They should be teaching kids how to use Wikipedia properly rather then banning it out right. Use it like a search engine and follow the cited sources for real research. Check the authors of the cited sources for any bias. Check the edit history if something seems suspicious.
Wikipedia is very good, but ALWAYS look for more than one source.
Wikipedia is a terrible source, but it’s a great source for other sources.
One of the biggest problems with the site is that it doesn’t archive the linked material. So you can have a bunch of dead links to older historical entries, which undermines the value over long terms.
Wikipedia is a terrible source, but it’s a great source for other sources.
Lol! That’s what makes it a great source, not a terrible one. It compiles a wide variety of sources on different subjects, and cross references them with related subjects, so that additional information is easy to find.
Wikipedia itself should never be what you’re quoting. Quote the sources you find there.
Nah dawg. That’s a gaping hole in Wikipedias model and value proposition. How can THE global encyclopedia not archive its source material? What happens if all the sources get nuked? How can future historians calculate the accuracy of Wikipedia over time if the sources are not archived?
Apart from decentralization, their focus should not only be on archiving all current and future source material, but archiving all historic source material since inception.
Apart from decentralization, their focus should not only be on archiving all current and future source material, but archiving all historic source material since inception.
Dude. Do you know how massive that project would have to be? You wouldn’t be able to do that, without serious funding. And it would also be the opposite of “decentralization”. It would make them the largest single repository of all that information. If anyone wanted to “nuke” that material, they’d only need one bomb.
The more you research a specific topic the worse Wikipedia seems as a source. For a general overview before writing a paper and starting real research? It’s great.
For actually researching and compuiling that paper? Terrible. The Wikipedia editors are people too and they cant know everything.
I love Wikipedia and have donated and will donate again but looking back on it there’s a reason that most schools don’t let you source it as Wikipedia and make you look at the actual sources that Wikipedia uses.
One of the biggest problems with the site is that it doesn’t archive the linked material. So you can have a bunch of dead links to older historical entries, which undermines the value over long terms.
You know, that’s an excellent point. I am surprised that, in 2025, there isn’t an automatic Internet Archive service in place that does that for any link added to a Wiki entry.
ETA: logistically, there’s quite a bit entailed thinking on it more. Besides developing a queue system for existing and new links on Wikipedia’s side, they’d now be non-trivial extra traffic on IA’s side. Probably need to have some deal in place first. Otherwise, Wikipedia would need to run their own archive service, which instantly adds to the overall size. As of Jan 2024, it’s already ~88GB for just raw text.
In elementary school I was doing a paper on Al Capone and there was the section with his early days which included “like every young boy he liked jerking off.”
Most likely true, though the sources were missing.
Is it bad that I didn’t know masturbation was a thing until AFTER I had already had sex? My girlfriend was like “Why are your loads always so massive??? How often do you jerk off???”
Wikipedia is very good, but ALWAYS look for more than one source.
I also once wrote a paper about WW2 in school, and when I got into Wikipedia, someone had edited the entire page to say “Hitler won”. Nothing else.
It was only in my language tho, and was resolved quickly.
They should be teaching kids how to use Wikipedia properly rather then banning it out right. Use it like a search engine and follow the cited sources for real research. Check the authors of the cited sources for any bias. Check the edit history if something seems suspicious.
Also teach when it’s necessary to do so and when not so much and if they have to check how deep they need to go.
Wikipedia is a terrible source, but it’s a great source for other sources.
One of the biggest problems with the site is that it doesn’t archive the linked material. So you can have a bunch of dead links to older historical entries, which undermines the value over long terms.
Lol! That’s what makes it a great source, not a terrible one. It compiles a wide variety of sources on different subjects, and cross references them with related subjects, so that additional information is easy to find.
Wikipedia itself should never be what you’re quoting. Quote the sources you find there.
Nah dawg. That’s a gaping hole in Wikipedias model and value proposition. How can THE global encyclopedia not archive its source material? What happens if all the sources get nuked? How can future historians calculate the accuracy of Wikipedia over time if the sources are not archived?
Apart from decentralization, their focus should not only be on archiving all current and future source material, but archiving all historic source material since inception.
Dude. Do you know how massive that project would have to be? You wouldn’t be able to do that, without serious funding. And it would also be the opposite of “decentralization”. It would make them the largest single repository of all that information. If anyone wanted to “nuke” that material, they’d only need one bomb.
The more you research a specific topic the worse Wikipedia seems as a source. For a general overview before writing a paper and starting real research? It’s great.
For actually researching and compuiling that paper? Terrible. The Wikipedia editors are people too and they cant know everything.
I love Wikipedia and have donated and will donate again but looking back on it there’s a reason that most schools don’t let you source it as Wikipedia and make you look at the actual sources that Wikipedia uses.
You know, that’s an excellent point. I am surprised that, in 2025, there isn’t an automatic Internet Archive service in place that does that for any link added to a Wiki entry.
ETA: logistically, there’s quite a bit entailed thinking on it more. Besides developing a queue system for existing and new links on Wikipedia’s side, they’d now be non-trivial extra traffic on IA’s side. Probably need to have some deal in place first. Otherwise, Wikipedia would need to run their own archive service, which instantly adds to the overall size. As of Jan 2024, it’s already ~88GB for just raw text.
I could swear that on some occasions Wikipedia sources have sent me to a wayback machine archived site
Often a better link than the original, since Wayback is better supported and not prone to the whims of a billionaire oligarch.
But it isn’t mandated nor is it integrated with Wikipedia.
In elementary school I was doing a paper on Al Capone and there was the section with his early days which included “like every young boy he liked jerking off.”
Most likely true, though the sources were missing.
Is it bad that I didn’t know masturbation was a thing until AFTER I had already had sex? My girlfriend was like “Why are your loads always so massive??? How often do you jerk off???”
And I was like “…what do you mean by jerk off?”
This says… something… about you. But I couldn’t tell you what.
One of those ditzy but attractive types, perhaps?
Upvoted for calling me attractive!
D’awww!