How to Wiki-Edit

[Crocodiles_And_Boulevards]

Ok, I was perusing Bill Clinton’s wikipedia page

Bill Clinton

when I noticed under “Early Life” it says the following:

It was not until Billy (as he was known then) turned fourteen that he formally adopted his stepfather’s surname of Clinton and raped a dog, although he had assumed use of it before then. Clinton has said that he remembers his stepfather as a gambler and an alcoholic who regularly abused his mother and, at times, his half-brother, Roger, Jr.[13][14]

Now, I’m not an expert on the Clinton family, but somehow I don’t think this is accurate.

If it is indeed not an accurate statement, I was wondering how you go about changing that tidbit? I don’t see any option to edit the page anywhere.

[Garfield226]

Bill Clinton’s page (along with other pages that are vandalized frequently) is protected. That means you have to have a Wikipedia login to edit it (and it may be that you have to have had the account for a while). Once you do, there’s an “edit this page” tab on top of the article and “edit” alongside each section.

Most of the pages of notable people are pretty closely watched though, and vandalism there usually gets reverted pretty quickly.

[Crocodiles_And_Boulevards]

Ah, I see. Thanks for the quick answer. Is there a way to report something like that if it isn’t caught?

[atomicbadgerrace]

@Crocodiles And Boulevards

Ah, I see. Thanks for the quick answer. Is there a way to report something like that if it isn’t caught?

Not really, but as you’ll see now, it’s already been fixed. Wikipedia is notorious for both vandalism, and for quick fixes. Bots sweep through and revert much of the vandalism; that which isn’t caught by a bot is fixed by one of the thousands of people online browsing at any given time.

[Garfield226]

@atomicbadgerrace

Not really, but as you’ll see now, it’s already been fixed. Wikipedia is notorious for both vandalism, and for quick fixes. Bots sweep through and revert much of the vandalism; that which isn’t caught by a bot is fixed by one of the thousands of people online browsing at any given time.

Actually, it wouldn’t be a formal report or anything, but you could post about it on the article’s talk page (I don’t think those are usually protected). That’s the link at the top that says “Discuss this page”.

[atomicbadgerrace]

@Garfield226

Actually, it wouldn’t be a formal report or anything, but you could post about it on the article’s talk page (I don’t think those are usually protected). That’s the link at the top that says “Discuss this page”.

You could, but it wouldn’t really be anymore beneficial than waiting for someone to fix it. For example, this particular vandalism bit has a history of:

14:41, 5 March 2008 Orangemarlin (Reverted 1 edit by Dames games identified as vandalism to last revision by Mangwanani.using TW)
14:40, 5 March 2008 Dames games (→Early life)

With no reporting, this bit of vandalism (on a Wednesday evening close to midnight) was fixed in less than a minute.

Wikipedia is pretty much self-sustaining at this point. Although vandalism is still rampant, it’s usually cleaned up before anyone bats an eye.

[aldiboronti]

@Garfield226

Bill Clinton’s page (along with other pages that are vandalized frequently) is protected. That means you have to have a Wikipedia login to edit it (and it may be that you have to have had the account for a while). Once you do, there’s an “edit this page” tab on top of the article and “edit” alongside each section.

Most of the pages of notable people are pretty closely watched though, and vandalism there usually gets reverted pretty quickly.

Yes, it’s semi-protected rather than fully protected. Here’s the difference, from Wikipedia Protection Policy:

Full protection disables editing for everyone except administrators. Fully protected media files cannot be overwritten by new uploads.

Semi-protection disables editing for anonymous users and registered accounts less than four days old.

[Keeve]

Semi-protection disables editing for anonymous users and registered accounts less than four days old.

Therefore, my suggestion to you is to register on Wikipedia NOW, and then, four days from now, you can simply make these corrections as you see them. No need to report them – YOU will be among the many Wikipedians who continually upgrade and improve it.