8 ms·

I have in the past, but three things put me off doing so now; Pages where I can spot inconsistencies are often controversial, with long dense discussion pages,

I have in the past, but three things put me off doing so now; Pages where I can spot inconsistencies are often controversial, with long dense discussion pages, edits here are almost impossible beyond trivial details. I dont mind fixing trivia, but not if the actual improvement I think I can make is rejected. There is a bit of a deletionist crusade to keep some topics small, for example, Ive had interesting trivia about a cameras development process simply deleted. Maybe it is truly for the better, but it is not really that easy to add to the meat of the project, without someone else's approval. Third, the begging banners really feel a bit gross; I know the size of the endowment, and how long it would be able to sustain the project (forever essentially)... It really feels like the foundation is using the Wikipedia brand to funnel money to irrelevant pet causes. This really puts me off contributing.

gotoeleven 1y ago
It really feels that way because that's what they're doing. There's a legit non-profit internet encyclopedia barnacled with a bunch of generic left wing political stuff, except the barnacle is bigger than the boat.
- arrowsmith 1y ago
  Yeah I stopped donating to Wikipedia once I learned where the money goes. Even if it ends up supporting causes I agree with, why would I need the Wikimedia Foundation as an intermediary? I could just give money directly to the causes!
webstrand 1y ago
I made an edit last year, it immediately got reverted and I got a banner on my user page for vandalism. I complained about that, other people agreed with me but the person who reverted my edits never responded. So there it sits.
- paradite 1y ago
  Seems like the story of Stackoverflow.
- the_mitsuhiko 1y ago
  Would be curious to learn what you edited.
- Arch-TK 1y ago
  If there's a dispute and the person you're having a dispute with never materialises to argue their side of the argument, you're fine to just revert the banner.
  - firesteelrain 1y ago
    How are people supposed to understand these hard to follow and shifting rules?
    - Kim_Bruning 1y ago
      The base rules are actually not very complicated. But any time you try to write them down, people will come along and interpret them to their own advantage, sometimes outright in the opposite direction. That's a people problem, to some extent, not purely a Wikipedia problem. (BRD is my favorite pet-peeve)
      - firesteelrain 1y ago
        I am going to use this at work!
      - oarsinsync 1y ago
        > The base rules are actually not very complicated. > But any time you try to write them down, people will come along and interpret them to their own advantage, sometimes outright in the opposite direction. I think this a feature/bug of a (litigious) society that works on the letter of the law rather than the spirit of the law.
      - dredmorbius 1y ago
        BOLD, revert, discuss, for those unfamiliar: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:BOLD,_revert,_discuss_cycle https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:BOLD,_revert,_discus...>
- technothrasher 1y ago
  The only few times I tried to make small edits, typo corrections, or similar, they just got immediately reverted as vandalism. So when I found a page that is largely wrong about a relatively obscure historical figure that I actually know a lot about and have plenty of source material for, I didn't really feel motivated to put the work in to clean it up.
  - stogot 1y ago
    I made a small edit to fix a mistake once and it didn’t get called vandalism but I sort of got a harsh message telling I did it wrong and didn’t follow processes There must be some admin-level expectations of how things should be done but the editor flow gives you zero warning or indication. This was a while back so maybe they changed the flow
    - dharmab 1y ago
      I've had my edits similarly mass reverted with an unkind message.
- arjie 1y ago
  For reasons unknown, I am much better than many at navigating this: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40655989 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40655989 https://x.com/arjie/status/1847046183342297498?s=46 https://x.com/arjie/status/1847046183342297498?s=46 If you share with me what your change is I might be able to get it done.
- GoblinSlayer 1y ago
  I think it's an antispam bot, just rerevert.
- Avamander 1y ago
  If you revert someone's malicious reverts three times, you'll be forced into arbitration. They rarely bother with that though.
YZF 1y ago
I've also edited random things in the past. Like inaccuracies in Comp.Sci. topics. I used to like Wikipedia but I'm changing my mind. One thing amongst many others was seeing some company that competed with the startup I worked in basically introduce marketing material into the site. It just feels like it's too big and there are too many interests that want to distort things. I was surprised to see some article recently removed effectively rewriting history and directing to some alternative version. I just checked again and it's been restored but it just seems like the wild west. I'd need some serious convincing to restore my trust in it. There are still some good technical/science articles I guess. It kind of sucks that instead of getting more reliable information on the Internet we're trending towards not being to trust anything. It's not clear how we fix this since reliability can not be equal to popularity.
- bawolff 1y ago
  > It just feels like it's too big and there are too many interests that want to distort things. I was surprised to see some article recently removed effectively rewriting history and directing to some alternative version. I just checked again and it's been restored but it just seems like the wild west. In fairness, this does mean the system is working.
  - YZF 1y ago
    Yeah- Maybe it's "eventually working". It's hard to trust when it seems so fluid. Maybe there needs to be some mechanics to make it harder to change. Something like being able to suggest changes/corrections but having those come out on some schedule after a review? (thinking software release process here). Quarterly Wikipedia releases? Creating some "core" of Wikipedia that is subject to tougher editorial standards? Not sure.
    - terribleperson 1y ago
      Harder to change doesn't make it more or less correct, just means wrong information sticks around longer. Because revision history is kept and changes are instant, it's easy to fix bad changes. For topics that see extensive astroturfing, they can be restricted.
20after4 1y ago
I think the "deletionist" tendency is one of the biggest problems with Wikipedia. At least it's the main thing that prevents me from making significant contributions. I say tendency, but maybe it really is more of a crusade. Deletion and rejection definitely seem to be the default "predisposition." I've seen a lot of examples of apparently well meaning contributors being pushed away by the need to establish "notability" for a subject and the expectation that all information must be referenced to a fairly limited number of approved reliable sources. These are norms which have been built over a long period of time so it would be incredibly difficult to change them now.
- potato3732842 1y ago
  Exactly. It makes it basically impossible to get niche industry/trade information and history onto wikipedia unless it was so newsworthy it's covered everywhere.
  - kurtreed2 1y ago
    Yet when I (or others) are trying to raise the issue on certain Reddit communities in addition to Lemmy people there still prefer to bury their heads in the sand. Often they'll simply resort to personal attacks and so on just to avoid facing the fact that Wikipedia is not as infalliable as they think at all. Example: https://lemmy.world/comment/14158030 https://lemmy.world/comment/14158030
- Animats 1y ago
  That's a feature. Each article requires future attention and adds load. Most of the important articles were in the first 100,000.
  - johnnyanmac 1y ago
    If that's the intention, fine. But don't be surprised when no one but the most committed politicians want to bother trying to contribute to the project.
  - 20after4 1y ago
zbobet2012 1y ago
I've had basic facts about mathematics which are wrong deleted in revisions by editors with no knowledge of the subject beyond having asked ChatGPT (which repeats the wrong shit on Wikipedia). It's hard to be worth it. Wikipedia's biggest problem is the editors.
- TimorousBestie 1y ago
  Wikipedia is really, really bad at mathematics. The tone is all over the place, from “plagiarized from an undergrad textbook” to “crackpot with an axe to grind against Cantor.”
- Kim_Bruning 1y ago
  A new layer of Citogenesis? ( https://xkcd.com/978/ https://xkcd.com/978/ ) Interesting. Do you have an example? I'll go look!
kyzx 1y ago
I've tried to contribute to Wikipedia and other Wikimedia projects but they block Tor, e-mailing admins to get an account manually created always results in them telling you to follow some other process, but that process is only for "established editors", so it seems there's no realistic way for me to contribute.
psychoslave 1y ago
Not everything meets Wikipedia editorial goals, but you still have a lot more of latitude in Wikibooks and Wikiversity, the latter also admitting original researches.

gotoeleven 1y ago

It really feels that way because that's what they're doing. There's a legit non-profit internet encyclopedia barnacled with a bunch of generic left wing political stuff, except the barnacle is bigger than the boat.

arrowsmith 1y ago
Yeah I stopped donating to Wikipedia once I learned where the money goes. Even if it ends up supporting causes I agree with, why would I need the Wikimedia Foundation as an intermediary? I could just give money directly to the causes!

webstrand 1y ago

I made an edit last year, it immediately got reverted and I got a banner on my user page for vandalism. I complained about that, other people agreed with me but the person who reverted my edits never responded. So there it sits.

paradite 1y ago
Seems like the story of Stackoverflow.
the_mitsuhiko 1y ago
Would be curious to learn what you edited.
Arch-TK 1y ago
If there's a dispute and the person you're having a dispute with never materialises to argue their side of the argument, you're fine to just revert the banner.
- firesteelrain 1y ago
  How are people supposed to understand these hard to follow and shifting rules?
  - Kim_Bruning 1y ago
    The base rules are actually not very complicated. But any time you try to write them down, people will come along and interpret them to their own advantage, sometimes outright in the opposite direction. That's a people problem, to some extent, not purely a Wikipedia problem. (BRD is my favorite pet-peeve)
    - firesteelrain 1y ago
      I am going to use this at work!
    - oarsinsync 1y ago
      > The base rules are actually not very complicated. > But any time you try to write them down, people will come along and interpret them to their own advantage, sometimes outright in the opposite direction. I think this a feature/bug of a (litigious) society that works on the letter of the law rather than the spirit of the law.
    - dredmorbius 1y ago
      BOLD, revert, discuss, for those unfamiliar: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:BOLD,_revert,_discuss_cycle https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:BOLD,_revert,_discus...>
technothrasher 1y ago
The only few times I tried to make small edits, typo corrections, or similar, they just got immediately reverted as vandalism. So when I found a page that is largely wrong about a relatively obscure historical figure that I actually know a lot about and have plenty of source material for, I didn't really feel motivated to put the work in to clean it up.
- stogot 1y ago
  I made a small edit to fix a mistake once and it didn’t get called vandalism but I sort of got a harsh message telling I did it wrong and didn’t follow processes There must be some admin-level expectations of how things should be done but the editor flow gives you zero warning or indication. This was a while back so maybe they changed the flow
  - dharmab 1y ago
    I've had my edits similarly mass reverted with an unkind message.
arjie 1y ago
For reasons unknown, I am much better than many at navigating this: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40655989 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40655989 https://x.com/arjie/status/1847046183342297498?s=46 https://x.com/arjie/status/1847046183342297498?s=46 If you share with me what your change is I might be able to get it done.
GoblinSlayer 1y ago
I think it's an antispam bot, just rerevert.
Avamander 1y ago
If you revert someone's malicious reverts three times, you'll be forced into arbitration. They rarely bother with that though.

YZF 1y ago

I've also edited random things in the past. Like inaccuracies in Comp.Sci. topics. I used to like Wikipedia but I'm changing my mind. One thing amongst many others was seeing some company that competed with the startup I worked in basically introduce marketing material into the site. It just feels like it's too big and there are too many interests that want to distort things. I was surprised to see some article recently removed effectively rewriting history and directing to some alternative version. I just checked again and it's been restored but it just seems like the wild west. I'd need some serious convincing to restore my trust in it. There are still some good technical/science articles I guess. It kind of sucks that instead of getting more reliable information on the Internet we're trending towards not being to trust anything. It's not clear how we fix this since reliability can not be equal to popularity.

bawolff 1y ago
> It just feels like it's too big and there are too many interests that want to distort things. I was surprised to see some article recently removed effectively rewriting history and directing to some alternative version. I just checked again and it's been restored but it just seems like the wild west. In fairness, this does mean the system is working.
- YZF 1y ago
  Yeah- Maybe it's "eventually working". It's hard to trust when it seems so fluid. Maybe there needs to be some mechanics to make it harder to change. Something like being able to suggest changes/corrections but having those come out on some schedule after a review? (thinking software release process here). Quarterly Wikipedia releases? Creating some "core" of Wikipedia that is subject to tougher editorial standards? Not sure.
  - terribleperson 1y ago
    Harder to change doesn't make it more or less correct, just means wrong information sticks around longer. Because revision history is kept and changes are instant, it's easy to fix bad changes. For topics that see extensive astroturfing, they can be restricted.

20after4 1y ago

I think the "deletionist" tendency is one of the biggest problems with Wikipedia. At least it's the main thing that prevents me from making significant contributions. I say tendency, but maybe it really is more of a crusade. Deletion and rejection definitely seem to be the default "predisposition." I've seen a lot of examples of apparently well meaning contributors being pushed away by the need to establish "notability" for a subject and the expectation that all information must be referenced to a fairly limited number of approved reliable sources. These are norms which have been built over a long period of time so it would be incredibly difficult to change them now.

potato3732842 1y ago
Exactly. It makes it basically impossible to get niche industry/trade information and history onto wikipedia unless it was so newsworthy it's covered everywhere.
- kurtreed2 1y ago
  Yet when I (or others) are trying to raise the issue on certain Reddit communities in addition to Lemmy people there still prefer to bury their heads in the sand. Often they'll simply resort to personal attacks and so on just to avoid facing the fact that Wikipedia is not as infalliable as they think at all. Example: https://lemmy.world/comment/14158030 https://lemmy.world/comment/14158030
Animats 1y ago
That's a feature. Each article requires future attention and adds load. Most of the important articles were in the first 100,000.
- johnnyanmac 1y ago
  If that's the intention, fine. But don't be surprised when no one but the most committed politicians want to bother trying to contribute to the project.
- 20after4 1y ago

zbobet2012 1y ago

I've had basic facts about mathematics which are wrong deleted in revisions by editors with no knowledge of the subject beyond having asked ChatGPT (which repeats the wrong shit on Wikipedia). It's hard to be worth it. Wikipedia's biggest problem is the editors.

TimorousBestie 1y ago
Wikipedia is really, really bad at mathematics. The tone is all over the place, from “plagiarized from an undergrad textbook” to “crackpot with an axe to grind against Cantor.”
Kim_Bruning 1y ago
A new layer of Citogenesis? ( https://xkcd.com/978/ https://xkcd.com/978/ ) Interesting. Do you have an example? I'll go look!

kyzx 1y ago

I've tried to contribute to Wikipedia and other Wikimedia projects but they block Tor, e-mailing admins to get an account manually created always results in them telling you to follow some other process, but that process is only for "established editors", so it seems there's no realistic way for me to contribute.

psychoslave 1y ago

Not everything meets Wikipedia editorial goals, but you still have a lot more of latitude in Wikibooks and Wikiversity, the latter also admitting original researches.