Reply #14: The Wikipedia article on "Naked short selling"

[Jim Lane]

The article on is unusual in that it was the subject of an extraordinary amount of contention, including at least one lengthy arbitration proceeding, allegations of violations of Wikipedia rules, etc. It's now one of the tiny fraction of all Wikipedia articles to be on article probation, a heightened level of scrutiny. (BTW, other such articles include those on DU and Free Republic, but even those two combined haven't attracted the furor this one has.)

Anyone who wants all the details of the Wikipedia dispute can read the . Well, if you want all the details, you'll also have to read the associated talk page and the Evidence page and even the Evidence page's associated talk page.

The article linked in the OP was written during a brief period last fall when the article was fully protected, meaning that it couldn't be edited except by the Wikipedia admins, of whom there are, at this writing, 1,632. (In other words, it's more like the corps of mods at DU than like the "admins" here.)

The article is currently "semi-protected". That means that, unlike most Wikipedia articles, you can't edit it without registering. You have to register an account and wait a few days. There's no procedure of reviewing your new account to determine if you're sensible or a disruptor; just create the account and wait, and you can edit. (If you do disrupt, of course, your new account will be swiftly blocked.)

Protection, whether semi-protection or full protection, doesn't affect your ability to read the article or its history, though. Go to and click on the "history" tab at the top, and you can review each and every edit that's ever been made. You can also click on the "discussion" tab and see the editors wrangling with each other over the points in dispute.

The March 20 edit -- in case B o d i or anyone else is dying of curiosity -- added a sentence to the caption of the "Schematic representation of naked short selling in two steps" illustration. The caption now reads: "The short seller sells shares without owning them. He then purchases and delivers the shares for a different market price. If the short seller cannot afford the shares in the second step, or the shares are not available, a 'fail to deliver' results." The most recent edit added the final sentence. This edit was the product of that began on March 9.