Comments on: Do You Wiki?

By: Jake Was Here

Jake Was Here — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 18:06:45 +0000

TVTropes is a wiki that is relatively free of political bias — and tends to collectively scold itself when such things get caught. They tend to talk about and analyze fiction in a way that makes it difficult to introduce political bias, unless you’re trying really hard to do so.

All the same, I may be one of the few openly right-wing editors there.

By: Mike

Mike — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 17:50:28 +0000

Thank you, David.

By: Raoul Ortega

Raoul Ortega — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 17:49:26 +0000

My last employer used a “wiki” for internal documentation and “an institutional memory”. No one really used it, or kept it up to date. As the new guy, I got the task of doing some cleanup. I hated it. As someone who knows HTML and CSS and all that, the limitations were annoying and cumbersome, and I could see how/why on public sites like Wikipedia, it’s the true believers who are willing to put up with the lousy design and interfaces end up dominating. (And no surprise, since the same people are already comfortable with “theoretics” and “deconstruction” and other such gobbledegook.)

I’ve had some troll try to cite the wikidepia to me as a source for some silly argument they were making.

Recently I came across a squish who was defending his labeling of Palin as a “right wing wacko” by citing Brooks and Frum and Parker and the like. I responded that “if you are going to use an ‘appeal to authority’, you should at least use an authority that the other side respects and uses.” I feel the same way about those who cite wikipedia.com.

By: JohnFN

JohnFN — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 17:19:37 +0000

Somehow I ended up at Wikipedia’s entry for “media bias.” Just out of curiosity I read the entry and virtually every source of information was from Media Matters or similar groups – no mention of the MRC, Newsbusters and the conservative entry was about a paragraph long. Most of it was written in typical academic speak. Wikipedia’s inherent strength is its inherent flaw, which is how something as ubiquitous as the discussion of media bias against the right wing can be completely snowed over on a major entry.

I read Wikipedia for entertainment purposes. If I want information, I check out the direct source that is referenced, but even those are somewhat shady depending on who did the reporting and just what the person doing the entry took out of it.

By: AndrewPrice

AndrewPrice — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 17:19:25 +0000

So said the Wikipedia, much to Terry’s surprise.

By: fritz8945

fritz8945 — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 16:59:36 +0000

While we’re at it, Snopes is taking a liberal dive, as well.

By: Rufus

Rufus — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 16:47:54 +0000

Terry Bradshaw’s dead?!

By: David Marcoe

David Marcoe — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 16:41:46 +0000

Wikipedia:Tutorial

By: Mr. Sideous

Mr. Sideous — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 16:26:50 +0000

I agree this is a real problem. We can’t let this go they might just as well rename it “Sorospedia”.

By: AndrewPrice

AndrewPrice — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 16:19:55 +0000

Mike, You make a good point, a very good point. Conservatives need to learn to engage in the culture, not flee from it. If we abandon something like wikipedia, it will veer sharply to the left.

And unfortunately, far too many people (particularly the young) rely on it and trust it. I can’t tell you the number of times I’ve had some troll try to cite the wikidepia to me as a source for some silly argument they were making. I always like to point out the number of people the Wikipedia has wrongly declared dead, with the most famous being Fox Sports announcer Terry Bradshaw.