Digital Is folks will want to muse on this Atlantic piece

Okay, so I posted about The Atlantic article that discussed T. Mills Kelly's Lying About the Past course at George Mason and discussed some of what was learned about communities like the editors at Wikipedia and Reddit. I also commented in this thread about my ambivalence about the assignment, despite my appreciation. And I did mean ambivalence in all its connotions.

So, now I feel responsible for passing along continued coverage of the story since Mills Kelly has not become such a target for internet flaming that he has needed to unplug his blogs, Twitter accounts, etc. The flaming started with the comments on The Atlantic piece, and no doubt continued in more personal online spaces.

In response, Spencer Roberts posted a thoughtful response and annalysis at his blog Digital History and Beyond. Worth a read. For those just catching up on the story, I quote Spencer's summary of the assignment and class at the center of the controversy...with very useful links:

Kelly’s students are tasked with creating a historical hoax that connects with factual events, but fills in some gaps to provide a history of their own making. The first round took place in fall 2008. Kelly warned the world that the hoax was forthcoming. The project proceeded as scheduled, and when the hoax took in a few members of the historical community and received a negative backlash, Kelly reminded us that we had been warned. Then hereminded us again. The main controversy was that his students had created a fictitious character, Edward Owens, and accompanying Wikipedia page about him. Co-Founder of Wikipedia, Jimmy Wales, was personally outraged when he heard, which prompted another responsefrom Kelly. The hoax made waves, to say the least, and people began to discuss the validity of a learning experience that involves dishonesty.

Round Two of “Lying about the Past” kicked off in spring 2012, and Kellydutifully warned the world again. On April 29th, 2012, the students launched their carefully crafted hoax on Reddit. Unfortunately, the members of Reddit proved much more savvy than the crowd in 2008, and the hoax was uncovered in about 26 minutes. Kelly posted about the event, noting the probable reasons that Reddit was so quick to unravel the web. When Kelly wrote that post on May 14th, it seemed the class had successfully perpetrated their hoax for 26 minutes, been successfully challenged by the Redditors, and had little impact in the larger community.

The next day, Yoni Appelbaum covered the story in The Atlantic, providing the background and thoroughly discussing the approach and usefulness of such a class activity. Kelly’s purpose was to challenge his students to think of research and knowledge differently; in that respect, his course was quite successful. In the comments that followed Appelbaum’s article, however, Kelly received a verbal lashing. One commenter called him “pond scum” while an email directly to Kelly used the term “sociopathic.”

Hop over and read his piece.