Tomasz Wegrzanowski wrote:
Oh no, we are perfectly balanced, it's non-free
'pedias that contain
too little about computer stuff, science, pop music and
sci-fi/fantasy, and surprisingly lot about some boring and not very
relevant topics.
:-)
The issue of balance among topics is indeed interesting. I think the
wiki mechanism that anybody can add information is the perfect
guarantee for relevance. But the balance will reflect the interests
of those who *write*, not those who only *read*.
I digitized an old Swedish encyclopedia ("Nordisk familjebok",
http://runeberg.org/nf/) and it is clear that the 1st edition
(1876-1899) contains a lot more of ancient Greek and Roman mythology
and history (stuff known by people who took Latin and Greek in school)
and the 2nd edition (1904-1926) focuses more on inventions, technology
and contemporary politics (stuff known to people who took French,
German, and English in school).
I think you should be able to trace similar trends if you compare
different editions of Encyclopaedia Britannica, Larousse, Brockhaus,
or other encyclopediae. So it should be natural that Wikipedia
reflects the interests of those living in the 21st century and who are
familiar with computers.
--
Lars Aronsson (lars(a)aronsson.se)
Aronsson Datateknik -
http://aronsson.se/