Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2014-07-30/News and notes

How many more hoaxes will Wikipedia find?

Another hoax on the English Wikipedia was uncovered this week—not by any thorough investigation, but through the self-disclosure of an anonymous change made when the editors were in their sophomore year of college. The deliberate misinformation had been in the article for over five years with plenty of individuals noticing, but not one suspected its authenticity. This leads to one obvious question: how many more are there?

Amelia Bedelia is a fictional character used by children's book author Peggy Parish and her nephew Herman Parish, who stepped in to continue the series after the former's death in 1988. Bedelia is over 50 years old and is literal-minded to the extreme. According to publisher HarperCollins, "When she makes a sponge cake, she puts in real sponges. When she weeds the garden, she replants the weeds. And when she pitches a tent, she throws it into the woods!" The New York Times Book Review noted that "No child can resist Amelia and her literal trips through the minefield of the English language—and no adult can fail to notice that she's usually right when she's wrong." Writer Cynthia Samuels continued:

However, Peggy Parish would likely be the first to tell her readers that her main character was not based on a maid in Cameroon.

Nor did she spend some "formative years" there.

Yet this is precisely what the Wikipedia article on Amelia Bedelia had said since January 2009: "Amelia Bedelia's character is based on a maid in Cameroon, where the author spent some time during her formative years. Her vast collection of hats, notorious for their extensive plumage, inspired Parish to write an assortment of tales based on her experiences in North Africa."