I have noticed recently online in many places when a question is asked the answer is most times just a wiki link. And we all know the wiki is written by the people for the people. Personally I can't just blindly believe anything said there. Sure a lot of it is true but still really if the wiki said you'd die tomorrow I think many people would believe it. My whole point is why are people all of a sudden not giving answers to question. They are just spitting out wiki links? It's very strange. I don't like it. Do you agree with this?
Encyclopedias are written by people too, and as such, can be wrong too. Wikipedia so far has given me no reason to believe that anything It contains is false.
I personally take the opposite tack on that. Yeah, they're edited by anyone and everyone. Everyone is a key word. If five people work on an encyclopedia, what those five people perceive to be the truth is what they write in that entry. A wiki, on the otherhand, is what thousands of people agree to be accurate. Anyways, i don't think most people would take a wiki link to be concrete. If they do, well....They need to start hanging out at Yahoo! Answers more.
Wiki link is short for "You could've easily found the answer yourself so why should we waste our time typing it out?"
Wikipedia is actually one of the most reliable source of information on the internet. By far. I do not understand peoples objection to its accuracy. The information there may be a little vague or too technical at times but I would say it is plentiful reliable. What is wrong with linking? I am a self-didactic and appart from school all I know is researched from the internet. As long as you do not rely on a single source there is nothing wrong with that. I am sick and tired of people asking the same questions over and over when a simple google search answers their question in 5 seconds. That is wrong.
It is also short for "I could not be assed to type out an answer for this question so I'll just give you a wiki link" And this is my main point here. Sure there is the accuracy issue is always there but already discussed. I'm more talking about people using it to be lazy. I think at times we ask people for an answer so we can hear that person's answer. We want to hear their opinion on a subject. We could have looked up a book or read wiki ourselves if we just wanted straight information. It's the human element/interaction and their opinions we want when we ask a question. Like a person took the time to give you a well thought out question and you slap the person in the face by quoting wiki and not giving me a well thought out answer of your own.
I've used Wiki to find sites for some of my college research papers. I may not have looked at the article itself, but looked at the reference list at the end to find decent sites to use. Lazy is part of human nature, we're always looking for ways to cut corners.
'It is also short for "I could not be assed to type out an answer for this question so I'll just give you a wiki link"' That is completely ridicilous counter-'argument'. You want to know the answer. So why would you bother other people when while you are typing out the question onto some website you could just google it? If you do not find anything through google then you have good justification to ask. Until then you are the one who cannot be arsed to act properly, not the people who do your job for you, google it and send you the link. And you never mentioned opinions. If you ask about someones beliefs or opinions I doubt you would get an answer in form of a wikipedia link. If you were ever to do something so assenine as to scoff on my answer in form of a link to a website which you could have and should have googled within 5 seconds I would assume that you are a disrespecting, arrogant prick and I would waste no more time on you since if you cannot be arsed to do some work as well I am not going to do it for you. @Eon: Cutting corners is fine as long as you do not do it at the expense of other peoples time and then disrespect them if they refuse to give you well detailed answer which could be easily found using personal research.
actually, several studies have been done and they all pretty much come up with the same conclusion: wiki is equal to, if not better than, established print encyclopedias (like Brittanica). also, i like to look at wiki for general information, but if i'm using it for serious work, i make sure the wiki itself has references. CHECK THE REFRENCES.
