Thursday, February 7, 2008

Controversy Over Wikipedia’s Use Of Muhammad Image

According to the International Herald Tribune, the depiction of Prophet Muhammad in Wikipedia’s article on the subject has triggered an online petition. The goal of the petition, which according to IHT collected more than 80,000 “signatures” (including many anonymous ones), is to remove the image of Muhammad citing a “prohibition in Islam on images of people.” IHT quotes from an FAQ explaining Wikipedia’s “polite but firm” refusal to remove the image:

Since Wikipedia is an encyclopedia with the goal of representing all topics from a neutral point of view, Wikipedia is not censored for the benefit of any particular group.

Currently, the Wikipedia page in question is protected from editing, meaning, according to Wikipedia, “editing on the page has been restricted to either registered users or administrators.”

[Thanks DPic!]

Update: Mathias Schindler of Wikimedia in the comments points to the Wikipedia FAQ on the subject mentioned above. [Thanks Mathias!]

Controversy Over Wikipedi ... by Philipp Lenssen | Comments (1+38)

>> More posts

Advertisement