On Monday, the School of Continuing Studies’ Technology Management Program sponsored a lecture by Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales and Andrea Weckerle – founder of the cyber-etiquette organization CiviliNation – on the need for civil discourse on the Internet.

The talk, entitled “Upholding the Core Ideals of Democracy & Freedom of Speech: the Need for Civil Digital Discourse,” focused on the need for a healthy online environment that fosters a thoughtful exchange of ideas. However, neither contributor saw this as the present reality.

“Because we haven’t yet developed online social norms,” Weckerle mused, “we have allowed this to become a truly global problem,” citing intentional provocation, release of private information, Facebook attacks, Google bombs, cyber stalking, and generic spreading of lies online.

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If someone asked you to pick the greatest innovation of our day, it might be a pretty tough choice: Our generation has witnessed the birth of such life-changing inventions as iPads, smartphones, and jeggings. But if you ask me, the answer is obvious: Wikipedia.

Which is why those who are still at Georgetown should get excited for Monday, June 13. According to an email sent yesterday by the University, Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales will be speaking this Monday at 6:00 p.m. in Copley Formal Lounge, along with Andrea Weckerle, founder of CiviliNation.

The title of this discussion is “The Need for Civil Discourse,” and it is sponsored by the School of Continuing Studies’s Technology Management Program. The two speakers will focus on issues about the “epidemic” of online hostility, a topic which our very own Nico Dodd tackled in the Voice a few months back.

The two speakers are more than qualified to speak on the subject. Wales, of course, revolutionized the spread of information with a website that allows users to update it themselves, but in doing so left room for biased or outright false information to spread widely (until it gets taken down, which is usually momentary).

CiviliNation, the nonprofit organization that Weckerle founded, is aimed at promoting a healthy, civil atmosphere in cyberspace. According to their website, the group aims at “fostering an online culture in which individuals can fully engage and contribute without fear or threat of being the target of unwarranted abuse, harassment, or lies.” Wales serves on the organization’s Board of Directors.

Anyone wishing to attend this event should RSVP on the School of Continuing Studies’s website here.

The Wikimedia Foundation, the organization that operates Wikipedia and other “wiki” projects such as Wiktionary and Wikitravel, announced Monday that its Wikimania 2012 conference will take place July 12-15, 2012 at the Georgetown University Conference Center.

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Remember when professors began telling us we couldn’t use Wikipedia as a source for research? How many times has your class collectively groaned when someone asked if it was a legitimate source?

The folks over at Wikipedia have heard our cries, it seems, and they’re reaching out to institutions of higher learning.

Nine professors, including two from Georgetown, have agreed to make creating, expanding, and editing Wikipedia pages a part of the work for the courses they teach. The idea come out of Wikipedia’s Public Policy Initiative, launched to improve the free encyclopedia’s coverage of U.S. public policy.

Rochelle Davis, an assistant professor in the SFS, is helping to pioneer the program. Davis plans to have students post literature summaries on Wikipedia, and then use those summaries as “jumping-off point[s]” for future research papers.

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From the Norovirus Wikipedia article:

In October 2008, 165 students at Georgetown University contracted the virus.[25] Several students refused IVs, asking instead for a Busch Light drip while in the emergency room.[citation needed]

From Voice writer in exile Jeff Reger

Aramark’s takeover of Leo’s is just okay, despite the sublime pasta bar. It’s going to take at least a semester before we see real changes, but more worrisome is Aramark’s old habit for questionable business practices–and a more recent taste for covering it up online.

Wikipedia’s entry on Aramark has a short section on corporate malfeasance: Aramark overcharged a prison $2 million, it’s been firing people unfairly at a hospital, and it withheld tips from hotel employees. Things might be much worse, though, because someone at an Aramark IP address has been editing damaging entries from the Wikipedia page.

This news comes from Wikiscanner, a website that links IP addresses to the anonymous edits they make. It’s not necessarily an Aramark employee or company sanctioned, but who besides an Aramark employee can use their internet access? Aramark’s vandal isn’t so much sinister as clumsy–any amateur wiki prankster knows not to just delete paragraphs. One person using an Aramark computer deleted huge chunks of the corporate malfeasance section. Later, some PR boiler plate was inserted that inadvertently referred to “our” employees.

Amusing as Aramark’s antics are, Georgetown can’t afford repeats of either their corporate dirty tricks or bumbling disinformation.
-Will Sommer, blog editor