NationStates Jolt Archive

My brother, and my friend, say wiki isn't reliable.

:eek:

If it is.. I'm not saying it isn't, but, why do we like it?:confused:

My brother, and my friend, say wiki isn't reliable.

:eek:

If it is.. I'm not saying it isn't, but, why do we like it?:confused:
We like it because it's convenient, and, in the most part, fairly accurate. I wouldn't advise you to use it as a source for everything, but if you want some background knowledge on something while you're online, it's the place to go.

I like it because it's quite accurate most of the time, and if you see something that's not right it doesn't take 30 seconds to correct.

It is a fine resource provided it is used like any source ... to explore further.

It's not a bad thing, it's just a transitional thing.

It is a fairly accurate. It was in the news a few weeks ago that Wikipedia had something like 4 or 5 mistakes per article and Encyclopedia Britannica (SP?) 4, so...

It's fairly accurate and very convenient. Some people made an accuracy test of Wikipedia against Britannica and they won, so it's not that bad, even if Britannica is questioning the study.

But for serious research and such it shouldn't be your only source.

Wiki is more reliable than people in general, because i'ts like lots of people that are correcting each other.
It may be less reliable than an expert in the field though, unless in fact the wiki-entry was written by an expert in the field (and corrected by some of his/her colleagues)

Wikipedia is fallable, as its open source format allows it to be vandalised, and for subtle mistakes to be overlooked as users hesitate to hit the edit button if they find something as small as a spelling mistake or an incorrect addition.

HOWEVER, wikipedia is self-improvable, and it's never-ending quest towards universal knowledge is proceeding at an unstoppable exponential rate. So the wikipedia your brother knew whenever ago was inferior to today's wikipedia to a huge degree, just as wikipedia will have improved by a huge degree in years to come.

Some people made an accuracy test of Wikipedia against Britannica and they won,'some people' being Nature, and 'won' being 'doing just slightly worse' (something like 4 mistakes vs 3)

'some people' being Nature, and 'won' being 'doing just slightly worse' (something like 4 mistakes vs 3)
Oh, yeah. Nature. I had forgotten who it was and was too lazy to google it. Although they were slightly worse the fact that they came so close to Britannica from a position of not being taken very seriously was a victory. Like a bum going all 12 rounds against the heavy weight champ and losing slightly by points.

And I wouldn't say 'worse'. They both are pretty good, obviously there'll never be a perfect source of information, and most of the errors were small, only 4 from each encyclopedia were considered serious.

Last night, I was desperately trying to find out the candidates in the lelection I thought I might be voting in today (see other thread ---> ) and couldn't be having with all the "These are all the candidates /our/ party is fielding in the elections" pages and was desperately trying to find an official source of all candidates by each constituency.


So I Google and Googled and refined my search criteria, and found that the highest-ranking page that contained the information I wanted was Wikipedia...

Quite a surprise to me. Even considering the fact that these days I divide my searches for information between Google and Wiki on a regular basis (dependant on whether I think it'll have been Wiki-ised or not). And it's amazing how much stuff is on Wiki.

Not that I trust it explicitly, but if someone has put the information in, it's a start, and can easily be corroborated. Stay away from anything based on opinion (especially creatinism v.s. evolution) and you'll not be far wrong.

'some people' being Nature, and 'won' being 'doing just slightly worse' (something like 4 mistakes vs 3)

Depends on who you believe. Like everything else, there is a range of opinion.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/4840340.stm

My brother, and my friend, say wiki isn't reliable.

:eek:

If it is.. I'm not saying it isn't, but, why do we like it?:confused:

We like it because it's incredibly, mind-bogglingly thorough and complete, is generally accurate, and is an easy, convenient way to access enormous amounts of information on even the most obscure of topics.

Because it's got a lot of things you wouldn't easily find elsewhere, and even if you don't like it, guess what? There's usually an "External Links" section at the bottom where you can get more sources.

....on even the most obscure of topics.

Look up the Halibut Treaty in Wiki... can't find it in ANY encyclopedia, but it's there, fairly accurate, and w/ lots of info in Wiki.

Use it for simple info, just to learn something quick and easy.
Never take it for 100% fact tho, I'd say. And for the love of god, never cite it in any academic writings, be it a grade 8 paper or a university .... anything. That's just stupid.

we like it cause its easy to get to and everyone's lazy. Whats the point in spending hours trying to get an exact answer to a question that was just slightly bugging you, when you can spend 10 mins on wiki and find out more or less the basics of what you wanted to know. so its simple. lazy us-es

Wiki is more reliable on obscure topics (which are usually written by specialists) than on mainstream culture stuff (where every idiot has an opinion and wants to share it).

It's very good. Just subject to bias on sensitive and controversial issues.

Wikipedia also covers subjects that traditional encyclopedia don't. It's an excellent resource if you want to learn about body-piercing or Homestar Runner. :p

Something that's just occured to me is that if you can say Wiki is bad, you should be able to say Google is bad.

After all, for every item of misinformation on Wiki, there is surely many examples of similar misinformation available through Google (not including deliberate subversion to get someone looking for details on Lego getting redirected to pr0n sites...), and no easy way for the community to go to a page referenced by Google and sanction changes to improve the accuracy.