Andrew Orlowski (born 1966 in Britain, currently based in San Francisco) has been an investigative journalist and columnist for The Register since 2000.
In 1992 he started an alternative newspaper in Manchester, England called "Badpress", and also wrote for Private Eye.
In April 2003, he coined the term Googlewashing to describe the potential for well-linked weblogs to obscure the original meaning of a controversial expression (e.g., "the Second Superpower"). He later classified this[1] along with "absurd intellectual property claims" as an example of an unwarranted assumption of power or authority to gain sociological advantage on behalf of a particular lobby group. This factor is the core of what makes a story "great", he argues.
In December, 2004 he was invited to assemble a panel on techno-utopianism at Harvard Law School's Berkman Center for Internet and Society.
Orlowski argues that utopianism distracts attention and diverts capital away from solving real infrastructure problems[2] "Technology can help us," he writes on his FAQ page[3]. "But we venerate the machines we have, which aren't very good, and worse, limit ourselves to seeing the world through this machine metaphor. Technology is useful when it makes something we already like to do easier. Technology can't tell us something we don't know. Technology cannot solve problems that don't exist."
Criticism of Wikipedia
Orlowski has been described as a "professional troll" by Jimmy Wales with regard to several generally hostile articles about Wikipedia in the online IT newspaper The Register. In reply to one, Wales wrote, "Excellent article! Well balanced and thoughtful! Ok, well, entertaining anyway."
In these articles, Orlowski called Wikipedia editors "wikifiddlers"[4], or "wiki wankers", and "pediaphiles", perhaps a pun on pedophiles.
External links
References/External links
- ^ Andrew Orlowski's FAQ
- ^ Andrew Orlowski, Six Things you need to know about Bubble 2.0, The Register, 7th October 2005.
- ^ Andrew Orlowski, "Wiki-fiddlers defend Clever Big Book", The Register, 23 July 2004.
- ^ Andrew Orlowski, "Why Wikipedia isn't like Linux", The Register, 27 October 2005
- ^ Andrew Orlowski, "Wikipedia founder admits to serious quality problems", The Register, 18 October 2005
- ^ Andrew Orlowski, "Buckminster Fuller on stamp duty", The Register, The Register, 14 July 2004
- ^ Andrew Orlowski, "Wikipedia: magic, monkeys and typewriters", The Register, 24 October 2005
- ^ Nicholas G. Carr, "The amorality of Web 2.0"
- ^ George Haff, "More Wikipedia Weakness", 20 September 2005
- ^ Robert McHenry, "The Faith-Based Encyclopedia", Tech Central Station, 15 November 2004
- ^ Andrew Orlowski, "Wikipedia 'to make universities obsolete'", The Register, 07 September 2004.
- ^ Andrew Orlowski, "Wikipedia's Emergent People fail to impress readers", The Register, 15 September 2004.
- ^ User:Jeremygbyrne/Wiki-fiddler
- ^ Gavin Clarke, "Wikipedia eclipses CIA", The Register, 7th September 2005