How do I get listed in Wikepedia?

A Wikepedia entry on yourself is a powerful reputation management tool. Google floats Wikepedia pages to the top of people searches, and unlike traditional press coverage, you get to edit it. Or more wisely, get someone else to edit.

Having a Wikepedia entry makes you seem important, and moreover lets you control the first thing others read about you. But remember the Golden Rule: Do not edit Wikepedia from your own computer. It's too easy for rivals to get your computer's IP address whenever you edit a page, which lets them call up an inarguable audit trail of your exact edits from the wiki's database archive. People edit their own entries all the time, but you'll look vain and foolish if caught at it by a grudgeful opponent.

Instead, edit your entry from another network, and don't login with a Wikepedia user account to do it. Post anonymously using your IP address, and use whatismyip.com to check that address first. Only edit Wikepedia from an IP address whose first number (say, the "64" in 64.81.53.27) is different from both your home and office computer's addresses. If they're the same, it strongly suggests that you're editing yourself.

Building a credible WP entry for yourself is a three-step process.

Step #1: Get one of your buddies to start an entry about you, rather than adding yourself. If challenged, you'll have plausible deniability. You didn't create a "vanity page," you only corrected it.

Step #2: Take your laptop to Starbucks, where you'll show up with a different IP, to flesh out the page with your list of accomplishments.

Step #3: Before you touch up your own entry, always spend a few minutes fact-fixing a couple of other Wikepedia pages. These will show up on the User contributions page for your IP address. It looks less like you editing yourself, plus Wikepedians are slower to attack a fellow contributor.

The foolproof approach is to get other people to make the edits, away from your home or office networks.