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"It's not like they lost anything" If you read about the original incident, linked in another comment: https://www.newsweek.com/2015/04/03/manipulating-wikipe

"It's not like they lost anything" If you read about the original incident, linked in another comment: https://www.newsweek.com/2015/04/03/manipulating-wikipedia-promote-bogus-business-school-316133.html https://www.newsweek.com/2015/04/03/manipulating-wikipedia-p... it means they lost the power to use Wikipedia to promote another scam. The original account was no troll doing it for the lulz, they were after money and possibly actually a group of people. So either this revelation is now fake for whatever reason, or there is more going on. In either case, all of the activity of said admin (Lourdes) should probably be looked at with concern. Possible other scams to be found.

joenathanone 3y ago
It seems like you are reading into it too much, the account only ever shilled for one company, not that it makes it okay, but that makes it more likely a personal affiliation rather than an admin for hire.
- hutzlibu 3y ago
  It seems you missunderstood me, I did not say they were for hire. But they were after money. And they got money by convincing students they can get internationaly accepted and sought for MBAs, while they were worthless in reality. And wikipedia was promoting that fraudulent school for 4 years, repeatedly deleting sources exposing the scam. That was organized. And maybe they found new projects to work on after the old got exposed too much, or indeed freelance, sell out their wiki skills to other malicious actors. At the moment it is all not really clear to me.
  - WarOnPrivacy 3y ago
    > I did not say they were for hire. But they were after money. ...in trade performing a service. I might disagree with you on what 'for hire' means.
    - SiempreViernes 3y ago
      Looks like parent reads "for hire" in the more specific "mercenary" meaning, and not in the very generic "old enough to be employed" sense you seem to use.
  - joenathanone 3y ago
    This person made thousands of other legitimate changes, it seems a stretch to say someone would do all that just as a marketing tactic, that is a whole lot of effort for questionable results. I mean, how many people go to Wikipedia for college recommendations? How many people are going to attend a school they otherwise wouldn’t because they looked it up on Wikipedia? I’m sure it’s not zero, but we can’t be talking about many.
    - hutzlibu 3y ago
      "just as a marketing tactic" The article I linked claimed, that indeed quite a few persons in rural india believed wikipedia. Also labour in india is cheap, I doubt he did it himself, but payed someone to do it. In general, many people do trust wikipedia. And PR companies get payed much more, to get some information inside.

joenathanone 3y ago

It seems like you are reading into it too much, the account only ever shilled for one company, not that it makes it okay, but that makes it more likely a personal affiliation rather than an admin for hire.

hutzlibu 3y ago
It seems you missunderstood me, I did not say they were for hire. But they were after money. And they got money by convincing students they can get internationaly accepted and sought for MBAs, while they were worthless in reality. And wikipedia was promoting that fraudulent school for 4 years, repeatedly deleting sources exposing the scam. That was organized. And maybe they found new projects to work on after the old got exposed too much, or indeed freelance, sell out their wiki skills to other malicious actors. At the moment it is all not really clear to me.
- WarOnPrivacy 3y ago
  > I did not say they were for hire. But they were after money. ...in trade performing a service. I might disagree with you on what 'for hire' means.
  - SiempreViernes 3y ago
    Looks like parent reads "for hire" in the more specific "mercenary" meaning, and not in the very generic "old enough to be employed" sense you seem to use.
- joenathanone 3y ago
  This person made thousands of other legitimate changes, it seems a stretch to say someone would do all that just as a marketing tactic, that is a whole lot of effort for questionable results. I mean, how many people go to Wikipedia for college recommendations? How many people are going to attend a school they otherwise wouldn’t because they looked it up on Wikipedia? I’m sure it’s not zero, but we can’t be talking about many.
  - hutzlibu 3y ago
    "just as a marketing tactic" The article I linked claimed, that indeed quite a few persons in rural india believed wikipedia. Also labour in india is cheap, I doubt he did it himself, but payed someone to do it. In general, many people do trust wikipedia. And PR companies get payed much more, to get some information inside.