I hope Wikipedia doesnt go bankrupt it will feel like the end times . I think I will literally panic
Encyclopedia Britannica is always there
there’s this place called a library. and they have these things called books. and then there’s this thing called Google Search. where you can find books in PDF form.
Wikipedia is user edited. you can literally put anything you want in an entry almost. I think you know where I’m about to go with this.
You’re condescending and annoying. I am attached to Wikipedia out of sentimentality it’s always been there for as long as I remember and reliable to me for some casual trivia. Wikipedia is iconic and I love her. go write a research paper or something
who let high school teachers find tumblr
me: hm i wonder how many countries drive on the same side as the UK
friend: let’s check wikipedia in 2 seconds on our phones
some asshole on tumblr: um excuse me why don’t you stop what you’re doing to go to the library and look it up in an outdated book that’s edited maybe twice a decade and that definitely doesn’t have a single page article called “list of countries with left-hand traffic”
also “user edited” really doesn’t mean as much as you think it does. there are millions of people displaying accurate information, for every one person displaying inaccurate information. and that inaccurate information is usually changed quickly, and the person who made it can get their ip blocked from wikipedia if it was bad enough. way more accurate than textbooks or a library.
Librarian here! I’ve worked at both academic (college/university) and public libraries, and let me tell you this: most print encyclopedias are useless garbage we can’t get rid of fast enough. With the exception of subject-specific sets which we need to buy again every few years because the information has become outdated, most of the information in any volume of an encyclopedia is far more accessible and far more in-depth on the internet.
Wikipedia as a reference resource is fantastic because, just like print encyclopedias, it serves as a jumping-off point for research… and so do librarians! A librarian isn’t going to just write your paper for you, we’re going to point you to the books, articles, and websites that contain the information. Wikipedia is great for that, too, because any article that gets more than a bit of traffic will wind up with sources and external links. But print encyclopedias don’t go that far in citing their sources, and because they’re static media, the references may not only be outdated, they might be entirely inaccessible due to age, obscurity, or cost of access.
And there’s an interesting thing about all those books we have on the shelves… anyone can write one, and usually they only have a handful of other people checking their work. Academic journals are somewhat notorious for the ease with which a completely falsified paper can see publication (especially in cases of electronic journals), but printed books can also be easily falsified, whether as a result of publishers with an agenda or just fact-checkers slacking off.
As has been pointed out above, wikipedia is really great at getting obscenely specific in terms of the topics of articles. It’s an amazing collection of data, and more importantly, it’s an amazing collection of sources of data.
The role of a reference librarian and a wikipedia editor are basically the same: show you a brief summary of the information you need, and point you to more in-depth, reliable sources.
I was helping a friend clear out their dad’s old stuff from their home recently and we came across encyclopedias from the 90s.
They all went to the dump. They were ASTOUNDINGLY outdated. Totally fucking useless.
High school English teacher here–I regularly get crap from some of my colleagues, but I am completely fine with students using Wikipedia for info. Wikipedia does an excellent job of flagging articles that have been recently edited until someone can verify the changes, so pages with inaccurate info often have giant warnings at the top saying “THIS PAGE MAY CONTAIN IANCCURATE INFO”. Won’t find that in an out-of-date print edition.
Not only that, but Wikipedia cites its sources. It tells you right at the bottom of the page where all its info came from, so if you want to use a fact from Wikipedia but don’t want a teacher annoyed with you, just cite the source in the footnote. Teachers and professors are (a) not likely to check up on this and (b) it’s a real source so even if they do it’s legit?
The biggest problem I have had with letting students use Wikipedia is actually that Wikipedia articles are often written in such academic language that students sometimes struggle to understand them. That part kids have to overcome on their own or with the help of their teacher. But there’s nothing wrong with Wikipedia as a source. Hatred for it is a remnant of academic elitism, thinking that “peer-reviewed” can only mean some handful of crusty white dudes instead of literally anyone with enough knowledge and motivation to review it.
Honestly. My dad is a college professor and he’s told me time and again to always start my research at Wikipedia. You have to go further, obviously, but its such a great jumping off point for information.
Plus, where else can I find an itemized and updated list of every Cryptid known to human kind?
For the impenetrable articles, here’s my tip.
The list of other languages in the sidebar? Look at it and check whether the article has a version in Simple English.
Simple English is a mode for non-native English speakers but is also great if your reading comprehension is not super good, you’re having a slow brain day for any mental health or developmental disorder reason, or the English version is just poorly written.
Librarian here, and this whole post gives me so much joy.
@sugargroupie, @turtletotem
I feel like people think “not a reliable source” means “not true” but it actually means “can’t be quoted because the words might change”
I never knew there was a simple English version? I learned something new!
So yeah, everyone go donate to Wikipedia, they’re having a hard time over there.
ALSO.
It’s available in 285 languages.
Two. Hundred. And. Eighty. Five.
No, not every article is available in every language. But do you have an idea what a wealth of information is there for countries where getting to paper media might be difficult, due to extreme remoteness or civil unrest or poverty? (I’m specifically thinking of what a blessing Wikipedia would have been to Russian and Eastern European students and adults in the couple of years immediately following the fall of the USSR.)
SAVE WIKIPEDIA. It is an incredible resource, and not just for English-speaking nations.
it also doesn’t use ads and runs entirely on donations, I have been making (small) monthly donations to Wikipedia for awhile cuz like i don’t miss the three dollars a month and even a little bit counts
