SilentSadness
Dead inside
- Feb 28, 2023
- 1,358
If other people agreed with me, I wouldn't post this, but looking online, the vast majority of people fully support Wikipedia as an unbiased open source. That view is such a stark contrast to the reality of Wikipedia that I have to talk about it.
Firstly, Wikipedia's idea of what it means to be neutral is completely nonsensical. To give an example, if a hypothetical person was suspected of murder, then a neutral way to comment would be "The person is suspected of murder by X" or "The person was accused of murder by X, and the accusation is supported by Y". However, Wikipedia claims that being neutral just means repeating whatever "reliable sources" say verbatim. According to Wikipedia, public opinion defines the meaning of "reliable source". The result is that the Wikipedia way to comment is "The person committed murder[1]" or "The person is innocent[1]".
Secondly, Wikipedia's policy on what they call "edit warring" is the worst conceivable policy. An "edit war" generally arises when a troll repeatedly makes problematic amendments to an article and someone reasonable undoes their edits. Since trolls have a lot of time, this often never ends. Wikipedia's solution is to attack the reasonable person using a "three-revert rule" which punishes them for undoing the vandalism more than three times. The result is that it is very unlikely for a troll's edits to be removed unless moderators get involved.
Thirdly, when a moderator does get involved, their response is usually to lock the article. This is again the worst conceivable policy because it removes the whole point of the site. Even worse, it ensures the vandalism can't be changed.
My opinion is that Wikipedia is a complete waste of time for anything that could be controversial, as it's a cesspool of misinformation. Even for non-controversial topics, it's always the site that gives the longest monologues about irrelevant information to the topic, and its UI is borderline unusable. It should have died 15 years ago when it would have been older than Sanctioned Suicide.
Firstly, Wikipedia's idea of what it means to be neutral is completely nonsensical. To give an example, if a hypothetical person was suspected of murder, then a neutral way to comment would be "The person is suspected of murder by X" or "The person was accused of murder by X, and the accusation is supported by Y". However, Wikipedia claims that being neutral just means repeating whatever "reliable sources" say verbatim. According to Wikipedia, public opinion defines the meaning of "reliable source". The result is that the Wikipedia way to comment is "The person committed murder[1]" or "The person is innocent[1]".
Secondly, Wikipedia's policy on what they call "edit warring" is the worst conceivable policy. An "edit war" generally arises when a troll repeatedly makes problematic amendments to an article and someone reasonable undoes their edits. Since trolls have a lot of time, this often never ends. Wikipedia's solution is to attack the reasonable person using a "three-revert rule" which punishes them for undoing the vandalism more than three times. The result is that it is very unlikely for a troll's edits to be removed unless moderators get involved.
Thirdly, when a moderator does get involved, their response is usually to lock the article. This is again the worst conceivable policy because it removes the whole point of the site. Even worse, it ensures the vandalism can't be changed.
My opinion is that Wikipedia is a complete waste of time for anything that could be controversial, as it's a cesspool of misinformation. Even for non-controversial topics, it's always the site that gives the longest monologues about irrelevant information to the topic, and its UI is borderline unusable. It should have died 15 years ago when it would have been older than Sanctioned Suicide.
