I feel like not enough people appreciate the simple fact that Wikipedia is essentially the most well-organized and complete collection of human knowledge in existence, and furthermore, it’s available to everyone who has access to the internet for free in dozens of languages.
There are tens of thousands of individuals collaborating every hour of every day to collect knowledge and share it with the rest of the world purely out of the desire to document and teach, and millions of people spending hours in the Wikipedia rabbit hole learning about subjects that they would have had no opportunity to without it.
Wikipedia is amazing. It’s the modern Library of Alexandria.
Wikipedia and Archive.org are two of the most fantastic projects in existence. Their contributions to humanity rival NASA imho.
Oh man, how could I have forgotten to mention archive.org??
My favorite thing on there is the Old Time Radio Researcher’s Group who maintain a huge archive of radio shows produced between 1920 and the 1960s (and some from later years as well such as CBS Radio Mystery Theater).
I’ve been listening through the most well-known shows for about the last 10 years and I still haven’t even listened to them all and there are dozens of other more obscure shows!
I agree. And this makes me wonder: of they both disappeared due to some catastrophic event, would it be remembered through the ages in a similar way to the destruction of the Library of Alexandria?
Wikipedia isn’t going anywhere unless most of humanity and our tech is gone. Tons of people take “backups” of it all the time. (Shout out to my fellow datahoarders). If you only get the text, it’s not very large at all.
It’ll easily fit on phones these days.
https://www.howtogeek.com/260023/how-to-download-wikipedia-for-offline-at-your-fingertips-reading/
Internet archive? Likely. It has an archive of a large portion of the beginnings of the internet, which will likely be a major historical source in the future.
Wikipedia? I’m unsure. It’s a collection of information obtained via various sources, most of which would still be extant. Not to put down the work of their project, it is very important. But it’s not impossible to replace like the way back machine.
Archive is already used as a historical source in some cases, including as the source of many citations on Wikipedia.
Can we all just take a moment to stop and appreciate just how much content Wikipedia delivers to us completely ad-fucking-free???
Oftentimes, I find myself just skipping a search engine entirely and going straight to Wikipedia first.
The power of community driven projects! Tis’ a beautiful thing.
As an ex-contributor, what goes on behind the scenes is absolutely wild. If you’re ever bored and want something to take over your life… Start editing Wikipedia.
Me when I check some minor article and I notice some questionable things, go into the talk page, and observe the fireworks behind the scenes
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As I generally read the science related pages, I have yet to find a bad citation, they are almost always from an accredited journal or other verified source. The Wikipedia chemistry section has saved me so much time and given me so much helpful info. The pages on genes and proteins are also usually amazing!
Wikipedia is one of the few online orgs that I donate to every year. Even if I can only throw a couple of bucks their way, I usually try to gift at least $20 or something.
Same here! I have a monthly donation going, and the $2 is well worth the hundreds of hours I’ve spent on it.
Don’t. I used to, until i found out that they have a ton of money and their begging and their pleading is a disingenuous emotional appeal to make people like me donate
This is a bad take to me. Them having a surplus of money is good. We want them to be operating as strongly as possible. Is it shitty to use an appeal to emotion like that? Absolutely. However, that shouldn’t mean we all stop donating to them. For some people, the shitty appeal to emotion doesn’t outweigh the importance of what wikipedia provides. Don’t donate if you don’t have it, but if someone still sees the value in what they do and it is easy for them to donate then they should do so. Personally, I put my money elsewhere, but discouraging people from donating at all is a weird stance to take.
The alternative is telling people that they shouldn’t donate until Wikipedia is nearly bankrupt. If you want Wikipedia to exist, that doesn’t sound like a wise plan.
I’ve never donated, but I don’t mind seeing them ask. It really is all the information in history in your pocket. That’s a great thing in my book, and has never been done before ever at the scale they make possible. I see zero problems with them having money in the bank.
Should contributors be paid? I think that’s a valid question. But I’d want to know what actual contributors think on that subject.
I don’t mind contributing to a service I use pretty much daily. That seems a fair thing to do regardless of their financial state.
That site has some huge yikes material on it. They basically pride themselves on being contrarian, as well.
I’d never heard that about Wikipedia before. What sorts of things are they contrarian about?
Not Wikipedia, the unherd site they linked lol
Imagine someone advocating for Wikipedia like it can’t be wrong at all cuz too lazy to visit a library or research yourself.
It’s generally correct for a quick answer. I don’t think anyone here would be naïve enough to think it can’t be wrong at all but if say it’s definitely right more often than it’s wrong.
And at least it has the openness to say (citation needed) unlike many other websites
It’s not perfect, but it’s definitely useful. I think of it like a free plane. If I need to visit my aunt in Florida I’ll fly to an airport, but once I’m there I have to do extra legwork to get to the exact house.
