New Mexico Central

Waging Wiki Wars Against Wildlife West?

by John Weckerle

It was just this past week that your editor decided to take a look at the Edgewood Wikipedia entry, having not done so in a very long time.  I was appalled to find that much of the community-related information had been removed – as had the external link to Wildlife West Nature Park.  We went through the edit history of the Edgewood article, and found some very interesting patterns.  One especially fascinating set of changes was wrought by a user named EdgewoodNMTown, who made a series of changes in late May 2009, “updating” the page by adding citations for the Town’s web site, updating the Chamber of Commerce web address, removing referenced and relevant information on the Town history, correcting sponsorship and date information on Run Rally and Rock, and adding information from the town of Edgewood meeting minutes.  When correcting the sponsorship information, EdgewoodNMTown provided an explanation: “corrected the sponsorship information.  If you have a question contact EdgewoodNMTown on wikipedia or the Edgewood chamber of commerce at www.edgewoodnmchamber.com.” This involved removing the external link to the Mountain View Telegraph article “Game of Chance Decides Mayoral Contest.”  Perhaps most significantly, EdgewoodNMTown also removed the external link to the Wildlife West Nature Park site just a few minutes later, explaining: “removed link to a private business, removed link to irrelevent (sic) reference (no bearing on content on page).”

Let’s take a look at what we see here, but first, there is an inaccuracy in the entries that should be addressed.  EdgewoodNMTown cites www.edgewoodnmchamber.com as the Chamber address.  It is not, and has not been for quite some time.  It is the address for Edgewood, New Mexico and the Surrounding Area.  That is an informational site about Edgewood, not connected with the Chamber, run by your editor.  EdgewoodNMTown had to have known this, as it was in fact this person who had updated the Chamber’s address on Wikipedia the previous day.  It is unclear whether this is a typographical error or some sort of a primitive attempt to pit uninvolved parties against each other.

Other edits by EdgewoodNMTown involve:

• adding information on the Father’s Day antique car show
• reference to a weekly arts and organic market on Route 66
• changing “public library” to “a new public library”
• another removal of a link to Wildlife West from main text of the article
• change in the name “the Independent” to “The Independent,” capitalizing “The” in the name of the newspaper
• repeated references to the Town’s Comprehensive Plan, including insertion of the web address for the Plan
• insertion of the web address for EVEDA into the main body of the text
• insertion of the Chamber’s web address into the main body of the text
• insertion of a link to a brochure for Basset Ranch
• insertion of what appears to be promotional text for Run, Rally and Rock.
• Removal of a reference to Police Chief Paul Welch on the basis that he had resigned

A number of apparently promotional entries were made in the same time frame by an unnamed user with the IP address 68.35.3.238 (whois records indicate that this may be a Comcast address), whose edits appeared mainly promotional in nature and seemed intended to market the Town, the Chamber, and events.  Another unnamed user at 208.50.194.191, part of a cluster held by IXNM, Inc. according to whois data, was making edits within the same general time frame.  The latter entered such things as the correct web address for the Chamber web site and the list of the Chamber’s officers. According to this LinkedIn profile, the president of IXNM is also the president of City Link, a company hired by the Chamber to prepare a map of the area.  It is unclear what other involvement City Link has with the Chamber, or whether anyone associated with City Link was making the edits.  This person did remove a reference to Wildlife West, but it was likely correct to do so, as the information had become outdated.

Many of these entries were undone by Wikipedia editors and administrators.

We have contacted Robin Foshee at the Edgewood Chamber of Commerce and Karen Mahalick, Edgewood’s Town Administrator.  Both emphatically deny any involvement.

We will make note of the reference to Wildlife West by EdgewoodNMTown as a “private business.”  Most in the community understand that Wildlife West is not a private business per se; rather, it is run by a 501(c)(3) charitable organization – the New Mexico Wildlife Association. There are only a very few people in the community who persist in referring to Wildlife West as a private business, and these people seem to be those from whom the Park has received a great deal of criticism, most of which appears to have little basis in fact.  Included in this are the preposterous statements some have made regarding the park’s finances, specifically that it is “profitable” or that people are getting rich from it.  The Park is pinching pennies until Lincoln screams.  If you’ve heard otherwise, you’re hearing falsehoods.

We cannot prove the identity of EdgewoodNMTown within reasonable doubt, so we won’t publish a guess; our readers will have to review the information and draw their own conclusions.   If we ever are able to confirm the identity of this individual, we will provide an update – and even give him or her the opportunity to provide an explanation.  If any of our readers has relevant information, please let us know by posting here or sending an e-mail to editor@nm-central.com.

All things considered, removing the links to Wildlife West appears to have vendetta written all over it, and we believe that it is time for this type of behavior to stop.  It is petty, it is damaging, and it is entirely unnecessary.

Sunday, February 28th, 2010, by John Weckerle and is filed under "Edgewood ". You can leave a response here. Pinging is currently not allowed.