[WikiEN-l] Wikipedia trumps Britannica

[Charles Matthews]

Keith Old wrote:
> Folks,
>
> According to John Graham-Cumming, Wikipedia is a better resource for
> researchers than Britannica.
>
> http://newstilt.com/notthatkindofdoctor/news/wikipedia-trumps-britannia
>
>   
<snip>
> Initially, I’d find myself double-checking facts on Wikipedia by looking in
> Britannica. I’d read that
> Boltzmann<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ludwig_Boltzmann> died
> on September 5, 1906 on Wikipedia and jump to Britannica to check the
> date<http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/72401/Ludwig-Eduard-Boltzmann/72401main/Article#toc=toc9080519>
> .
>
> After weeks of doing this I realized that Britannica wasn’t helping. Any
> errors I found on Wikipedia were because I was reading original source
> material (see for example this
> correction<http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Miller%E2%80%93Urey_experiment&diff=248412125&oldid=248347239>
> ).
>
>   
Yes, this is an interesting testimonial. For me the turning point was 
the realisation (this was in relation to history) that I was finding 
errors in academic writing, in compiling and using Wikipedia, about as 
often as finding errors in Wikipedia itself. Though that depends a bit 
where you look on the site.

Charles