mm,

I’m not sure whether you’re making a normative or a descriptive argument.

If you’re arguing normatively, that is talking about shoulds and oughts, that’s one thing. But if you’re arguing descriptively, that is arguing about the actual contents of Wikipedia’s vandalism policy, well, then there’s a mistake.

You probably didn’t read the link I provided above:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Vandalism

I think that page spells it out pretty clearly. But for avoidance of doubt, here’s another page:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Do_not_create_hoaxes

Creating hoax pages violates published Wikipedia policy.

If you want to argue that the existing policy ought to be changed, then you might make more headway doing that inside Wikipedia’s internal policy process. Because from an external viewpoint, Wikipedia’s policy is (a) not unreasonable, and (b) clearly noticed. It strikes me that it deserves respect and enforcement.

I assume the student created a new, spurious Wikipedia article about the fictional pirate. Somehow, that does not strike me as vandalism. To me, vandalism is marring an existing article, thereby ruining someone else’s work.

One might say that creating a new, purposely untrue article is to mar Wikipedia as a whole. But come on, what’s not to mar about Wikipedia? It’s wonderful in many ways, but it will never be purely serious.

I know that the Wikipedia element is only a small part of the argument against the hoax assignment, and Barbara and Anne-Marie make excellent points. But the history professor was trying a creative assignment that did elicit creative work on the part of students, so I applaud that.

The Wikipedia vandalism was a class requirement.
See http://lastamericanpirate.net/wp/?p=78

This class requirement seems to violate GMU’s “Responsible Use of Computing Policy”.

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George Mason University
Responsible Use of Computing Policy
http://www.gmu.edu/catalog/policies/#responsible_use_of_computing_policy

The Responsible Use of Computing (RUC) policy applies to all academic and operational departments and offices at all George Mason University (Mason) locations owned and leased. The policies and procedures provided herein apply to all Mason faculty, staff, students, visitors, and contractors. [...]

Rules of Use
[...]
Rule 2: Do not use computer accounts for illegitimate purposes.
[...]
Rule 5: Do not use Mason’s computing resources to violate other policies or laws.