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WOW! a bunch of people from San Francisco ventured out in to the real world and found that people have strange ideas like property rights and the right to bear arms. I'm glad they got an education.

CurtMonash writes ""Everybody knows" that Wikipedia shouldn't be regarded as an authoritative source on anything. Well, Tom Relly of Register makes a compelling case, by way of anecdote, that mainstream journalists don't know actually this. And that makes for an interesting circularity:

• Wikipedia is full of claims that are sourceable in principle, but aren't actually sourced.
• Mainstream journalists use information from Wikipedia, even if it is not further sourced.
• Those very articles can be viewed as authoritative for Wikipedia's own sourcing purposes.
• Thus, unsourced information could, by virtue of having been placed in Wikipedia, grow to be regarded as authoritative by Wikipedia itself.

This phenomenon needs a name, and I am helpfully offering one: Circlesourcing. So how long will it now take for Wikipedia to have an entry of that name?"