Christina Aguilera Protected From Naughty Wikipedia Writers

Posted on June 17, 2006

How times change. Wikipedia has now changed its former "anyone can edit anything" policy due to all the malicious postings and lawsuit threats.

At its core, Wikipedia is not just a reference work but also an online community that has built itself a bureaucracy of sorts - one that, in response to well-publicized problems with some entries, has recently grown more elaborate. It has a clear power structure that gives volunteer administrators the authority to exercise editorial control, delete unsuitable articles and protect those that are vulnerable to vandalism.

Those measures can put some entries outside of the "anyone can edit" realm. The list changes rapidly, but as of yesterday, the entries for Einstein and Ms. Aguilera were among 82 that administrators had "protected" from all editing, mostly because of repeated vandalism or disputes over what should be said. Another 179 entries - including those for George W. Bush, Islam and Adolf Hitler - were "semi-protected," open to editing only by people who had been registered at the site for at least four days.

Wikipedia founder Wales says the protection applies to only a very small fraction of the site's entries. He tells the New York Times, "Protection is a tool for quality control, but it hardly defines Wikipedia. What does define Wikipedia is the volunteer community and the open participation."

All we can say is Thank Goodness someone is protecting the biography of our beloved Xtina. Because you just know her many enemies are ready and waiting to write scurrilous entries about her offstage antics activities.

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