Wikiwashing refers to strategies of whitewashing one’s image by associating it to values advocated and represented by Wikipedia. In other words, wikiwashing is a twofold strategy developed by companies that provide infrastructure, sharing or collaboration services in order to achieve two goals. Firstly, they promote a positive image of their company by associating it with values of wikis. Secondly, these companies conceal practices that could be regarded as unethically by its users.[1] WikiWash is the name of a website that has been established to detect wikiwashing cases.
Origin
editThe term wikiwashing is based on the notion of washing and refers to the cleaning up of the company's image. The term also derives "wiki" from the encyclopaedia Wikipedia and thus makes the connection to associated values. Thirdly, the term is analogous to the terms whitewashing and greenwashing. Whitewashing orginated in the late 16th century as a "cheap white painting technique used to give a clean appearance quickly" [1] and as "efforts made to appear beautiful on the outside without changing the inside" [1] in the 19th century. The term greenwashing includes efforts to market products as environmentally friendly.[2] Mayo Fuster Morell has published a short article on wikiwashing, in which she relates this activity as "the unethics of sharing".[1] She analyses several case studies empirically with regard to the utilisation of wikiwashing strategies from Facebook, Yahoo! and Google.[1]
Values
editWikipedia was founded in 2001 as an international encyclopaedia that is based on free access and the contribution of its users. Since then it stands for and promotes various values such as openness, transparency, sharing, neutrality and collaboration. Companies, which use wikiwashing strategies, orient and associate themselves with these values.[3] The central values promoted by Wikipedia are:
- Transparency – All information should be provided by indicating the source. It should be visible where the information was retrieved.[1]
- Openness – All information should be freely accessible to any internet user. Websites such as Wikipedia provide information for anyone with an Internet connection – free of charge.[1]
- Sharing – All information should be supplied by users. They draft, compose and write informative articles on certain topics. Both experts and amateurs can contribute and submit information on fields they have certain knowledge on.[3]
- Collaboration – All information is provided through users that cooperate in writing, reviewing and correcting articles among each other. The user’s collaboration is based on open-source software.[3]
- Neutrality – All information should be supplied in an objective and neutral manner. The articles should give descriptive explanations of terms, concepts, persons, objects etc.[3]
WikiWash
editThe website and community of WikiWash emerged as a practical tool to eliminate wikiwashing practices on Wikipedia. This community takes the theoretical concept of wikiwashing as a basic foundation and acts upon it as a complementary force. WikiWash members concern themselves with wikiwashing cases on Wikipedia. They aim to support Wikipedia in maintaining its values of neutrality and transparency. Conributors try to detect, correct and eliminate wikiwashing cases, so that the content on Wikipedia remains neutral and is not compromised by misleading or false formulations. The platform WikiWash “is a free public tool that allows journalists, citizens and activists to uncover spin and bias on Wikipedia by tracking page edits in real time”.[4] This means they aid to detect alterations, deletions or additions in real time and edit false or unethical statements. The WikiWash users operate on the same principle of Wikipedia users: by cooperating and sharing information on cases with each other and trying to correct the misleading formulations collaborately. [4] The idea for WikiWash was born at the data and news conference TechRanking Toronto and the tool eventually founded by a group of journalists. Metro News Canada, The Working Group, and the Centre for Investigative Reporting collaborated to realise the project.[4]
References
edit- ^ a b c d e f g Fuster Morell, M. (2011). The Unethics of Sharing: Wikiwashing, In International Review of Information Ethics, 15.
- ^ Cambridge Dictionary. (n.d.). greenwash. Retrieved from http://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/greenwash
- ^ a b c d Encyclopaedia Britannica. (2014). Wikipedia. Retrieved from https://www.britannica.com/topic/Wikipedia
- ^ a b c WikiWash. (2016). About. Retrieved from http://wikiwash.metronews.ca/docs