Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2006-07-17/In the news
{{Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/Templates/Signpost-article-header-v2|{{{1|In the News}}}|By Michael Snow}}
=If the Internet is "a [[series of tubes]]", what does that make Wikipedia?=
Wikipedia's rapid compilation of information on topics of interest to an Internet audience brought another citation from the press last week. A widely reprinted [http://www.adn.com/front/story/7967717p-7860858c.html story] from the Anchorage Daily News related how U.S. Senator Ted Stevens' comments about the structure of the Internet (in a debate about legislation addressing network neutrality) earned him considerable ridicule. Discussing the reaction, the article noted that Wikipedia's article on Stevens "already includes a lengthy recap of the tube speech and its aftermath."
=''Salt Lake Tribune'' still at it=
After last week noting vandalism to the article on U.S. Senator Orrin Hatch, The Salt Lake Tribune followed up by pointing out another Wikipedia oddity of local interest. This time it was the article on Ralph Becker, [http://www.sltrib.com/utah/ci_4039608 highlighted] by columnist Paul Rolly. Writing about Utah's current House Minority Leader of that name, Rolly noted that Wikipedia described him as a former ambassador and World War II veteran who was nearly a century old ... except that he had died in 1994.
It appears that Rolly had followed a link from the Utah State House of Representatives article. However, the link to Ralph Becker had since been turned into a biography of Ralph Elihu Becker, who happens to be the father of the Utah legislator, as Rolly afterward [http://www.sltrib.com/utah/ci_4049631 pointed out]. Ta bu shi da yu cleaned up the situation by converting Ralph Becker into a disambiguation page and starting a stub on the younger Becker.
=More Digital Universe=
The Guardian ran the latest [http://technology.guardian.co.uk/weekly/story/0,,1818630,00.html profile] of Larry Sanger and the Digital Universe project, first announced last December. The article discussed both the portal aspects of the project, which are beginning to be fleshed out on the site, as well as the not-yet-visible encyclopedia planned to accompany them. Also covered was a side project of Sanger's called [http://www.textop.org/ Textop] (short for Text Outline Project), a collaboration planned to synthesize texts into "a single outline of human knowledge." Although Textop is "under the broad umbrella of the Digital Universe Foundation", it apparently is being hosted by Sanger at his own expense.
Also this week: Archive deals
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