[WikiEN-l] in response to your article "Librarian: Don't use Wikipedia as source" in the Post-Standard

Sat Aug 28 21:04:53 UTC 2004

Jens Ropers wrote:

> If you doubt the standards of our editorial review mechanisms, go try  
> and introduce some decidedly un-encyclopaedic (unproven, contentious  
> and/or unacademic, etc.) information into an article of your choice.  
> Then check back and see how long your contribution will remain in the  
> article. My confidence is high that -- depending on how much this  
> contribution falls short of encyclopedic standards -- you will find  
> your contribution challenged on the respective article's discussion  
> page (where you will likely be asked to provide references for your  
> claims) or outright removed.

I think "go and try" is a dangerous answer to give to our critics. It is 
easy to falsify and it starts at the wrong end. Of course I could insert 
wrong information, but for what purpose? And what does that prove about 
wikipedia in general?

Wikipedia is based on the assumption that there are much more people 
adding valid information than people interested in deliberately 
inserting wrong information. I don't talk of vandalism, this is rather 
frequent but easily spotted, I talk of deliberately adding "hidden" 
mistakes. My claim is that there are not enough people who find such 
actions satisfying to make wikipedia in general unreliable as a source.

So please don't tell people "go and try" (they will suceed if they are 
halfway intelligent) but tell them: "most people just don't do it, 
that's why wikipedia works".

greetings,
elian