On 02 Oct 2004 11:04:00 +0200, Erik Moeller <erik_moeller(a)gmx.de> wrote:
This is great and should help to combat some of the
FUD about Wikipedia
< and wikis in general. Now imagine the result when ...
newspapers, magazines,
academics and anyone else can cite a specific
certified version of a Wikipedia
article and be sure that it's 1) accurate, 2) not a redirect to goatse.cx.
For starters, we need a permanent link to the current revision.
Let's not get cocky and keep that goal in mind.
The road to credibility is
long and requires constant innovation. The next review might very well
Quite right. Both innovation and communication about what works and
what doesn't. en: could learn something from the de: and zh: quality
offensives, for instance... and everyone could learn from the cleanup
processes involved in
preparing snapshots for our distribution partners.
include an article on [[Wikipedia:Cleanup]] or in
[[Category:NPOV
disputes]]. Unless we can then say, "this is the unstable version - check
the stable one, which already has 10,000 articles", we're on the defensive
Until we can actually provide a view of Wikipedia which never shows a
link to an unstable or unedited page, we will be on the defensive
about certain things.
It is natural to desire a site that you can visit, or take your
children to, without worrying that they will randomly end up on a talk
page full of curse words and
vitriol.
Wikipedia is still lacking in a great many departments; we have little
reason to be cocky. c't may have been nice to Wikipedia because they
are a tech mag and we were the underdog, but once we are actually seen
as comparable to traditional encyclopedias, there will be ten times as
many writers and researchers eager to tarnish our image.
By then we should have better tools for community review, better
browsing options for readers, and support from widely respected groups
in research and academia.
+sj+