Observer Gives Wikipedia Glowing Report 224
JaxWeb writes "The UK newspaper The Observer is running an article about the open encyclopaedia Wikipedia. The article, 'Why encyclopaedic row speaks volumes about the old guard,' gives Wikipedia a glowing report and mentions some of the issues which have recently occurred regarding the project, including the need to lock the George Bush article in the run up to the election, and Ex-Britannica editor Robert McHenry's comments, as previously mentioned on Slashdot."
Glowing report? More like optimism. (Score:5, Informative)
Heh (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Finally (Score:2, Informative)
The bumblebee argument (Score:3, Informative)
In truth, the only reason such a "proof" exists is that the laws were applied incorrectly; the scientists involved used the explanations for single-foil flight (i.e. birds' wings.)
Whether they did so accidentally or as a joke remains the domain of speculation, but the truth is that the laws of aerodynamics can account for bumblebees quite nicely.
Re:Heh yes, it is /.'ed (Score:4, Informative)
If he had only consulted the Wikipedia. (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Locking Articles (Score:3, Informative)
You do have a very good point about popular articles being correctly reverted faster. The mentality that seems to prevail is that it's better to lock down a known target, rather than let 'x' number of viewers see a vandalized page.
Re:Glowing report? More like optimism. (Score:4, Informative)
Nonsense. He says he and countless others use it all the time. He says he finds the articles useful and more timely than EB's. He cites the articles of George Bush and Sollog and Tsunami as examples of Wikipedia's enormous success. He even begins the article by comparing Wikipedia to the bumblebee: all of our theory says that it shouldn't work, but it does. This is not a man waiting for things to get better; it is a man who thinks things are great now. Perhaps you only read the last paragraph where he says that someday it will as invaluable and popular as Google. That hardly means he isn't praising its current state. RTFA next time.
Re:Who's the "well-known crackpot"? (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Why was the George Bush article locked? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Who's the "well-known crackpot"? (Score:2, Informative)
Actually, Sollog denies that it means "Son of light, light of god" and says it's derived from "sol" and "logos", giving a meaning of "the word of the sun" (which is clearly mentioned in the Sollog [wikipedia.org] article).
The Sollog/Wikipedia incident was covered on Slashdot back on December 14, 2004 [slashdot.org].
Re:Guardian vs. Observer (Score:3, Informative)
John Naughton (Score:3, Informative)
John Naughton, who wrote the article, writes regular articles on the internet, software and related matters in the Observer's business section. He is one of the few journalists in the UK who really "gets it", and is also the author of the book "A Brief History of the Future" (published 1999) about the history and future of the Internet.
In fact his journalism is only a sideline to an academic career.
His Observer articles can be found archived at http://www.briefhistory.com/footnotes/ [briefhistory.com].
His blog is at http://www.skillbytes.co.uk/memex/ [skillbytes.co.uk].
Re:life before Wikipedia? (Score:3, Informative)
The Paris squids began serving their first content today.
Oh the irony. (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Who's the "well-known crackpot"? (Score:2, Informative)
When it started out, I expected it to die within a year It didn't. I was wrong.
I never refer to it myself, though, because I do not trust it. How could I - even if a friend referred me to your article, I can't be sure of the source when I get around to viewing it.
This seems to be a common worry, but it also seems primarily theoretical. That is, a worry by people like you who don't use wikipedia, rather than those who have actual knowledge of its quality.
Most people don't use wikipedia in a vacuum--we have some ability to detect BS, and make judgements as to the quality and reliability of information after we read an article. The concerns are different, but this is fundamentally no different from using critical facilities when reading a book or newspaper article.
Re:Article hogs (Score:3, Informative)
I edit Wikipedia articles regularly, and its weak spot IMO is not vandalism - blatant or sneaky, vandalism is easier to rectify than content disagreements. Read the page history of "Clitoris" and "Male circumcision" for instance - edit wars of almost operatic tenor, but no vandalism. But Clitoris is in decent shape after the war.
On the other hand, reading the page history of a controversial topic *really* tells you what different camps and factions think of the subject. You just have to be a reasonable judge yourself.
Re:If he had only consulted the Wikipedia. (Score:3, Informative)
Your reason for not fixing it yourself Doesn't Make Any Sense, BTW.