Indeed.
However, it's worth pointing out that Britannica's Macropaedia articles (as opposed to Micropaedia) are pretty comprehensive and certainly, from my point of view, eminently citable.
Wikipedia has no real equivalent of Britannica's Macropaedia - no expansion. We're just writing summaries all the time. Something to think about changing?
Of course, nobody can meaningfully give any sort of review to an unstable article, for obvious reasons. I won't start talking about stable versions here, because I refuse to lower myself to the level of Waiting for Godot.
CM
Odi profanum vulgus et arceo.
Date: Mon, 17 Dec 2007 11:25:28 -0500 From: wknight8111@gmail.com To: foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] Fwd: for an academic endorsement of wikipedia articles?
Encyclopedia articles from any encyclopedia are not intended to be primary resources ever. Encyclopedias are meant to be short introductions to a topic, not a comprehensive coverage of it, and certainly not an authoritative source that is worth being referenced. However, the value of Wikipedia is that each article typically contains many references of it's own, and those sources can be used as a starting point for research and investigation.
In short, there is no sense in trying to make Wikipedia more citable, because people shouldn't be citing it in the first place.
If you are looking for stable and "approved" versions of "good" articles, you may be looking for something like Veropedia instead.
--Andrew Whitworth
On Dec 17, 2007 11:01 AM, Nathan Awrich nawrich@gmail.com wrote:
I can't see that ever happening, unless we freeze articles that reach a certain level of quality (judged by FA or something) for a period of time or make a version permanently available as a link from the top of an article. The issue with academic referencing isn't quality - its stability.
On Dec 17, 2007 10:57 AM, Michael Bimmler mbimmler@gmail.com wrote:
---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Pascal Belouin pbelouin@hotmail.com Date: Dec 17, 2007 4:54 PM Subject: for an academic endorsement of wikipedia articles? To: foundation-l-owner@lists.wikimedia.org
Hello,
I was thinking about the fact that wikipedia was still a tricky subject regarding its use for referencing in the academic world. I was wondering if it would not be possible to obtain from official academic bodies a sort of endorsement that would qualify a wikipedia article for "official" academic referencing?
Regards,
Pascal Belouin
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