Fame and Censorship -- intent to forget

[ghost]

I take issue with the section on famous individuals.

I believe they are committing an error of selection bias: their sample consists of all people with Wikipedia pages and those in the Encyclopedia Britannica -- it denotes that their fame peaks & slowly decays; yet it does not account for those individuals who may have been famous in the past, but for some reason has been entirely forgotten in present times -- enough so they don't merit a spot on Wikipedia.

An extreme counter example would be an individual who is so despicable that people at the time tried to destroy all record of their existence. Perhaps we could measure this by noting a growing use in their name over a certain time period, then a sudden complete absence in usage of that name.

The authors go on to note in the 'censorship and suppression' section specific methods of addressing these suppression of individuals, but they only succeed in doing so by measuring variation across cultures.

Are there methods of uncovering ideas and people who were actively censored across multiple cultures?

[sunnyJy]

Good point of "ruler tried to destroy material"!!