Wikipedia....what happens when geeks and nerds can write thier own encyclopedia

[LordMorpheus]

That's a really stupid article.

Two major flaws (I'm sure you could point out a million more):
- The existance of articles about nothing (video games) does not mean that the articles about legit topics are bad.
- Word count is a terrible way to compare the quality of two articles.


I've found wikipedia to be very very good, especially on topics like WWII and such. They've got individual articles for a ton of naval vessels in the war, you will not find that level of detail outside of dedicated WWII naval history tomes, and they've got it for just about everything.

The techa articles are good and up to date.

The only really suspect parts of it are the articles about current events / companies / people, and only a tiny amount of those are bad.

Articles that say wikipedia is bad / our generation is doomed because some star wars nerd spent a ton of time putting stuff on wikipedia piss me off.

 

[mugs]

Originally posted by: Fayd

Originally posted by: mugs

Originally posted by: frostedflakes

Originally posted by: Cogman
I find it funny that so many people (Mostly school teachers) will bash the wikipedia, yet the fact remains, CAN THEY GIVE ME A FREAKING EXAMPLE WHERE IT IS INACCURATE / WRONG! and the answer is almost assuredly a resounding no. Seriously, I hear how horrible it is from these people and I have yet to find an article that wasn't fairly accurate.

But no, because everyone can edit that MUST mean that only idiots edit, therefore it is worthless. Hello! Wake up people. The only person that will edit the article on gausses law (or even know that it exists) is someone that has dealt with it.

I have a sister that is a school teacher and she has been brain washed into the "Wikipedia is bad" mind set. One simple question I have asked her "Have you ever used it". Well, um, no. "Well, give it a try before you bash it. Tell you what, pick a topic you know a lot about and go look it up. Then tell me how far off they are on the topic" She never did that I know of, but she also stopped bashing it.

Well I can understand teachers' frustration with Wikipedia, I think a lot of students don't understand how it works and assume all the information on it is factual. You obviously have to read any article critically and be skeptical of any information that isn't cited or sounds ridiculous. For a lot of my college courses, citing Wikipedia directly is an automatic F on a paper, lol. It's a good starting point, but for any serious research you need to explore the cited articles and papers as well.

Citing any encyclopedia for a college paper should be an automatic F. I was taught in Jr. High that citing encyclopedias is not acceptable.

considering wikipedia has been cited in a number of supreme court cases, i dont consider it too wrong to use the information contained therein. (EDIT: with proper backup, of course)

i agree with cogman. i've yet to find an article that wasnt at least 99% accurate. the only discrepancies i've seen have been things like editing questioning whether or not there should be articles detailing how to commit copyright violation, or arguments over whether an image is pornographic in nature or not.

The problem with citing Wikipedia for an academic paper has nothing to do with accuracy.

 

[Inspector Jihad]

wikipedia is a top10 invention of mankind.

 

[Tom]

Originally posted by: Jeff7
Something I've ALWAYS wondered about Superman

superman's anus cannot be penetrated.

 

[Descartes]

I love wikipedia, and having it on my iPhone is ftmfw. Within little more than a second or two, I get a media-light version of almost everything imaginable topic.

I don't use wikipedia for detailed analysis of a given topic, and if I did I would supplement it just like I would any encyclopedia. So, the fact that anyone can edit it was always far more of a plus than a negative to me.

 

[ConstipatedVigilante]

Originally posted by: 0roo0roo
yea the subpages of ww2 are quite vast. it had to be split apart or it would be overwhelming

Exactly. I've spent hours looking up WW2 weaponry and battles on links from one another. Call of Duty doesn't have all that many subpages that don't lead to WW2 stuff.

 

[IEC]

So, because it has a bunch of articles on mangas/animes it's also fail, right?

Author of article = FAIL

 

[Ruptga]

Originally posted by: frostedflakes

Originally posted by: Cogman
I find it funny that so many people (Mostly school teachers) will bash the wikipedia, yet the fact remains, CAN THEY GIVE ME A FREAKING EXAMPLE WHERE IT IS INACCURATE / WRONG! and the answer is almost assuredly a resounding no. Seriously, I hear how horrible it is from these people and I have yet to find an article that wasn't fairly accurate.

But no, because everyone can edit that MUST mean that only idiots edit, therefore it is worthless. Hello! Wake up people. The only person that will edit the article on gausses law (or even know that it exists) is someone that has dealt with it.

I have a sister that is a school teacher and she has been brain washed into the "Wikipedia is bad" mind set. One simple question I have asked her "Have you ever used it". Well, um, no. "Well, give it a try before you bash it. Tell you what, pick a topic you know a lot about and go look it up. Then tell me how far off they are on the topic" She never did that I know of, but she also stopped bashing it.

Well I can understand teachers' frustration with Wikipedia, I think a lot of students don't understand how it works and assume all the information on it is factual. You obviously have to read any article critically and be skeptical of any information that isn't cited or sounds ridiculous. For a lot of my college courses, citing Wikipedia directly is an automatic F on a paper, lol. It's a good starting point, but for any serious research you need to explore the cited articles and papers as well.

But if the article is well done it will have links to sources all over the place, so you can still use Wikipedia, if only in a round-about fashion.

 

[Evadman]

wikipedia updates faster than my 1969 encyclopedia set.

 

[newnameman]

Originally posted by: mugs

Originally posted by: frostedflakes

Originally posted by: Cogman
I find it funny that so many people (Mostly school teachers) will bash the wikipedia, yet the fact remains, CAN THEY GIVE ME A FREAKING EXAMPLE WHERE IT IS INACCURATE / WRONG! and the answer is almost assuredly a resounding no. Seriously, I hear how horrible it is from these people and I have yet to find an article that wasn't fairly accurate.

But no, because everyone can edit that MUST mean that only idiots edit, therefore it is worthless. Hello! Wake up people. The only person that will edit the article on gausses law (or even know that it exists) is someone that has dealt with it.

I have a sister that is a school teacher and she has been brain washed into the "Wikipedia is bad" mind set. One simple question I have asked her "Have you ever used it". Well, um, no. "Well, give it a try before you bash it. Tell you what, pick a topic you know a lot about and go look it up. Then tell me how far off they are on the topic" She never did that I know of, but she also stopped bashing it.

Well I can understand teachers' frustration with Wikipedia, I think a lot of students don't understand how it works and assume all the information on it is factual. You obviously have to read any article critically and be skeptical of any information that isn't cited or sounds ridiculous. For a lot of my college courses, citing Wikipedia directly is an automatic F on a paper, lol. It's a good starting point, but for any serious research you need to explore the cited articles and papers as well.

Citing any encyclopedia for a college paper should be an automatic F. I was taught in Jr. High that citing encyclopedias is not acceptable.

This.

 

[bunnyfubbles]

Another point is that articles of academic importance are also going to be protected and scrutinized far more than trivial ones about gaming (or anything else pop culture), and thus gamers are going to be more free to blab on about it.

 

[Linflas]

Originally posted by: Cogman
And I can completely agree with that. What I don't agree with is the fact that they treat it like ever word written there is contrary to the subject it is supposed to speak on.

I suspect they do that for much the same reason they encourage you to read the actual book rather than the Cliffs Notes. It is not that they think Wikipedia is bad rather they want you to learn how to do in depth research rather than have it handed to you with no effort via Wikipedia in a learning environment.