Submissions/History of the Murder of Meredith Kercher Article

This is a rejected submission for Wikimania 2012.

Submission no.

38

Title of the submission: History of the Murder of Meredith Kercher Article

Type of submission (workshop, tutorial, panel, presentation): Presentation

Author of the submission: Joseph W Bishop

E-mail address: Bishopj@aol.com

Username: PhanuelB

Country of origin: USA

Affiliation, if any (organization, company etc.)

Personal homepage or blog

Abstract (at least 300 words to describe your proposal)

The Murder of Meredith Kercher article may well be the most contentious in Wikipedia’s history. The case involved the highly publicized and controversial trial of Seattle college student Amanda Knox and her then Italian boyfriend Raffaele Sollecito in Perugia, Italy for the murder of British exchange student Meredith Kercher. Before being freed on appeal in October 2011 the two had been demonized in the European tabloid press and subjected to a show trial that was widely condemned by experts in the US and other nations. For a nearly two year period Wikipedia became a central player in the dissemination of false and misleading information about the case.

With 36 archived talk pages in only a three year period, the repudiation of the Wikipedia content by the authors of four books about the subject, a dozen editors indefinitely blocked, and the extraordinary intervention of Jimbo Wales (fully endorsing the complaints of an online petition signed by 400 people) the article provides an excellent case study in how to approach the most contentious topics.

The presentation will be given by one of the indefinitely blocked editors. We are not Scientologists or LaRouche followers; we are dedicated Wikipedians who will not back away or apologize for challenging the infiltration of Wikipedia by those with an agenda of demonizing two innocent college students.

To quote Jimmy Wales, “Is it true that people have been banned for completely neutral edits? Yes. Is it true that reliable sources have been systematically excluded? Yes.”

The recommendations on how to avoid such problems in the future may surprise the audience. Wikipedia has done so much good for the world, but in a handful or areas they may need to listen more carefully to responsible voices of dissent.

Track

Length of presentation/talk: 25 Minutes

Will you attend Wikimania if your submission is not accepted?: Yes

Slides or further information (optional): Yes

Special request as to time of presentations

Interested attendees

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Sj (talk) Awesome topic. Have you also considered organizing an informal lunch event/workshop about this?
CT Cooper · talk 18:37, 19 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Varnent (talk) 07:26, 1 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Johnbod (talk) 02:34, 15 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
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