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Ad will collapse in seconds CLOSE January 31, 2017 01/31/2017 10:39 a.m. By Madison Malone Kircher

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On Tuesday night, thenacting attorney general Sally Yates was fired after ordering Justice Department lawyers to not comply with Trumps recent immigration ban on people from seven, primarily Muslim, nations. In her place, President Trump appointed Dana Boente, United States Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia. Boente will serve as acting AG until Jeff Sessions is (theoretically) confirmed by the Senate. But while the Trump administration was busy shuffling things around at the Department of Justice, and media organizations were hustling to send out push notification after push notification, a few unknown people on the internet were dealing with the news in their own way: editing Yatess and Boentes Wikipedia pages.

While Yatess page was edited to label her a god damned American hero, Boentes edits werent quite so laudatory. Instead, Boentes anonymous editor described him as the newest sock puppet for the Trump administration. (Worth noting: Wikipedia entries are often the first piece of information that Google pulls up about a person. If you Googled Boentes name for a brief period of time last night, youd have seen the sock puppet sentence beside the new acting AGs birthday and headshot.)

Boente and Yates arent the only two who have seen Wikipedia tweaks in light of the inauguration. Earlier this month, somebody changed White House press secretary Sean Spicers Wikipedia photo to a shot of notoriously mendacious Iraqi spokesman Muhammad Saeed al-Sahhaf, better known online as Baghdad Bob.

And in a creative play on a joke that just wont die, another person changed the Wikipedia entry for invertebrates to include a photo of Paul Ryan. Because he doesnt have a spine. [Pause here for eye-rolling and groaning.]

The concept of Wikipedia-edit-as-gag isnt a new one just ask any nerdy teen who had access to a computer in 2007 and some time to kill but it can also be a decent way to gauge public tenor and concern. When Hillary Clintons campaign team teased the announcement of Tim Kaine as her running mate, Wikipedia edits on his page increased significantly, while edits on other potential candidates dropped off. And unlike the announcement of Sarah Palin as John McCains VP in 2008, when Palins page saw a rise in edits from the same users who were also simultaneously editing McCains (possibly linking them to the campaign), the edits to Kaines page seemed to come from Wikipedia users genuinely interested in keeping Wikipedia up to date with the current political news. And for those users right now, that news includes Sally Yates as hero, Dana Boente as sock puppet, and Paul Ryan as, well, a jellyfish.

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Wikipedia Edits Are the Only Joy in These Fraught Political Times - New York Magazine