Wikipedia’s Porn Promoting Purgatory

Sometimes one thing leads to another and then another and then ultimately purgatory. That’s exactly where Wikipedia is finding itself after a tip on ChildLaw blog led to this FoxNews.com story which led to action by Congress and now this.
According to FoxNews.com:

The parent company of the online encyclopedia Wikipedia is rapidly purging thousands of explicit pornographic images from its websites as it prepares to announce a new policy regarding sexually explicit content in response to reporting by FoxNews.com.

The move came as FoxNews.com was in the process of asking dozens of companies that have donated to Wikimedia Foundation — the umbrella group behind Wikimedia Commons and its Wiki projects, including Wikipedia — if they were aware of the extent of graphic and sexually explicit content on the sites.

Among the donors to Wikimedia Commons who were contacted by FoxNews.com were Google, Microsoft’s Bing, Yahoo!, Open Society Institute, Ford Foundation, Best Buy, USA Networks and Craigslist Foundation.

These images were and in some cases still are easily accessible to anyone, including school children, many of whom receive unfiltered access to Wiki projects in schools across the country. A child doing homework research on the educational website could easily stumble upon pornographic photos — including close-ups of genitalia and people having sex and masturbating. There’s even a “nude children” category.

Check out the entire late breaking story here at FoxNews.com!

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