[WikiEN-l] Wikipedia is forever.

[Bryan Derksen]

Daniel R. Tobias wrote:
> However, in such a scenario, the surviving Wikipedia would be merely 
> a "dead" historical document, albeit a massive one with many 
> alternative versions.
> 
> Or, is it the belief here that a "living" Wikipedia, still being 
> actively updated and open to such updates from the general public, 
> will continue to exist for centuries to come?

I think it should be "living", but thanks to the complete record of
previous edits it would also still serve as a historical document - with
a copy of the database it should be possible to "dial back" Wikipedia to
a previous state at will. The only problem with using it as such might
come when AfD or its successors starts deleting articles because they're
"no longer notable any more", in which case articles of historical
significance will start going down the memory hole and future
researchers will need to resort to archived database copies for it.



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