Wikipedia Corrects Encyclopedia Britannica

javipas writes "Despite all the controversy about Wikipedia's work model, no one can argue the potential of a project that has so effectively demonstrated the usefulness of the 'wisdom of crowds' concept. And that wisdom has detected a large number of mistakes in one of the most revered founts of human knowledge, the Encyclopedias Britannica. Among the wrong information collected on this page are the name at birth of Bill Clinton and the definition of the NP problems in mathematics."

Score +5 (Troll)

[Anonymous Coward]

Too bad most of the administrators think they know more than you, simply because they read an article on the subject. The others are all to happy to demonstrate the Wikipedia caste system to you.

Britanicca is useless.

[Whiney Mac Fanboy]

Even if it were error free, Britanicca would still be useless - it does not enough content.

I mean, where's the articles on Fanboy [wikipedia.org]? Or the List of minor Buffy the Vampire Slayer characters. [wikipedia.org] (and for that matter, detailed summaries [wikipedia.org] of individual episodes [wikipedia.org]) Or for that matter, where's the article on the Slashdot effect [wikipedia.org]

ok lets compare the number of wiki errors

[timmarhy]

why so silent now? Oh thats right Wiki is brimming with incorrect information.

A novelty but nothing more.

[Anonymous Coward]

This is the kind of thing that Wikipedians love to trot out to show how much better they think they are than traditional sources, but this "corrections" list is not actually very meaningful. Heck, I once caught a typo in The Economist - does that mean a publication I made would thus be more accurate and reliable than The Economist? No, it just means they messed up once. Hey, when you produce a large volume of text, it happens. The real question is, how often do they mess up compared to how often we mess up? And that is a difficult question to find the true answer to, but one thing is for sure: it's certainly not hard to find errors in Wikipedia.

Re:Britanicca is useless.

[Anonymous Coward]

correction:

it does not have enough content.

talk: I hate wikipedia. It's at best a well spoken gentleman in a pub. It sounds right but I can't be sure.

(captcha: deserves)

A Bit Biased

[EvanED]

Okay, so where's the Wikipedia article listing all the times that someone found something wrong with Wikipedia, and corrected it with information from E.B.? I'm sure that's not an uncommon occurrence either.

Both Wikipedia and EB have their place. Wikipedia is great for getting a quick overview of something while you're sitting at your desk, or looking up random information like the plot of an individual TV episode. EB is better at having a bit more academic cred (at the very least, EB's mistakes are actual mistakes and not outright vandalism, which may or may not be true for Wikipedia). If I were to give up one, I'd keep WP in an instant.

But neither should be considered the definitive source for anything.

Re:A novelty but nothing more.

[timeOday]

I think that's the whole point - not that Wikipedia contains fewer errors than Britannica (the idea you're debunking), but that finding an error here or there in something doesn't prove anything, much less negate the value of the whole collection. It's simply to blunt accusations against Wikipedia, not bring down Britannica.

However, to me and most people Wikipedia really is far more valuable than Britannica - simply because we have no access to Britannica. And I also think the vast majority of wikipedia pages are quite good - at least the ones anybody is interested in. Certainly a much higher S/N ratio than the Internet at large. I even have a downloaded copy of wikipedia on my PocketPC, it's amazing how rarely I can not settle issues or questions that arise by consulting it.

It's a repeat of "bloggers are journalists"

[EmbeddedJanitor]

Sure Wikipedia might have some materials that is more correct than EB, and likely the reverse holds true too. Good research takes more than just having arbitrary contributions from a wide audience.

For every good example...

[alvinrod]

For every good example, there apparently are several bad examples [wikipedia.org] of this so called "wisdom of crowds." I'm not saying it doesn't work, but to pretend that it's the be all and end all of systems is just disingenuous.

Wisdom of crowds is a pretty good concept, but in reality it turns out that the crowds aren't always so wise.

Old news, please disregard

[Taxman415a]

This page has existed nearly since the beginning of Wikipedia. For a long long time it contained a disclaimer that it was just for the fun of it, and not to be taken too seriously. I think the disclaimer was taken off because it should be inherently obvious. Well apparently not to the submitter, who submitted what amounts to a flame bait story. Oh well, such is slashdot. Gotta get pageviews I suppose. But the submitter should have known better than to trump it up so much in the submission.

Re:Purposeful

[rm999]

If an encyclopedia purposefully says something incorrect, it has lost credibility for a poor reason. For example, if I want to know what the NP problem is, I don't consider it acceptable that an encyclopedia purposefully lied to me just to mess with its competitors.

Re:Britanicca is useless.

[Anonymous Coward]

Even if it were error free, Britanicca would still be useless - it does not enough content.

I mean, where's the articles on Fanboy? Or the List of minor Buffy the Vampire Slayer characters. (and for that matter, detailed summaries of individual episodes) Or for that matter, where's the article on the Slashdot effect

I'm glad something is documenting every minutae of our popular culture. Popular culture of the past is fascinating, and often tells you a lot more about what it was really like to live in the time than journalistic or encyclopedia articles or the works promoted to "high culture" of the period.

For example I love old newspaper strips from the turn of the century to the Great Depression. They're endlessly fascinating, ofen very well written and draw you into a world that is very similar yet completely different than our own. They're also incredibly difficult to find, even some of the ones that were enormously popular (like Buster Brown or Mutt and Jeff), and there is almost nil written about them. Someone else might find this in Old West dimestore novels, or minor Victorian theater, who knows. What I wouldn't give for the "fanboys" of the past to have documented every minutae, because there are a lot of great works have simply faded into obscurity because they were considered "throwaway pop culture" at the time.

That's the beauty of Wikipedia; it's limitless and only takes a small community (even of one) to decide something is relevant. If it's something you don't find interesting then there's no reason for you to bother with it. And who knows? In fifty years an article about Fanboyism, Buffy characters or the Slashdot effect may be extremely treasured information to someone else.

By the way how long did it take The Beatles or Charlie Chaplin to make it to Britannica's pages?

Yes, but...

[ocop]

I doubt Britannica's editor's let them accidentally kill people (rhetorically, at least). Wikipedia is probably more accurate for large, visible topics but equally (if not more so?) subject to painful bias on obscure subjects.

Re:Britanicca is useless.

[KeepQuiet]

FYI, Britanicca is not a collection of popular culture or slang terms. It is an encyclopedia.

Wikipedia is getting better

[Oldsmobile]

There are a few minor issues I have with the new winds blowing over at Wikipedia, but these are not pressing enough for me to get all worked up over them.

Over all I'm positively surprised at Wikipedia's ability to continually get better, work on not only the content but also the form factor.

A greater emphasis on references and citations has greatly contributed to some articles.

There are a few problems, such as the fact that important and well known scientists are still reluctant to contribute.

Overall though, Wikipedia is continually evolving and getting better, which is a whole lot more than can be said about Britannica or any other encyclopedia which have pretty much kept to their centuries old methods ideas.

Re:Errors

[blahplusplus]

"all because of the idea that "the wisdom of the mob" is infallible."

The same holds true for the wisdom of the 'elect', history has shown that their needs to be a deep suspicion of both, able and intelligent people are just as bone-headed and misguided as anyone else, but this bone-headedness always has to wait for the next generation to look back from the current one to see how hopelessly naive they were. Many experts of the past were just as ignorant and barbaric as any other man, its just that experts can hide their own misguidedness and stupidity behind the ignorance of laity and their current positions of authority.

Re:Britanicca is useless.

[Threni]

> FYI, Britanicca is not a collection of popular culture or slang terms. It is an encyclopedia.

Also, it's hard to imagine Britannica being unable to find loads of mistakes in Wikipedia.

Re:Errors

[howlingmadhowie]

i think this is a standard problem with knowledge. every reference work was written by people living at a certain time in a certain culture. wikipedia should be better than most when it comes to heated issues (politics, sex, emacs/vi) because of the base of editors being global. however, as you say, if the big chief editor of an article supports a certain ideology, it can be difficult to make headway.

this is however a standard caveat. one cannot read a version of the eb from colonial times without being painfully aware of the fact. the brockhaus of 193x is even worse.

On the other hand...

[Xtifr]

That obscure stuff often isn't in Britannica at all. And a lot of the articles about obscure stuff in Wikipedia are fine. I think the only sensible conclusion to draw from this and every other comparison that has been made between the two is that Wikipedia and Britannica each have their strengths and weaknesses, and neither one is indisputably better than the other. They're different. Wikipedia is most useful when you treat it as a source for references, rather than blindly trusting the words on the page. Of course, that kind of goes against human nature, but what can you do? :) ~~~~

Re:Errors

[suv4x4]

The bias is subtle, one of withholding information, and the people enforcing the bias are very good at making it look like they're in the right

Thanks for demonstrating this in your own opinion piece.

Re:Errors

[Yetihehe]

Because if it was written in citizendium, it must be true and there is no need for editing.

Re:Britanicca is useless.

[Anonymous Coward]

But that's completely untrue, isn't it? Hundreds of articles are deleted from wikipedia every day because they're deemed by editors to be irrelevant or of interest to too few people.

Pros and Cons

[nagora]

The one think WP gets right is the online access. Freed of the need to limit paper use or even disc space (and therefore cost), an online encyclopedia can afford to expand on any topic for as far as that topic needs. WP gets everything else wrong: there's no business model, no quality control except agreeing with the consensus, no overall editing system either for the entire work or individual articles, a deranged approach to point-of-view, and - ironically - no good mechanism for keeping the length of trivial articles under control.

TWW

And so the errors of the Encyclopedia Britannica

[Britz]

will be corrected in the next edition. So the Encyclopedia Britannica even gets some 'wisdom of crowds' in addtion to their own editors. The best of two worlds, and it would not have been possible without Wikipedia. Hurray for competition, hurray for Britannica, hurray for Wikipedia.

I bet that Wikipedia editors sectetly read the Encyclopedia Britannica.

Re:Errors

[bkr1_2k]

"I used to love Wikipedia, but that incident made me realise it's nothing more than a starting point to get a very basic idea of a subject and then move on"

Seriously, it took you a problem with editors to figure that out? I would have expected anyone on Slashdot to recognize that immediately.

Am I too old or something? Are all "those damn kids" being taught that Wikipedia is now an acceptable source to quote without verification?

Re:Errors

[Frantactical Fruke]

About five years after my circumcision, my father - having one of his occasional lapses in disinterest in us kids - attempted to teach me how to wash the foreskin to avoid the nasty infections he had there. After that, I never regretted not having one. Thanks, Dad! I have difficulties understanding people who take it so seriously that they campaign against it. But do feel free to talk about it.

Just one thing though. Do not ever again mention male circumcision in the same paragraph as female genital mutilation, unless you are talking about complete penis removal. It is akin to comparing a summer camp to a Nazi concentration camp: an obscene error in magnitude that makes light of people's suffering.

Re:Score +5 (Troll)

[Xeth]

This comment always comes up whenever there's an article about Wikipedia. So, I'd like to ask, how about some details?

I'm an admin on Wikipedia. That probably biases me toward "the establishment". But on the other hand, every day I see a new person coming in, touting their "INFALLIBLE TRUTH THAT YOU ARE TRYING TO SUPPRESS!!!!11". Which, of course, magically can't be sourced to anything better than a blog.

So, seriously, I'm calling your bluff. Show me this abuse you're talking about, and you've got a guaranteed (new, probably unbiased) admin taking a look at it.

Re:Errors

[LordKazan]

I see you know absolutely nothing about anatomy. The foreskin is the same structure as the clitoral hood. Removal of the clitoral hood, a form of female genital mutilation, is the direct female equivalent of removal of the foreskin. The foreskin contains 66% of the erogenous nerves of the penis, 50% of the mobile tissue (without that it is MUCH more likely for the female to get sore during intercourse). Only your ignorance makes it seem to be an obscene error in magnitude (that is to not say there aren't forms of FGM that are worse than the one mentioned, but that doesn't make circumcision not evil).

You know why people compaign against it? Because it was done on us when we were infants, without our consent or any ability to reverse the damage done. It is the ONLY cosmetic medical proceedure allowed to be performed on a child with a parents preference.

Even a small amount of HONEST research will reveal that circumcision is an evil practice.

It was started in the english speaking world as a cure to masturbation - because at the time (late 1800s) masturbation was considered the root of all evil. Dr Kellogg and a few others got everyone to start cutting off foreskins - Dr Kellogg also encouraged applying carbonic acid to the clitoris for the same reasons. Infact FGM was practiced in the united states within living history - see the book "The Rape of Innocence" by Patricia Robinett - a woman born in kansas in the 50s who had most of her labia and her clitoris removed.

So before you godwin the thread again, know what the fuck you're talking about.

Re:Score +5 (Troll)

[Xeth]

Sorry to say it, but Tycho's commentary is as full of pseudo-intellectual bullshit as the rest of his writing. He's clever, but rarely insightful.

And how am I denying the problem? Wikipedia most certainly has problems. Right there. People have been abused, and that's sad. I try and correct it where I can. Sometimes Jimbo makes a ruling that I find supremely ill-advised. Hopefully that will change with time.

The biggest (solvable, not fundamentally rooted in the problems of the real world a la Israel and Palestine) problem is that people in Wikipedia don't know what to do. They best thing to do is go looking for other people. There are a lot of caring Wikipedians (I'd like to include myself there) that always try and help someone who needs it.

You can point to a bunch of problems, but that doesn't mean that there is "a problem". Not to say that it's perfect, but just because people have been abused doesn't mean the system is utterly broken beyond repair. That's a conflation that you seem desperate to make. You point to an abuse in hiding things, but I'm afraid I don't find someone deleting their private article workspace to be particularly egregious.

Incidentally, since you rather obviously have an axe to grind, when were you abused and by whom?

Re:Errors

[nahdude812]

Feel free to post a link to this article and your revisions, and we'll corroborate your sources and repair the article.

Re:Score +5 (Troll)

[Charles W Griswold]

No... at its best it represents a poorly written, rather unhelpful bit of meaningless prose the net effect of which may be at most "here's a bunch of links regarding what you were looking for."

So . . . don't use it. You seem to be getting really worked up over something that isn't actually that important.

Re:Are These Mistakes Or Intentional?

[TheoMurpse]

OK, I understand that the Encyclopedia Britannica is meant to be an authoritative source, but is it possible that some inconsistencies or errors were introduced in a similar manner?

No, and I'll explain why I think so.

The important difference between Trivial Pursuit and an encyclopedia here is that Trivial Pursuit's answers are just a short phrase or small set of words. You cannot copyright the answer (because facts are not copyrightable), but you can copy the set of questions and answers because aggregating the questions into meaningful sets is a "creative act."

Encyclopedias on the other hand, have long articles, which involve creative acts, so they article itself is copyrightable. Sentences are copyrightable.

This is important because, if you plagiarize a subset of the Trivial Pursuit questions, you could claim that you independently came up with the questions, and it would be hard to prove otherwise. However, if one of your questions has a wrong answer that matches up with a wrong answer in Trivial Pursuit, it's easier to prove that you plagiarized their question set, at least in part. With an encyclopedia, as with any book, it is easy to prove copyright infringement because the elements of articles are sets.

However, incorrect facts introduced into Brittanica cannot serve the purpose of detecting copyright infringement, because, when compiling your own work, you could use Brittanica as a source and get the same wrong fact. This is not copyright infringement. However, the copyright infringement Brittanica would be concerned with is you ripping off passages of text (since the underlying facts are not copyrightable). Spotting plagiarized passages is (relatively) easy to spot.