Wikipedia's first sentence called it “lawyer and a chief partner of boies”. Today it says “american lawyer who is the chairman of the law firm boies schiller flexner llp”. The one-line description Wikipedia serves to search engines and AI systems read “American lawyer and chairman”. It now reads “American lawyer (born 1941)”.
Measured, not asserted. Every count, date and revision on this page was taken from Wikipedia's own history and checked against the live article. The words quoted are theirs.
Machine-checked against the full current article on 2026-08-03.
We saved snapshots of this article over twenty years; you are reading the 2005 one. Red dashes: removed from Wikipedia since.Pale dots: rewritten; the numbered note shows what it says now.Red text: written in or rewritten since the previous snapshot.1 tap a number or a side note to jump between them
The opening as it read in 2005
David Boies (born March 11 , 1941 ) is a lawyer and a chief partner of Boies, Schiller & Flexner .1He has been involved in a number of high-profile cases in the United States.2Boies attended the University of Redlands, and studied law at Northwestern and Yale. He received a B.S. from Northwestern in 1964, an LL.B. magna cum laude from Yale in 1966, an LL.M. from New York University 1967, and an LL.D. from the University of Redlands in 2000. He helped defend IBM in an antitrust case, and years later famously took the "other side" by representing the Justice Department in the United States v. Following the 2000 U.S. presidential election , he represented Vice President Al Gore in the ensuing unsuccessful legal battle and participated in Bush v. He has also, unsuccessfully, defended Napster when the company was sued by the RIAA for facilitating copyright infringement. As of November 2003 , he is representing deposed Chief Financial Officer of Enron , Andrew Fastow , and has been retained by the SCO Group in their pursuit of alleged infringement of their rights to the UNIX intellectual properties . He is also representing Lord Black of Crossharbour regarding the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission and the Ontario Securities Commission probes of Hollinger International 's disclosure of $32 million (U.S.) in unauthorized payments to Black, fellow executives, and parent company Hollinger Inc.3
This is Wikipedia's own text, saved in our repository. Their copy of it is revision 15934422.
The opening as it stood in 2010 8 passages from the previous snapshot no longer appear
David Boies (born March 11, 1941) is a lawyer and Chairman of Boies, Schiller & Flexner .He has been involved in various high-profile cases in the United States .
Red text was written in or rewritten since the previous snapshot. Their copy is revision 367378733.
The opening as it stood in 2015
David Boies (born March 11, 1941) is an American lawyer and chairman of the law firm Boies, Schiller & Flexner . He has been involved in various high-profile cases in the United States .
Red text was written in or rewritten since the previous snapshot. Their copy is revision 667173192.
The opening as it stood in 2020 1 passage from the previous snapshot no longer appear
American lawyer and chairman David Boies ( / b ɔɪ z / ; born March 11, 1941) is an American lawyer and chairman of the law firm Boies, Schiller & Flexner .Boies rose to national prominence for three major cases: leading the U.S. federal government's successful prosecution of Microsoft in United States v.Microsoft Corp. , his unsuccessful representation of Democratic presidential candidate Al Gore in Bush v.Gore , and for successful representation of the plaintiff in Hollingsworth v.Perry , which invalidated California Proposition 8 banning same-sex marriage.Boies has defended numerous other high-profile clients in the United States , including Theranos , tobacco companies, and Harvey Weinstein .American Academy of Achievement .
Red text was written in or rewritten since the previous snapshot. Their copy is revision 964139951.
The opening as it stood on October 6, 2023 1 passage from the previous snapshot no longer appear
American lawyer and chairman David Boies ( / b ɔɪ z / ; born March 11, 1941) is an American lawyer and chairman of the law firm Boies Schiller Flexner LLP . Boies rose to national prominence for three major cases: leading the U.S. federal government's successful prosecution of Microsoft in United States v. Microsoft Corp. , his unsuccessful representation of Democratic presidential candidate Al Gore in Bush v. Gore , and for successful representation of the plaintiff in Hollingsworth v. Perry , which invalidated California Proposition 8 banning same-sex marriage. Boies has also represented various clients in US lawsuits, including Theranos , tobacco companies, Harvey Weinstein , and Jeffrey Epstein 's victims including Virginia Roberts Giuffre . American Academy of Achievement .
Red text was written in or rewritten since the previous snapshot. Their copy is revision 1166630492.
The opening as it stood in 2025
American lawyer (born 1941) David Boies ( / b ɔɪ z / BOYZ ; born March 11, 1941) is an American lawyer and also chairman of the law firm Boies Schiller Flexner LLP . Boies rose to national prominence for three major cases: leading the U.S. federal government's successful prosecution of Microsoft in United States v. Microsoft Corp. , his unsuccessful representation of Democratic presidential candidate Al Gore in Bush v. Gore , and for successful representation of the plaintiff in Hollingsworth v. Perry , which invalidated California Proposition 8 banning same-sex marriage. Boies has also represented various clients in U.S. lawsuits, including Theranos , tobacco companies, Harvey Weinstein , and Jeffrey Epstein 's victims including Virginia Roberts Giuffre . American Academy of Achievement .
Red text was written in or rewritten since the previous snapshot. Their copy is revision 1297502083. This is our newest snapshot; the live article may have moved again since.
Today
Wikipedia's first sentence called it “lawyer and a chief partner of boies”. Today it says “american lawyer who is the chairman of the law firm boies schiller flexner llp”. The one-line description Wikipedia serves to search engines and AI systems read “American lawyer and chairman”. It now reads “American lawyer (born 1941)”. Read the current article and compare.
2005
2010
2015
2020
Oct '23
2025
Counts in the opening at each snapshot. Green: the word gained ground. Red: it was cut. Grey: no change.
What Wikipedia says this is
Every article opens by defining its subject. This one was redefined since 2005, and today's defining sentence is their current revision.
Then
lawyer and a chief partner of boies
Now
american lawyer who is the chairman of the law firm boies schiller flexner llp
Struck red text is no longer in the article; dotted amber text was rewritten. Every revision id links to Wikipedia's copy; the text shown is our own saved copy. Data: /data. Wikipedia text is CC BY-SA; quoted for the record; not affiliated with Wikipedia.
