Somebody keeps censoring Ronnie Segev‘s wiki entry, could it be Reputation Defender?

After our post, “Ronnie Segev & ReputationDefender Can Eat A Dick,” Alex, a Consumerist commenter updated Ronnie Segev’s Wikipedia entry to reflect his arrest and his hiring of Reputation Defender to delete all internet traces of that arrest.

Then, two anonymous IP users came along and deleted Alex’s additions. They marked Alex’s edits as “slander.” Their username’s only actions have been to revert Ronnie Segev’s wiki entry.

What’s interesting is that “slander” is a favorite word of Reputation Defender, appearing repeatedly in their About page.

The revision comments seem to escalate in anger, as Alex keeps replacing the text they undo, so far peaking at, “slanderous bloggers are not a valid source.” Ouch!

Alex writes, “If anyone wants to help me keep the page updated to its most accurate version, I’d appreciate it.”

UPDATE: Reputation Defender denies any responsibility for Wikipedia deletions.

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How’s this for a valid source? A direct copy of the original NYPOST article, which seems to be missing from their archives for some reason…

PIANIST THROWN IN PEN FOR HARPING

A meek but persistent concert pianist was tossed in jail after repeatedly demanding a refund from Priceline.com .

In a bizarre tale of “extreme customer service,” Juilliard-trained Ronnie Segev sued Priceline earlier this month alleging the corporate giant billed him for a $953 plane ticket he never purchased, then had its top lawyer call the cops after he phoned 215 times to ask for his money back.

Segev, who has played Carnegie Hall, was handcuffed and hauled out of his Hell’s Kitchen apartment building early one morning in May.

The cops hit him with 215 counts of harassment — one for each call he made to Connecticut-based Priceline from January until his arrest.

“I tried to talk to them,” he said, shaking his head. “Now I get the chills every time I see a Priceline commercial.”

A judge later dismissed the charges, but not before Segev spent 40 hours in a Manhattan holding cell with hardened criminals who laughed at him, threatened him and tried to steal his fancy watch and sneakers.

[via Comedian]

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Ronnie Segev’s recent wiki edit history:

22:58, 12 January 2007 Dogooder021 (Talk | contribs) (

Life – rev back. additions were not helpful, and libelous)

15:35, 12 January 2007 Hearty000 m (

Life – reverted…prev changes were not relevant, and were potentially slanderous (also not well sourced))

08:19, 13 January 2007 DanteComedy (Talk | contribs) (Undo revision 100322844 by Dogooder021 (talk) Revisions were acurate and well documented, therefore neither unhelpful nor libelous.)

14:44, 13 January 2007 Hearty000 (Talk | contribs) m (

Life – rev back to long-term content. slanderous bloggers are not a valid source.)

15:17, 13 January 2007 24.239.152.19 (Talk) (Added in history that Reptuation Defender keeps trying to delete and mark as slanderous.)

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UPDATE: Just got this note from Reputation Defender, defending their reputation:

“We are writing to you with the aim of clearing up a few things. ReputationDefender does not delete content from Wikipedia. If and when ReputationDefender contributes to Wikipedia, we do so only by adding factually accurate and independently vetted information. We have not edited or sought to edit the Wikipedia entry for Ronen Segev in any way at any time. We are updating the FAQ on our site to state more clearly our policy on Wikipedia content. Again, no one on our staff has attempted to edit the Wikipedia article in this case.”

— BEN POPKEN

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