Wikipedia - Useful or Overrated?

[Kolbertt]

Well, almost everyone on the internet has at least heard from Wikipedia. However, I find it annoying how people take Wiki's words as holy source. Today, I received an inform regarding a certain subject from a professor assistant which was a word by word copy of Wikipedia - This was certainly the drop that cracked me down.

Wikipedia is a user updated encyclopedia. The fact that it looks professional isn't enough to glorify everything it says. I specially find this true when it comes to Anime and Manga files, where fans will sometimes mix speculation with actual facts, making the place really subjective.

At the same time, one cannot deny that Wikipedia IS useful. It contains information on random topics with at least, a professional format.

And please don't get me started on Fan Wikis... If Wikipedia contains certain amounts of fan-made information - These Wiki's are as good as our literary section

In my humble opinion, Wikipedia is way overrated. It usually get's quoted for everything - But one should never forget, that Wikipedia's quality is user achieved. There is NO warrant that the information you get is even true, and you may have been unlucky enough to see a modified post and you'll be holding a fake true.

What are your opinions? Do you use Wikipedia? Have you ever modified a post? Share your experiences (And bitching) regarding Wiki-

[Shdo]

its a good site, when i need to find a info about a game its a great place to look for, with info about the requirment, a short summery of the gameplay and even bug info.
as of now this havnt failed me.

in anime the same thing, info about the characters, story and i can find out if i even intrested at the show.
as of now when i searched for shows the data was correct.


should i do a paper work based on wiki? of course not, but when you look for info on black holes there is also links to other sites who have a little more...reliability.
in the end its a great site about fan stuff, public opinion and a link source for serious stuff.

[rayne_himura]

ive found it quite useful. but like any internet source, you have to take what you read with a grain of sand. since anyone can put the info up, it very well could be incorrect. so you need to use your judgement, or double check with another source for extra confirmation.

since other people are allowed to edit it
they might write something like...
"elmo was the first person to land on the moon" :cookie

[Shdo]

well, this kind of stuff would be edited out. its the little info bits that is questionable.

[Rain]

I use wiki all the time, it is fantastic


granted some losers go in and edit it to say random crap and lies, but that is usally fixed rather quickly

I don't take what it says as law, but it is enough to get me to think about it, and maybe do other research

but also, just because it is editted by regular people doesn't mean that everything posted on there is lies.

There have been reports that have said that wiki is right over 85-90% of the time, the biggest ones that report mistakes, political and very very recent pages

my source...wiki, and if wiki says it, it must be true

[Kojy]

It's great and accurate for general information, for subjectivity topics i'll leave it aside.

[cornflakes]

ive found it quite useful. but like any internet source, you have to take what you read with a grain of sand. since anyone can put the info up, it very well could be incorrect. so you need to use your judgement, or double check with another source for extra confirmation.

since other people are allowed to edit it
they might write something like...
"elmo was the first person to land on the moon" :cookie
I think it's quite a common misconception that just because Wikipedia is user-contributed, it's not reliable and is prone to silly statements as aforementioned. Wikipedia has a strict policy of fact-verification, and any statements made without citations are usually highlighted as [citation needed], or, if the whole article is considered unreliable/unsatisfactory/unnecessary, there will be a disclaimer on top of the page, or just outright deleted. For example, see the top of this (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antioch%2C_Pisidia) article.

See also: Link (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia#Reliability_and_bias) | Link (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reliability_of_Wikipedia) | Link (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticism_of_Wikipedia)

Also, not all Wikipedia articles are equal: some of them that meet Wikipedia's stringent standards (comprehensive, unbiased, no weasel words, good language, concise, etc.) are specially marked.

An anecdotal experience: I was browsing the Wikipedia entries on Naruto, and I saw a sentence that went something like [sic] "Gaara is also the vessel of the Ichibi and is a emo faget." When I navigated away from the page and returned to it about half an hour later, the "emo faget" bit was gone.

[speedphantom]

I absolutely love Wiki:pI use it almost every single day. I wouldn't have known many things were it not for wiki. Universities love telling students not to cite wiki, which is obvious why:p.

I think for the most part wiki contains good and accurate information. I don't know for sure but I'm pretty sure it's the smallest percentage of articles which contain inaccurate information.

[La`Punyeta]

Wiki is a good source...anything you wanted to know about someone or something..you can find it there....animes..formulas..a biography of a person..you can find it all there..I would know if the article in the wikipedia is 100% true if the source material is posted there at the bottom..

Actually 90% of my reports and projects that I've passed are wikipedia based...but I just paraphrased some of the sentences so not to look like it came from wiki.. :D

[ninhoic]

Wikipedia is actually very useful. I'mnot gonna say I've used it for any projects or reports. I've always used books for those. For the simple questions and topics I want answered, usually random things I want to know, Wikipedia works fine.

I love Wikipedia regardless though. Whenever I get bored, I just look up something and I'm satisfied for awhile.

[SSJ5]

Hmm I love Wiki thats is my Anime/Manga source thats how I got into to any of it and I figured out that my Height was not normal which made me feel good lol

[hottfroggy]

Wiki is great! ;3 As long as it has a nice, reliable source, I'm good. :D

[Frosted Heart]

Wikipedia is a good place to find general information, or something to 'wet your feet in'. It's good for research for fanfics, or to sate your curiosity, but definitely not for scientific papers and whatnot. My university professors all said wikipedia did not count as a viable source. If they saw it in our bibliography, they'd disregard it/we'd fail.

I'd say Wikipedia is a good place to start finding out about things, but should not be used for more indepth studies.

[KuchikiRukia]

I think Wiki is pretty good for information and whatnot the only thing I dont like about is that, when it comes to RPing most people just go and get the information from there and then paste it.

Doesnt really show you know alot about the character. I just wish some people would get to know the character they are RPing and then write their own little Bio. Thats only some people that do that though. Also, its good just for the information, not for reports or anything because anyone can edit the information that it put on there you know?

[Shdo]

keep in mind that most articles have little links at the buttom to more reliable sources. so even if you want to learn something for a serious report its a good first stop even if only to check those sites or recomanded books.

[mechaqua]

Wikipedia can be useful in the sense that it can give a basic understanding of some topics and it provides useful links as far as using it to cite something its not reliable.

[Dante86]

Wikipedia has some uses...but sometimes its filled with useless information. If you use Wikipedia...make sure you have a second source of information to back up the info that you acquire from Wikipedia.

[anfiwyn]

I love wikipedia, it gives you a general overview of a topic to better understand it. It's definitely not the be all end all. But a good source to locate more info on a subject

[Aizen]

Wikipedia is good for information about movies and videogames that are known facts. It's not bad for research either... I'd say it's pretty reliable. Not everything should be taken as a fact, of course. However, it pisses me off when people say that the information is invalid just because it was taken from Wikipedia.

[Superunknown]

I use Wikipedia only when I'm looking up the bios of some bands and musicians as well as music history, or when I'm doing a small investigation just to accumulate knowledge inside of my brain (knowledge is good). However, I think twice when the article in question does not possess a little star icon on the top-right corner or does not have any External Links.

When I get to do work, I investigate two other pages and sum up all the info, and when that is done, I put it on Wikipedia so everyone knows.

Overrated, but certainly useful when you need information badly.

[Ayu-chan]

I think it's very, very useful :wha

Wikipedia is probably the ultimate source of anything random you could think of. Plus Wikipedia helps you w/ your homework and somehow whenever I go in it I could never get out :XD