375973
submission
Moryath writes:
We all know Wikipedia isn't perfect — but can it be saved? Is it usable, or at the same time those who love it crow, why is it that more people are now leaving than entering? Why is it that the vast majority go by, perhaps contribute once, and quickly become like even Wikipedia's co-founder, utterly disillusioned? Why do former administrators come out and tell the problems themselves even when the "community" threatens them?
Or is it something more basic — is it that wikipedia's administrators are too powerful, and too willing to place an indefinite ban on anyone they choose, with no recourse? Is it impossible for new users to even come in and work, with edit-count-itis and entrenched cliques running the place into the ground?
324157
submission
Moryath writes:
My spam traps (email addresses that exist solely to receive spam, for filtration's sake) and my real address have recently seen a ton of mail from the Barack Obama campaign.
Their unsubscribe link does not work; email to the campaign asking them to remove my addresses was responded with a form letter thanking me for "joining" the campaign and asking me to donate money; phone calls have all been hung up on, several times after someone claimed to be "transferring" me to "the person who can fix this."
Why is this allowed? And what response would Slashdotters suggest for a campaign that is obviously unwilling to respect my request NOT to receive their spam?
315733
submission
Moryath writes:
A couple days ago I submitted the a question in the politics area — I guess maybe it's better as an Ask Slashdot.
My spam traps (email addresses that exist solely to receive spam, for filtration's sake) and my real address have recently seen a ton of mail from the Barack Obama campaign. Their unsubscribe link does not work; email to the campaign asking them to remove my addresses was responded with a form letter thanking me for "joining" the campaign and asking me to donate money; and phone calls have all been hung up on.
Why is this allowed? And what response would Slashdotters suggest for a campaign that is obviously unwilling to respect my request NOT to receive their spam?
The last submission here sat "pending" for 3 days and then was rejected, presumably by a slashdotter who favors Obama. We'll see if this goes any better in this category. I'd really like to see the Obama campaign clean up their act, it's obvious they have bought a spammer list and are using it.
303051
submission
Moryath writes:
This might deserve to be an Ask Slashdot, or somewhere else, I don't know, but recently a number of my spam-trap email addresses (addresses I keep just to compare to my normal inbox for spam filtering) have been seeing daily emails from the Obama presidential campaign asking for donations.
I tried using the unsubscribe link, which failed to operate; I sent the campaign an email directly , and received a form response thanking me for "joining" their campaign and asking me to donate. Phone calls to the campaign office have been uniformly dismissive — 90% of the time they just hang up, the other 10% they put me on hold claiming to be "getting someone who can fix this" and then drop the call.
It's obvious that they have no intentions with complying with my request to get off of their email system — and equally obvious that they have padded their supposed "record number" of supporters by purchasing bulk email lists from spammers. Why should we support politicians who behave in this way and don't respect our rights? And what would Slashdotters suggest as the next step to deal with a politician who simply refuses to follow the law?
For the record, I'm a registered independent, and so far my only intention for the campaign is to point and laugh at Ron Paul.
97844
submission
Moryath writes:
High ranking Wikipedia admins — caught trying to shut people up for exposing their deeds, and then posting "anonymous" flames at them?
Wikipedia seems to be in a tailspin lately. What can they do to pull out of it? Or is the entrenched cronyism and corruption of the administrators too much for it?
97770
submission
Moryath writes:
Following the story on Fuzzy Zoeller the other day, I saw a Digg Link scrolling around, and it caught my eye. Apparently a former admin from Wikipedia who's been exposing abuses in the system got booted from their private mailing list for exposing some serious corruption. What's worse, some real nasty comments came in to the livejournal he wrote at.
He traced the IP of the comments back far enough to link it to one David Gerard, a high-ranking admin and (not coincidentally) a listmod to that same mailing list who's got a real mean streak.
Could Wikipedia's real problem be administrators who keep doing things like this?
They have a funding drive coming up soon. Stuff like this makes me not want to donate. Why would I give money to people who can't be honest?
