Thanks for stopping by, Mr. Gorman. I suppose it’s an honor to have the man who wrote “It is entirely possible that [bloggers'] intellectual needs are met by an accumulation of random facts and paragraphs.” imply that I’m being snide.

Perhaps “misquote” is the right word and perhaps it isn’t (read the quote again, and see what you think: citebite link, original New Yorker article). More the point, it is typical of your style of argumentation, where you don’t engage with real people and what they really said. Instead you prefer to treat other people as easily-parodied cardboard cut-outs, to whom you can attribute whatever opinions you wish. In short, while you lecture us all on the proper uses of authority and research and the like, when it comes right down to it, you prefer ad hominem attacks and ex cathedra pronouncements to actual reasoned, researched arguments.

There are plenty of perfectly valid critiques that can be made of Google, Wikipedia, etc., if you would just take the time to actually understand what you were talking about first. From reading your opinion pieces, it sounds as if you have never actually used the Internet, but are basing your opinions on things you read in publications like the New Yorker.

Google :1 Michael Gorman: 0

I am unsure why he now says that the statement in the New Yorker is “unrefuted”. There is no issue of refutation here at all. The New Yorker said that I cite the statement frequently, and of course I do… but left out the context of my full discussion of the issue.

There are many examples of me joking about this test, and discussing the proper approach to using evidence from Google, in many speeches and talks, and of course the evidence of the actual discussion of the concept in Wikipedia itself is open for anyone to review.

And a serious review of it reveals quite quickly that neither my position, nor that of Wikipedia, can be reasonably characterized as evidencing anything like the absurd belief that if something is not in Wikipedia, it doesn’t exist.

I did not “misquote” Mr. Wales. I read that he had said those words in public speeches in the New Yorker article. It’s probably counter to the snide ethic of blogs, but I chose to accept his statement that, despite the unrefuted statement in the New Yorker, he had not said and did not believe those words.

Michael Gorman