Mark Androvich
22:51 (BST)
16/08/2007
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EA revises own wikipedia history
Expunges Hawkins, downplays lawsuit
EA has responded to news that an unnamed employee has been making revisions to the company's history on Wikipedia.
Shacknews used the Wikipedia Scanner tool on EA's Wikipedia page to match controversial changes with an IP address in a range that belongs to EA's Redwood City offices.
It found that an EA employee had deleted references to founder Trip Hawkins and had also removed paragraphs of criticism of the company.
Instead of referencing a class action lawsuit, for example, the revised entry describes the company as "having led the industry in reforming work/life balance issues that are endemic to the software industry." The entry also added a line to the effect that "many other game companies have been struck with similar lawsuits," without providing any references.
An EA spokesperson told GamesIndustry.biz that "EA sometimes updates websites with info about the company, games and employees. For example, EA has sent a correction to Yahoo Finance when they had misspelled the name of an EA executive."
While not specifically addressing the controversial changes, EA's spokesperson explained that "Many companies routinely post updates on websites like Wikipedia to ensure accuracy of their own corporate information."
According to Shacknews, the changes were subsequently revised by the Wikipedia community.
EA founder Trip Hawkins was on vacation and could not be reached for comment at the time of publication.
Update: Although most sources have attributed the story to Shacknews, Darkzero claims to have broken the news five hours earlier.
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