Wikipedia Warned Writers Owning Cryptocurrency of Conflict of Interest Update

The largest digital multilingual free-content information platform Wikipedia has updated its policy to add digital currency to the section titled conflict of interest. It states that the conflict of interest may arise, among other things, when a crypto trader edits a page devoted to this financial technology.    

“Any external relationship—personal, religious, political, academic, legal, or financial (including holding a cryptocurrency)—can trigger a COI. How close the relationship needs to be before it becomes a concern on Wikipedia is governed by common sense. For example, an article about a band should not be written by the band’s manager, and a biography should not be an autobiography or written by the subject’s spouse,” the latest policy update says.

Being a logically justified statement, it also contains a paradox. There is no surprise that people, who own and trade it on the cryptocurrency market, have a better knowledge of the fintech trends. Furthermore, it is ridiculous to talk about biased attitude in the cases of bitcoin, ethereum, or litecoin. Nevertheless, the new update seems useful while considering small virtual coins like stellar and verge, as biases can directly affect people’s opinions.

Undoubtedly, there have already been some attempts to change the content of some articles about crypto coins in order to create certain kind of impression. For instance, the page on bitcoin cash has been edited a dozen times to represent different points of view.