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Wikipedia's the best wiki in the world, so why does anyone bother to come here? :P
PeterTaylor suspects the rest of the world might take umbrage at a group of Cambridge M:tG players using Wikipedia to organise a draft. Further reasons supplied if necessary.

The OP was from aol.com, so, um... Wikipedia is, indeed, the best encyclopedia I have seen.  Slightly hard to index it without google, but with google, utterly wonderful.  But it's not a ChatRoom?.  This place is.  --Vitenka

The best encyclopedia? What, out of all of them?
It says "the best wiki", not "the best encyclopedia".  And it has a silly smiley, even at that... --M-A
'Wikipedia is, indeed, the best encyclopedia I have seen', third paragraph on this page.
Oh, yes, oops...
How about "the best online freely-accessible encyclopedia"?  Or do you have some other recommendations?  --AC

One of the best general online references (though with a tendency to be very biased in some of its coverage, as people concentrate on adding information about their own hobbies/areas of expertise and so other bits get glossed over or left out entirely, and the 'give equal weight to all points of view' rule leads to a lack of what for want of a better term might be called quality control), but it's hardly the Britannica (which is not free of problems, of course, but is a damn sight more reliable, both in terms of there being information there about a given subject and it being accurate, than Wikipedia).

I stand by 'best'.  At least 'best that I know of'.  It's not the most complete, it's not the most unbiased it's not the acknowledged reference... but it is searchable.  With that ability, it outpaces all traditional encyclopedias - it's actually easy to check crossreferences (as opposed to 'take down volume thirteen') and it seems sufficiently complete.  The only thing that could compete with it, really, are the CD based ones - and they are at least as biased, and usually less interesting.  The best all rounder, I believe.  --Vitenka (Of course, there may be non-free ones that beat it, but I don't know of any)
The CD Britannica is pretty good for content, but suffers badly from its (IE-based) UI whch not only limits the platforms it'll run on but also is just plain not very good.  (Or at least, this is true of the version I bought a few years back).  The bulk of the data is in HTML but in some compressed format that I've not unpicked.  Rjk

Some of us like taking down volume thirteen. Knowledge isn't worth it unless it comes with a real risk of backstrain, that's what I say.

I suppose you prefer your coffee in a cardboard cup?
Of course!  Real coffee comes with a real risk of soaking through the base, destroying the structural integrity of the cup and scorching your lap!  ;)  --Vitenka
And from there leaking into the cupholder on the front of your computer? - CorkScrew


It may be worth linking to WikiPedia: Why_Wikipedia_is_not_so_great here. And then also WikiPedia: Replies_to_common_objections . Between those two, a lot of unnecessary advocacy can probably be pre-empted.

See also ["The faith-based encyclopedia"] vs ["The FUD=based encyclopedia"].
I am sorely tempted to agree with the former article, purely on the basis that the latter was so annoying to read.  By the time "The FUD-based encyclopedia" actually decides to refute any of the "faith" article's claims rather than just attacking the article and its author I had almost completely lost interest... --K
Also worth noting that a lot of these arguments apply to any large scale project, and another large batch apply to any collaborative project and are discussed in great detail everywhere.  --Vitenka



[The Register posts an article covering criticism of Wikipedia]. [Readers respond, mainly in support of the criticism].


[U.S. Congress staff make partisan edits to Senators' biographies]


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