Leading Article: e-Revisionism

The idea of an online encyclopaedia that everyone is allowed to edit seems to offend every rule about the sanctity of facts. But it has taken just six years for Wikipedia to win the trust of academics, students, politicians and of course journalists the world over. So it is alarming to discover that there are forces that are trying to undermine the project by censoring the truth.

The CIA, the FBI, the Republican Party and the Labour Party have all been caught making self-serving changes to their entries. Many others, less well known for their obsession with spin, have done the same. This invaluable source of free information is now under threat. In the end, though, those who think that they can rewrite history by changing the facts to suit their own agenda will be proved wrong. The thousands of volunteers who have helped make Wikipedia the phenomenon it is are already busy putting the record straight.