[WikiEN-l] A war on external links? Was: Inside Higher Ed: Does Wikipedia Suck?

[Charles Matthews]

Gregory Maxwell wrote:
> On Sun, Mar 28, 2010 at 3:24 PM, Fred Bauder <fredbaud at fairpoint.net> wrote:
>   
>>> And
>>> further reading sections can point the way for future expansions of
>>> the article, or for the reader to go and find out more about the
>>> topic.
>>>
>>> Carcharoth
>>>       
>> That is why I despise the war on external links and further reading some
>> editors seem to think is appropriate.
>>     
>
> I don't think I've seen much evidence of a "war on external links"
> ... what there is is, however, is pressure against an unfiltered flood
> of external links.
>
> Anyone capable of using Wikipedia is also capable of using Google,
> Bing, or any of a number of other search engines.  Beyond a point
> adding links reduces the value that Wikpedia provides over these
> resources.
>
> Even if you held the position that the world needed another
> unselective source of links, Wikipedia isn't especially well
> structured to provide it:  There is little to no automation to remove
> dead or no longer relevant things,  no automation to find new
> worthwhile links, and a lot of vulnerability to manipulation by
> interested parties.
>
> I think that at its best Wikipedia should be directly including all
> the information available up to Wikipedia's coverage depth, linking
> only for citations,  then it should have links to the most valuable
> external resources which go deeper into the subject than Wikipedia
> reasonably can. If you need a raw feed of sites related to some
> subject area this is what the search engines do well.
>   
Seems to me you are (precisely) rationalising a "war on external links".

Of your three points, I don't really find anything to agree with. Taking 
the attitide that "External links" is the name of a "Further reading" 
section for reading that happens to be online, what exactly _are_ you 
arguing? That trawling through the first hundred hits on well-known 
search engines will always produce those links? That is easy to refute. 
For many sites of high academic value, precisely no (zero) SEO is done. 
I can easily think of examples. Very good links can be very hard to 
find, unless you have a good reason to suspect they are there.

Given your style of argument, which is that we should be relying on the 
utility of commercial entities over which we have no control at all, to 
help our readers find the further information that we know (because WP 
does not aim to give complete coverage) they will need, I would say that 
Fred's worries are amply justified.

Charles