this post was submitted on 21 Aug 2023
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[โ€“] Sterile_Technique 33 points 1 year ago (4 children)

Academically it's not considered trustworthy because "anyone can make edits to it".

Functionally, it's one of the best sources of information there is, period.

It's not perfect - malicious actors can indeed make fraudulent entries; but I've only seen a real example of that once, and it was corrected super fast.

If ever in doubt, every page lists its sources, so you can always get your info directly from those... and back to academics: while it's generally taboo to cite Wikipedia directly, you can cite the same pages Wikipedia does as an easy work around.

[โ€“] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

My favorite example of fake entries was the guy who just made Missouri slightly bigger on its page every time he got drunk

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