On 6 February 2012, photography and ICT student Alan MacMasters attended a university lecture where the class was cautioned against using Wikipedia as a source. The lecturer mentioned that his friend had falsely claimed to be the inventor of the toaster on the Wikipedia page. Following the lecture, Alan and his friends edited the Wikipedia toaster article, replacing the lecturer’s friend’s name with Alan MacMasters, alleging he invented the toaster in Edinburgh, Scotland, in 1893.
A year later, one of the friends, Alex, expanded the prank by creating a dedicated Wikipedia article for Alan MacMasters, including a manipulated image to resemble a 19th-century photograph. The article falsely claimed that MacMasters also invented the electric kettle and linked the toaster to one of Britain's earliest fatal appliance fires.
Despite Alex’s intention for the article to be a joke, it was taken seriously by various newspapers, encyclopedias, government agencies, and even the Hagley Museum and Library in Delaware. These entities perpetuated the false story, and Alex used their citations to further legitimize the hoax. The fabricated story gained significant traction, with a primary school dedicating a day to MacMasters, and he was even nominated to appear on a £50 note following a Bank of England request for nominations. The tale was also cited during the 2014 Scottish independence referendum as an example of Scottish innovation.
In July 2022, a 15-year-old Redditor named Adam discovered the hoax when he found the photo on the Wikipedia page was edited. He reported this on the Internet forum Wikipediocracy, leading to the revelation that the entire article was fraudulent. Wikipedia administrators subsequently deleted the page, and Alex’s account was blocked. Alex later admitted that he had not anticipated the prank would cause significant harm, realizing its impact only when he saw MacMasters listed in a book about Victorian inventors.
The true inventor of the electric toaster is Charles Strite, who, working in Stillwater, Oklahoma, developed the appliance to ensure workers received evenly toasted bread.[1][2][3][4][5]
Origin
editOn 6 February 2012, photography and ICT student Alan MacMasters was at a university lecture where the class was warned not to use Wikipedia as a source. Additionally, the lecturer pointed out that his friend had edited the Wikipedia article about toasters, falsely claiming she was the inventor.[1][2][3]
After the lecture, Alan and his friends visited the toaster article on Wikipedia, where one of his friends, Alex, edited the article to replace the lecturer's friend's name with Alan MacMasters, claiming he invented the toaster in Edinburgh, Scotland, in 1893.[1][2][3]
A year later, Alex contemplated the extent to which he could escalate the prank. In February 2013, he created an article dedicated to Alan MacMasters, including an image of himself manipulated to resemble a 19th century photograph, and published it on Wikipedia.[1][2][3]
In the article, Alex mentioned that the product was not commercially successful. He also attributed the invention of the electric kettle to MacMasters and suggested that the toaster had contributed to one of Britain’s earliest fatal appliance fires. One fabricated anecdote recounted a woman whose kitchen table caught fire after the toaster's heating elements melted.[2][4]
Alex intended the article as a jest; however, newspapers, encyclopedias, government agencies, and the Hagley Museum and Library in Delaware perpetuated the false story of MacMasters as the inventor, where Alex then used these articles citing MacMasters as the inventor of the toaster to further propagate the false information.[1] Moreover, a primary school dedicated a day to MacMasters, and he was nominated to appear on a £50 note by an individual who responded to a request for nominations from the Bank of England. During the 2014 Scottish independence referendum, Scottish Government-funded organizations cited Alan’s story as evidence of how an independent Scotland could succeed.[3][2]
Discovery
editIn July 2022, a 15-year-old Redditor named Adam posted an explanation, revealing that the photo on the Alan MacMasters Wikipedia page was edited and not a legitimate photo. This discovery was prompted after his teacher spoke about MacMasters in class, and Adam searched him up.[2] However, he was unaware that the entire article itself was a hoax. Adam reported his concern on the Internet forum Wikipediocracy, where users discovered the article’s fraudulent nature and alerted Wikipedia administrators, who promptly marked the page for deletion. Alex’s Wikipedia account, which he used to perpetrate the hoax, was subsequently blocked from the platform.[1][2][3][4]
Alex anonymously told Wikipediocracy that he initially thought the prank wouldn’t cause much harm. He described the first time he realized the prank was harmful was when he read a book about Victorian inventors and found Alan MacMasters listed as one of the inventors.[2]
The inventor credited with the creation of the electric toaster is Charles Strite. Working as a manufacturer in Stillwater, Oklahoma, Strite observed that workers often received burnt toast during breaks. This inspired him to develop an appliance capable of toasting bread evenly, thus addressing the issue of burnt toast.[5]
See also
editReferences
edit- ^ a b c d e f Silva, Marco (18 November 2022). "Alan MacMasters: How the great online toaster hoax was exposed". BBC. Retrieved 2 June 2024.
- ^ a b c d e f g h i Cant, Ash (23 November 2022). "Alan MacMasters, the man the world thought invented the toaster". The New Daily. Retrieved 2 June 2024.
- ^ a b c d e f Felton, James (22 November 2022). "15-Year-Old Uncovers Major Wikipedia Toaster Hoax That Fooled The Media For Years". IFLScience. Retrieved 2 June 2024.
- ^ a b c Rauwerda, Annie (12 August 2022). "A long-running Wikipedia hoax and the problem of circular reporting". Input. Archived from the original on 4 September 2022. Retrieved 2 June 2024.
- ^ a b "The Demise of Burnt Toast: The Invention of the Pop-up Toaster". Hennepin History Museum. 10 September 2018. Retrieved 7 June 2024.
External links
edit- Archived article and deletion discussion on Wikipedia
- List of hoaxes on Wikipedia