wikipedia: "Your source for inaccuracies" ???

Discussion in 'Physics & Math' started by markl323, Jan 23, 2009.

  1. markl323 Registered Senior Member

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    I love wikipedia and I'm sure many of us here do as well as it is often quoted on this forums. This reporter really gets on my nerve (replace the spaces with dots):

    www msnbc msn com/id/28799154/

    Sorry if it is off-topic. I don't know where to post this.
     
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  3. Enmos Valued Senior Member

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    Here you go: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/28799154/

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    She has a point though, that's why you should always investigate multiple sources.

    By the way, when in doubt post in 'Free Thoughts'

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    I would probably have put it in 'Science & Society'.
     
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  5. markl323 Registered Senior Member

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    thanks.
     
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  7. John99 Banned Banned

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    How true...how true. Cant be stressed enough.

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  8. Orleander OH JOY!!!! Valued Senior Member

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    I want Roman to read this!!!! He's always getting on me about how I should be going to Wiki before I ask a question.

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  9. Trippy ALEA IACTA EST Staff Member

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    Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, it's a tertiary source.

    The main thing you should be getting out of wikipedia is it's references.

    They're at the bottom of each page, go check them out yourself.
     
  10. nietzschefan Thread Killer Valued Senior Member

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    It's sure as hell a better place to start answering your questions than sciforums...
     
  11. Orleander OH JOY!!!! Valued Senior Member

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    no, its not.
     
  12. BenTheMan Dr. of Physics, Prof. of Love Valued Senior Member

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    That depends on the question, and who's doing the asking.
     
  13. John Connellan Valued Senior Member

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    Or rather, who's doing the answering

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  14. Roman Banned Banned

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    I did read it, unlike you. This was criticizing wikipedia as a news source, not a source for science or cultural media. In a Nature paper published a few years ago, the number of errors between wiki science pages and the Encyclopedia Britannica online were virtually identical. For cultural stuff, like what movies Kevin Bacon was in, Star Trek episodes, or the history of the Silmarils, wikipedia was far, far superior. Where wikipedia performed more poorly was in the soft sciences (history, psych, sociology, etc). I don't know about as a news source, though I think this is the first article I've seen criticizing wiki about the quality of their news. Judging by the author's tone, and the fact that she works for a news agency, I'm skeptical of her impartiality.

    First, it's a single error that has her so hysterical. No study on the accuracy of wikipages, at all. Second, she can fix the error.
     
  15. markl323 Registered Senior Member

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    she's the media version of a troll. look at the comments left on newsvine by the readers who had been unfortunate enough to have read her past articles.
     
  16. BenTheMan Dr. of Physics, Prof. of Love Valued Senior Member

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  17. Nasor Valued Senior Member

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    Unfortunately writing this sort of article is an increasingly common strategy for online "journalists". Just deliberately say a bunch of stupid crap that pisses people off, and watch the hit counts skyrocket as people around the internet link to it and complain about it. Her boss probably just notices that her articles get a lot of traffic, not that she's a useless troll. Or maybe he knows she's a troll but doesn't care. It's especially common with computer-related stuff. There are a few "journalists" who make a career out of writing stories like "Why Vista is really better than OSX!" or "Why Amazon deserves to fail!" I'm not surprised that one of these hacks got around to doing a troll article about wikipedia.
     

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