BP (that’s “Beyond Petroleum” to you, sir) is in trouble again this week for doing the very sort of thing we’d expect it to do: using its spokesperson to rewrite nearly half of its own Wikipedia page.

The purpose of the edits was to play down the corporation’s horrible environmental record. And the accusation came only a few weeks before yet another hearing in which BP’s lawyer will try to argue that his client shouldn’t have to pay millions in “fictitious or inflated claims” related to the pending class action oil spill lawsuit.

So: move along, nothing to see here…

Of course it’s not all in-house: today PR Week reminds us that firms have been criticized for doing this sort of thing for their clients before.

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For all the talk of smartphones and tablets, you’d think every American plugs into an iPad after work each day and that millions of PCs currently sit in the corners of our homes gathering dust. Yet a recent survey conducted by Makovsky reveals that most Americans will stick with Old Reliable when it comes to their most significant expenditures: healthcare.

Despite the vast technological advances driving the evolution of healthcare around the world, healthcare communications remains a very traditional field. The message to PR pros operating in the industry is clear: Most patients prefer old-school human interactions—and tech tools will not necessarily win the day.

We have no doubt that, at some point in the relatively near future, medical research conducted via smartphone will be so easy and common that everyone from your little brother to your grandmother will wonder why they didn’t start doing it sooner. But the Americans who spend the most money on healthcare aren’t quite ready to make that leap just yet.

Here are some of the survey’s key findings: Read more

In politics — even more than most industries — PR reps strive to maintain control over the media narrative and save the most sensitive stories for release at the best possible times. On that note, the biggest news from Mitt Romney’s campaign in the coming weeks will be its official announcement of the former governor’s running mate.

Third parties and a certain former VP have advised the Romney camp to avoid the media explosion prompted by Sarah Palin’s appearance on the national stage four years ago, and the team has followed suit, aiming to divert the attention of the press by dropping big, unlikely names into the pool and encouraging friendly media outlets to run with the fake stories as they “break.”

NBC’s First Read reports that three candidates remain in the running, yet NPR and TechPresident believe that Romney’s PR camp may have revealed their hand by way of editorial activity on Wikipedia. Given the fact that traffic on any candidate’s page will shoot up in the wake of such an announcement, we find their theory credible: Last-minute edits are needed to make the potential Veep look as good as possible. So which of the frequently-named VP candidates’ pages have seen the most changes of late?

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Marcia DiStaso, assistant professor of PR at the College of Communications at Penn State University, surveyed 1,300 PR pros and they say 60 percent of Wikipedia entries contain errors about their clients. And because of rules against PRs editing Wikipedia articles, the errors can remain published for an indefinite amount of time.

According to information we received via email, DiStaso has been conducting Wikipedia research since 2006 and gathered responses from PR pros across agencies, nonprofit organizations, companies, and other groups. She told ABC News that PRs are only allowed to leave comments and wait for a public response. Ideally, Wikipedia guidelines say that should happen within five days. But nearly a quarter of respondents (24 percent) say they never heard back. More than half of respondents thought the rules should be changed.

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Top row l to r: Google, Converseon, Craigslist. Bottom row l to r: Wikipedia, Wired, and Google. Click here to get a better look at Google’s infographic.

We are losing the Internet, site by site. Google has a big black box on its logo. Wikipedia is dark. And dozens of New Yorkers may be out on the street because they can’t get to the rental listings on Craigslist.

Websites are taking their opposition to SOPA (the Stop Online Piracy Act) and PIPA (Protect IP Act) to the Web, protesting the bill by demonstrating what they think will happen should it go into effect. Still a little fuzzy on what it all means? Fast Company has got a quick summary here. A few other screenshots are available on Poynter.org.

The Guardian is liveblogging the protest, updating this webpage with a list of sites that are joining in. A full list of participants and how to turn your site into a site of protest is available on the SOPAStrike site.

After the jump, we’ve got a poll to gather your thoughts on the impact that SOPA would have on your business.

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Left to right: Adweek's Mike Chapman and Jimmy Wales Photo: Nancy Lazarus

Jimmy Wales, founder of Wikipedia and Wikia.com, talked about trust and community in an interview with Adweek editor Mike Chapman during the second day of Adweek’s Social Media Strategies conference in New York on Thursday.

Wales believes that humanizing the communities on the Internet is a solution to increasing the level of trust online. “One of the principles of trust that Wikipedia uses is to assume good faith,” according to Wales. “It turns out that most people are decent and fewer are malicious.”

Wales added,” When people answer their edits, they realize the human dimension, and the community cares if you do a good job.” He contrasted that with newspapers’ online reader comments, where “people are often badly behaved since they are interacting with a giant entity.”

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