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Aseem Member
Joined: 15 Dec 2006 Posts: 2841 Location: YYZ
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Posted: Sun Mar 11, 2007 8:33 pm Post subject: Wikipedia |
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Economist wrote: | Online encyclopedias
Fact or fiction?
Mar 10th 2007
From Economist.com
Wikipedia's wide variety of contributors is both a strength and a weakness of the online encyclopedia
The idea of an encyclopedia—a compendium of all the best available knowledge—is as tempting as it is flawed. Truth does not always come in bite-sized chunks. And the notion of an infinitely elastic internet encyclopedia, always up to date and distilling the collective wisdom of the wired is even more tempting. When open to all comers, anonymously, the problems are even more glaring.
This week a senior Wikipedia editor, who used the pseudonym Essjay, turned out not to be a professor of religious studies as he claimed, but in fact a 24-year-old college drop-out. That has highlighted both the strengths and the failings of the world’s biggest online encyclopedia, which now boasts well over 1.5m articles. The “Encyclopedia Britannica”, by contrast, has a mere 120,000.
Essjay (or Ryan Jordan in real life), got away with his pretence because Wikipedians jealously preserve their anonymity. With most entries, anyone can edit without even logging in; or they can create an entirely fictitious online identity before doing so. The effect is rather like an online role-playing game. Indeed, it is easy to imagine some sad fellow spending the morning pretending to be a polyglot professor on Wikipedia, and then becoming a buxom red-head on “Second Life”, a virtual online world, in the afternoon.
That anonymity creates a phoney equality, which puts cranks and experts on the same footing. The same egalitarian approach starts off by regarding all sources as equal, regardless of merit. If a peer-reviewed journal says one thing and a non-specialist newspaper report another, the Wikipedia entry is likely solemnly to cite them both, saying that the truth is disputed. If the cranky believe the latter and the experts the former, the result will be wearisome online editing wars before something approaching the academic mainstream consensus gains the weight it should.
Wikipedia has strengths too, chiefly the resilient power of collective common sense. It benefits from the volunteer efforts of many thousands of outside contributors and editors. If one drops out, another fills his place. People are vigilant on issues that interest them. When mistakes happen, they are usually resolved quickly. This correspondent’s modest Wikipedia entry was edited this week by an anonymous contributor who posted a series of entertaining but defamatory remarks; a mere four minutes later, another user had removed them.
Constant scrutiny and editing means even the worst articles are gradually getting better, while the best ones are kept nicely polished and up to date. Someone, eventually, will spot even the tiniest error, or tighten a patch of sloppy prose. Mr Jordan, for all his bragging, seems to have been a scrupulous and effective editor.
The most tiresome contributors do get banned eventually, though they can always log in under a new identity. Other shortcomings are the subject of earnest internal debate too, such as Wikipedia’s inherent bias towards trivial recent events rather than important historical ones. That is already changing, slowly, though subjects of interest to northern white computer-literate males are over-covered, while others are laughably neglected.
Wikipedia is the biggest collaborative online encyclopedia, but not the only one. Citizendium, supposedly launching soon, aims to be like Wikipedia but without anonymity, and with more weight given to recognised experts. Conservapedia aims to offer a version of the truth untainted by Wikipedia’s liberal secular bias on issues such as evolution.
So how useful is Wikipedia? Entries on uncontentious issues—logarithms, for example—are often admirable. The quality of writing is often a good guide to an entry’s usefulness: inelegant or ranting prose usually reflects muddled thoughts and incomplete information. A regular user soon gets a feel for what to trust.
Those on contentious issues are useful in a different way. The information may be only roughly balanced. But the furiously contested entries on, say, “Armenian genocide” or “Scientology”, and their attached discussion pages, do give the reader an useful idea about the contours of the arguments, and the conflicting sources and approaches. In short: it would be unwise to rely on Wikipedia as the final word, but it can be an excellent jumping off point. |
I like the stuff knowing very well that it can be doctored. Especially good if the topic is not controversial.
rgds
VT-ASJ _________________ [url=http://openflights.org/user/aseemsjohri]
[/url] |
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HAWK21M Member
Joined: 19 Dec 2006 Posts: 8132 Location: Mumbai, INDIA
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Posted: Mon Mar 12, 2007 9:53 am Post subject: |
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Not very reliable source as Contributers vary.
regds
MEL _________________ Think of the Brighter side !!! |
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ABN397 Member
Joined: 27 Dec 2006 Posts: 113 Location: India
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Posted: Mon Mar 12, 2007 7:45 pm Post subject: |
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Perhaps some senior member can create a Wikipedia entry for our group:-)
As Aseem may know, IRFCA has an entry.
I have done a bit of editing and additions to a few entries-mainly biographies of prominent Indian businessmen and academics. |
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Nimish Member
Joined: 16 Dec 2006 Posts: 9757 Location: Bangalore, India
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HAWK21M Member
Joined: 19 Dec 2006 Posts: 8132 Location: Mumbai, INDIA
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Posted: Mon Mar 12, 2007 8:24 pm Post subject: |
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Airliners.net
The Link to A.net page.Which has a link to the Airliners-India.net group.
regds
MEL _________________ Think of the Brighter side !!! |
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the_380 Member
Joined: 19 Dec 2006 Posts: 2329 Location: Mumbai, India
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Posted: Mon Mar 12, 2007 11:35 pm Post subject: |
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Did u add that? I mean i tried to but someone erased it off _________________ http://www.myspace.com/avsatsworld
A Walt Disney and 20th Century Fox Audio Producer!!! |
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Birendra Member
Joined: 15 Feb 2007 Posts: 1411
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Posted: Tue Mar 13, 2007 4:42 am Post subject: |
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I see no mention of AI net....
Please guide |
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Aseem Member
Joined: 15 Dec 2006 Posts: 2841 Location: YYZ
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the_380 Member
Joined: 19 Dec 2006 Posts: 2329 Location: Mumbai, India
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Posted: Tue Mar 13, 2007 11:47 am Post subject: |
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Aseem, i tried to do it a lot of times before but someone kept on deleting it constantly. If you remember i had sent a PM to you regarding that also.
Now I am thinking to write a complete new article on our forum and internally link it to Aviation pages in wikipedia related to India like for example add the relevant thread links in Wikipedia to Air India/ Indian articled, etc.
Lets see who deletes them
AFAIK in this case i suspect that Planefan member doing some work in there in deleting Mel's posts _________________ http://www.myspace.com/avsatsworld
A Walt Disney and 20th Century Fox Audio Producer!!! |
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Akshay Member
Joined: 19 Dec 2006 Posts: 315 Location: Mumbai
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Posted: Tue Mar 13, 2007 5:04 pm Post subject: |
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the_380 wrote: |
AFAIK in this case i suspect that Planefan member doing some work in there in deleting Mel's posts |
Who is planefan? is he sort of enemy of MEL?
ABN397 wrote: | As Aseem may know, IRFCA has an entry. |
Yes Wikipedia does have an entry. AFAIK, there are 4 IRFCAns on this group. _________________ MRVC Mania. My blog dedicated to the new violet-white suburban rakes of Mumbai. |
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the_380 Member
Joined: 19 Dec 2006 Posts: 2329 Location: Mumbai, India
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Posted: Tue Mar 13, 2007 8:14 pm Post subject: |
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Akshay wrote: |
Who is planefan? is he sort of enemy of MEL?
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I dont think so. He's probably the member of Anet responsible for their wiki article...so must be keeping an eye on it _________________ http://www.myspace.com/avsatsworld
A Walt Disney and 20th Century Fox Audio Producer!!! |
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HAWK21M Member
Joined: 19 Dec 2006 Posts: 8132 Location: Mumbai, INDIA
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Posted: Tue Mar 13, 2007 9:06 pm Post subject: |
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Too bad Some one does not want our link there.Now there are two options.
1.I keep reposting.
2.Lets launch our data on a seperate page.
If someone can prepare a good Article on our Anet-India group.It would be really helpfull.
regds
MEL _________________ Think of the Brighter side !!! |
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C-GHKR Member
Joined: 26 Dec 2006 Posts: 626 Location: yyz
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C-GHKR Member
Joined: 26 Dec 2006 Posts: 626 Location: yyz
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Posted: Tue Mar 13, 2007 10:20 pm Post subject: |
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IMO, this forum is no way related to Airliners.net.
So, it should have its own identity. A guy like me has no loyalty to JP.net, A.net or PP.net. I use all of them for my interests and I don't feel obliged to any.
I have had real good experience with JP.net forum when you have a real question. Very positive and encouraging unlike A.net where everyone thinks they are too smart. That being said only 0.1% of my posts are in JP compared to A.net (cos most of it is BS) |
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the_380 Member
Joined: 19 Dec 2006 Posts: 2329 Location: Mumbai, India
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Posted: Tue Mar 13, 2007 11:29 pm Post subject: |
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Mel,
i have already suggested making a new article... i'll type it as soon as i am done with my exams. its better we post a new article altogether. i here totally agree with what c-ghkr. lets try and attract crowd towards indian aviation from all the aviation sites not just Anet _________________ http://www.myspace.com/avsatsworld
A Walt Disney and 20th Century Fox Audio Producer!!! |
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HAWK21M Member
Joined: 19 Dec 2006 Posts: 8132 Location: Mumbai, INDIA
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Posted: Wed Mar 14, 2007 8:46 am Post subject: |
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I got a PM requesting same too.As our Forum was only having members of Anet from India & no link to the site.Which is true.
Avi.....I guess We can start on preparing our own page in future.
regds
MEL _________________ Think of the Brighter side !!! |
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the_380 Member
Joined: 19 Dec 2006 Posts: 2329 Location: Mumbai, India
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Posted: Wed Mar 14, 2007 7:36 pm Post subject: |
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Yes i'll type the information soon ... meanwhile Aseem can you please help me out with the statistics? Date of starting the forum, date of shifting, average posts per day, average visitors per day (count me in everyday ) and such other figures .. thanks _________________ http://www.myspace.com/avsatsworld
A Walt Disney and 20th Century Fox Audio Producer!!! |
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shivendrashukla Member
Joined: 21 Dec 2006 Posts: 1354 Location: Mumbai, India
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Posted: Wed Mar 14, 2007 8:02 pm Post subject: |
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HAWK21M wrote: |
.I guess We can start on preparing our own page in future.
regds
MEL |
Yeah i too think the same. Lemme know if i can be of some help
Cheers
Shivendra |
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the_380 Member
Joined: 19 Dec 2006 Posts: 2329 Location: Mumbai, India
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Posted: Wed Mar 14, 2007 8:50 pm Post subject: |
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Everyone can! Lemme know your points...pen them down .. i'll start a new thread in non-avition where everyone will post their ideas _________________ http://www.myspace.com/avsatsworld
A Walt Disney and 20th Century Fox Audio Producer!!! |
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HAWK21M Member
Joined: 19 Dec 2006 Posts: 8132 Location: Mumbai, INDIA
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Posted: Thu Mar 15, 2007 10:08 am Post subject: |
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Good Idea.
Post a new thread & We all can add in our Inputs.
regds
MEL _________________ Think of the Brighter side !!! |
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Birendra Member
Joined: 15 Feb 2007 Posts: 1411
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HAWK21M Member
Joined: 19 Dec 2006 Posts: 8132 Location: Mumbai, INDIA
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Posted: Thu Mar 15, 2007 5:02 pm Post subject: |
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Right.
regds
MEL _________________ Think of the Brighter side !!! |
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