Stan has voiced a very important theoretical point that defines the whole mechanism of Wikipedia. It also resolves (or rationalises) some of Larry's concerns. Articles develop Darwinistically. They emerge from primordial soup (substubs, anon newbie edits) and evolve as more people add material. From this point, there are two types of articles: those that attract interest and those that do not. This is easily compared to evolutionary selection pressures. Lifeforms that develop under extreme circumstances are simply more adapted than those that have had free reign without being predated upon. Articles under scrutiny get better (vandalism to [[Jew]] or [[Holocaust]] is reverted quicker than vandalism to [[Metabolic syndrome]] due to Watchlist and "vested contributor" exposure). Articles out of the limelight perform much worse - inaccuracies are not corrected, vandalism is removed by other anons (yep, this happens), etc. These are the ones that are poorly sourced, inundated with irrelevant external links, sometimes edit warred over a bit, but generally don't reach anything close to featured article quality. Stan is completely right that effective contributors eventually carry the day. There is so much to write about, to improve, to edit. He ignores the big POV dinosaurs, who do eventually get blocked for personal attacks or sockpuppetry, but that just proves the point.
I don't completely disagree with Larry on the accuracy issues for these "underperforming articles". They are just not getting the attention they deserve. There are a few solutions. Most involve automatic Vfd, but it can be replaced with "cleanup" by inclusionists: * Vfd an article that has not been edited for 6 months (or 12, or 18) * Vfd an article that is on nobody's watchlist * Vfd orphaned articles * Vfd an article that has STILL not been put in a category (other than "stub")
The above is the pruning effort of unviable lifeforms on Wikipedia. Some articles should be allowed to die gracefully. Others may be revived by vigorous spring cleanup. Anyway, this amorphous mass of poorly edited articles should get more attention that it is getting right now.
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