I have been watching the Wikipedia story unfold with great interest. I know that many turn their noses up at this ‘militia encyclopedia’ because of its inherent problem: sometimes contributors either do not know what they are talking about or they are not entering information in good faith.
And yet I often find it is my first port of call when I want some information on a non-critical subject because it is just so damn usable. True, I often tend to cross check data with other sources but if it is regarding a subject I already have some knowledge of (say I want to jog my memory about some detail of the war of the Spanish Succession) or fairly trivial (such as what is Eliza Dushku’s ethnic background (and the answer is Albanian)) I usually just use Wikipedia rather hunt for a book or look elsewhere online.
I have no idea how Wikipedia will develop in the long run but it is already an astonishing example of user-generated content that explodes so many long held notions of value exchange and ‘commons’ that I have a feeling that looking back in twenty or thirty years we may see this experiment as one of the internet’s ‘Gutenberg moments’.
When I first heard the description “militia encyclopedia” I thought it was meant as a compliment. I still think of it that way, personally.
It depends on the subject really. Looking up political issues or current events or contentious issues are often a bit iffy, subject to bias and incessant vandalism. But for some subjects Wikipedia is very, very good.
Doing a computer science course at the moment, Wikipedia is very good for that. I often read it after a lecture, its more readable than the lecture notes, and I’ve not noticed it significantly disagree with other sources before on the subject of IT.
Here’s an interesing Wikipedia entry: Samizdata
This idea that Wikipedia is somehow less reliable than paid encyclopedias on political topics is very strange. I grew up in a household where Brittanica was banished because of the way they handled the subject of certain east European countries that had been swallowed into the Soviet Union. The Wiki is much better because if there’s some controversy you can read about the controversy itself on the Wiki rather than have the decided viewpoint presented as if it’s uncontroversial fact.
I bet it just kills the mainstream media to see people getting their news and information from everywhere else for once! I love it.
Wikipedia is useful because it covers subjects that the Britannica and other such sources never would. For instance, I wrote a post recently comparing the lives of two English hardcore porn stars. I got the information on each from Wikipedia. Somehow I don’t think Britannica would have included them.
I find that a Wikipedia article of even middling popularity is policed adequately to quickly filter out mischevious, erroneous or biased alterations. Regarding popular ones, the vandals and ideological warriors don’t stand much of a chance. Overall, I trust Wikipedia as a source.
And how.
The right cannot understand how something can be produced without payments, contracts and the monetised profit motives.
The left cannot understand how this unregulated social phenominon drives steamroller over their beloved “tragedy of the common”.
I agree. And I agree that for something like history, when the facts are (relatively) uncontroversial, it is especially good. Okay you can argue for ever about just how wicked Richard III (for instance) was, but the date of the Battle of Bosworth is not an issue, merely a date.
I also like how you can wander, via the links. If it’s a battle, say, you are automatically directed to other battles you might be interested in, and to the other exploits of the commanders. Amazing.
Clearly the way they exclude nonsense is very well thought out, but I don’t really understand how that works. I just enjoy the results. But I am quite used to the idea that, in a free society, numerous good things will be done in ways that baffle me.
Rubbish. Anyone with the tiniest ability to reflect on their motivations realises that many things they do are prompted by many motivations other than the possibility of monetary profit. Wikipedia is an example of that. I wholeheartedly agree with the last sentence of Brian’s post.
I am not against Wikipedia and I use it a lot…but when the subject of the article is historical, you can find histoy manipulated at tiny details where biased alterations can be continuately maintained by just a few people. For example, at the bottom of the article about Spanish Succesion War mentioned there is a link to “National day of Catalonia”, where Rafael Casanova appears like a great fighter…The problem about this being Casanova actually behaving like a coward who fled disguised as a monk,got the king’s pardon and quickly adapted to the new regime(among others heroical facts)
Of course, that doesn’t deny Wikipedia being a pretty useful tool when you are trying to verify a fact…or when the subjet of the article isn’t polemic anywhere in the world.
Wikipedia is fantastic for current and recent pop culture minutiae. There are full entries on topics like Morrisey or the cartoon “Aqua Teen Hunger Force”, things that would never appear in traditional encyclopedias.
For example, at the bottom of the article about Spanish Succesion War mentioned there is a link to “National day of Catalonia”, where Rafael Casanova appears like a great fighter…The problem about this being Casanova actually behaving like a coward who fled disguised as a monk,got the king’s pardon and quickly adapted to the new regime(among others heroical facts)
So correct it there, rather than here.
I used to believe that newspapers were wholly accurate, until I realised that where I happened to have first hand knowledge of the facts, they were invariably wrong on some count. Of course, it then dawned on me that it was likely that all articles were similarly riddles with errors, only I didn’t know enough about it to know where they were.
With Wikipedia, I find fewer obvious errors, and of course I have the opportunity to correct them when they appear.
Of course, being a ‘techie’ kind of project it is also an invaluable resource for looking up IT related issues. It has exhaustive definitions of everything you could think of and as an IT professional I find it invaluable for looking up stuff that gets fired at me in meetings.
I rely on the 1911 ‘tannica for facts and events prior to 1911, and to my own memory for facts and events since then. However, Wikipedia is an excellent place to go for the correct spelling of some person’s name or place name, which are items generally not found in online spelling programs. Their history and politics seem to be Stalinist.