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Q: Why is Wikipedia like a landfill?
A: Everybody dumps on it, and it keeps getting bigger.
Yes, the library and reference book establishments love to attack Wikipedia, the collaborative encyclopedia (http://www.wikipedia.org) as a fraud, a brazen imposter that will corrupt or-worse-misinform all who use it. With all of the information on the Internet, why is this well-intentioned reference source treated so badly? Because, while most of the nonsense on the Web knows its place, Wikipedia has the chutzpah to deem itself a real encyclopedia.
Actually, Wikipedia has a dual identity. It is a collaborative Internet project, one of the grandest and most successful examples of this fascinating breed. It is also a genuine encyclopedia and can be considered accordingly.
The Wikipedia Principle
The Wikipedia principle is simple: Collective wisdom is superior to that of any individual. It's not a fanciful notion; in fact, we trust it with life-ordeath decisions every time a jury reaches a verdict. The name is based on the Hawaiian term "wiki wiki," which means "quick" or "informal." Anyone can write an article on any topic for Wikipedia ... and anyone can change it. Then, through repeated refinements by many hands, the collaborative article will be better than that of any single author. And it's surprising how well it works.
Wikipedia is an enormous project. It has more than 650,000 articles in the English edition and a total of 1.8 million in more than 100 languages. The work is done by the compulsive Wikipedia community, which includes 13,000 active contributors and hundreds of thousands of visitors who make tens of thousands of changes daily.
This enterprise was started in 2001 by Jimmy Wales, a successful securities trader. As a child, Wales was intrigued by his family's World Book Encyclopedia and started Wikipedia as a labor of love. It grew exponentially and is now overseen by the Wikimedia Foundation, which is supported by grants and donations. The group administers several other wikis, including a dictionary and a quote book. These are far less developed than Wikipedia,...