger was banned for wielding his followers to sway discussion and decision making on Wikipedia. The discussion that led to the decision to ban Sanger concluded with what an editor called a \u201cclear consensus\u201d to ban Sanger.\u201cThere is general agreement among participants that he has engaged in off-wiki canvassing and is not here to constructively build the encyclopedia,\u201d the editor said in a note closing the discussion. \u201cThere is also a significant concern shared by many editors that his actions constitute calls for outing.\u201dWhile Sanger has been railing about bias on Wikipedia for years, the specific issue here is around his WikiProject Intellectual Diversity. WikiProjects are group efforts among Wikipedia volunteers to deal with certain issues on the site. For example, in 2024 I wrote about WikiProject AI Cleanup, a group of volunteers who focus on removing AI-generated content from the online encyclopedia. Sanger\u2019s WikiProject Intellectual Diversity, as its name implies, aims to bring more intellectual diversity to the site, mostly meaning more right-leaning perspectives.\u00a0Sanger\u2019s WikiProject Intellectual Diversity and its goals alone do not merit a ban according to Wikipedia\u2019s policies. The problem, according to Wikipedia editors, is that during the discussion about whether to allow WikiProject Intellectual Diversity to become an official WikiProject, Sanger invited his 91,000 followers on X to influence that discussion.\u00a0\u201cWikipedians are now debating whether my proposed WikiProject Intellectual Diversity should be permitted to become an official WikiProject (club\/group of editors),\u201d Sanger said on X on Friday and linked to the Wikipedia talk page about the issue. \u201cLots opposed. Also lots in favor.\u201d\u201cCan I still join the movement?\u201d one person replied to Sanger on X.\u00a0\u201cLet’s just say that if I answer that question one way or another, the playground moms who rule Wikipedia might block me,\u201d Sanger responded.\u00a0As one volunteer wrote in the discussion page about whether to ban Sanger:\u201cSince the return from his self-imposed exile pretty much all he has done is try to start a right-wing\/conservative pressure group within Wikipedia not to improve articles on topics that may be under-represented or highlight high-quality sources that could be utilised more, but to instead attempt to rewrite policies and guidelines to his political bent while throwing baseless aspersions about the conduct of many users (mostly those in privileged positions such as admins) and alleging they’re being funded by shadow money. Frankly if this was anyone else claiming all this with the way he is, we’d have shown them the door long ago.\u201dIlyas Lebleu, another Wikipedia volunteer and admin, told me that they had warned Sanger about similar behavior two months ago, but that Sanger ignored them.\u00a0\u201cLarry tried to frame the community discussion as a pseudo-legalistic process, bringing a list of \u2018charges\u2019 and \u2018counts\u2019 from \u2018prosecutors,\u2019 instead of an open community discussion,\u201d Lebleu said.\u00a0Discussions about potential bans are supposed to remain open for at least 72 hours. While consensus that Sanger had violated Wikipedia policies was clear, Sanger was banned at some point before that deadline. He was then briefly unbanned, and then again indefinitely banned once 72 hours had elapsed and the discussion about the ban closed.\u00a0\u201cWikipedia has become more of a mob-rule anarchy than ever,\u201d Sanger said in a statement sent to me by a spokesperson. \u201cIn the kangaroo court in which a mob ousted me, Wikipedia\u2019s administrators showed that they don\u2019t appear to value details like formal charges, a designated prosecutor, basic decorum, distinction between prosecution and judge, dispassionate adjudication, and so forth. They have no proper system other than triggering a mob to selectively enforce their hodgepodge of vague rules.\u201d\u201cNow that same mob has blocked me for trying to bring an intellectually diverse group of thinkers and editors to the site,\u201d Sanger continued. \u201cSubscribing to their groupthink is now an official requirement of being a member in good standing. Something must change, and now. I only wonder if the system as it currently stands can even allow the discourse necessary to fix the system.\u201dSanger\u2019s claim that Wikipedia has a left-leaning bias isn\u2019t unique or new. Elon Musk has railed against the site for years as well, an effort that culminated with the launch of his highly flawed, AI-generated Grokipedia. But the stakes for Wikipedia as a reliable source of information are higher than ever as every corner of the internet is struggling to deal with a flood of AI-generated, error-filled slop.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"