Chris Lüer wrote:
At 06:17 PM 10/28/2006, Sam Korn wrote:
1. We are getting more rigid about demanding
sources/citations for new
material. This is necessary. I expect most academics who contribute,
being used to being judged by their qualifications/reputation, will
not cite and reference their work in the way Wikipedia demands.
Giving references is the one thing about writing an encyclopedia
article that academics are used to.
That's true, but it depends somewhat on the context. When writing
textbooks or tutorial material, often references are left out, and
instead the correctness of the material relies on the authority of the
writer. References creep in more and more as the material gets more and
more like research---graduate-level advanced textbooks have more
references than intro textbooks, and monographs reporting novel results
have even more.
It may just require some gentle acclimation into the Wikipedia
culture---academics may be perfectly capable of providing references at
will, but simply not know that Wikipedia would prefer references even
for intro-level material that's commonly known in the field.
-Mark