Wikipedia:Wikipedia is failing

Is Wikipedia succeeding in its aim of becoming a reputable, reliable encyclopedia? It is important that Wikipedians assess the shortcomings of Wikipedia honestly, if they are to be overcome.

Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, and the quality of any encyclopedia can be gauged by several factors, including overall size, organization, ease of navigation, breadth of coverage, depth of coverage, timeliness, readability, biases, and reliability.

Wikipedia's overall size, organization and navigation

The number of Wikipedia articles has grown exponentially from October 2002 to October 2006, with a doubling time of roughly 1 year.

As of 2007, Wikipedia had over 1.6 million articles, making it the largest encyclopedia ever assembled, eclipsing even the Yongle Encyclopedia (1407), which held the record for nearly 600 years. Traditionally, the problem of finding information in a large reference work is managed by organizing topics alphabetically, by topic, and/or by including an alphabetical index. A more subtle organization is also imposed by the editor's choice of main articles and system of cross-referencing. Print encyclopedias generally give short entries to smaller topics, then cross-reference to a larger article in which smaller topics are discussed. This grouping of topics into larger articles was a key part of the "new plan" that was the basis for the 1st edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica.

Online encyclopedias such as Wikipedia have different methods of organization. Information is usually found by following a hyperlink from one article to another or by using a search engine. Hyperlinks are roughly equivalent to cross-references in traditional works, although a typical Wikipedia article has many more such cross-references than a traditional encyclopedia article. Using a search engine is roughly equivalent to searching the index of a print encyclopedia; unlike such indices, however, there is no limit to the number of possible search terms. The index of the 2007 Encyclopædia Britannica contains 700,000 terms, less than half the number of articles in Wikipedia.

Wikipedia also has its own topical organization. Articles are grouped into categories that may be searched; this is analogous to the Outline of Knowledge found in the Propædia of the Encyclopædia Britannica. However, unlike that Outline, the categorization of Wikipedia articles is not strictly hierarchical, instead forming a network of ideas. Wikipedia has also developed portals intended to provide readers with an overview of a topic.

Therefore, Wikipedia's overall size and navigation system seem superior to those of existing encyclopedias.

Breadth and depth of coverage

Wikipedia is a general encyclopedia — like other works such as the Encyclopædia Britannica and the World Book Encyclopedia, it seeks to describe as wide a range of topics as possible. Wikipedia covers subjects that would be expected in traditional encyclopedias, as well as many cultural and technical topics often absent from such works. For example, several featured articles, such as Cyclol and Laplace-Runge-Lenz vector, are not even mentioned in the Encyclopædia Britannica, while the coverage of others, such as Photon, is far more complete, better illustrated, better referenced and beter written than their counterparts in the Britannica. Wikipedia also does not shy from covering controversial topics such as sexual harassment that are sometimes ignored by other encyclopedias,.

In addition to the roughly exponential growth in number of articles, the average length of each article has increased steadily, as has the number of "featured articles" recognized for being of significant quality WikiProjects and automated article-assessment systems such as the MathBot have also fostered the improvement of articles in particular areas.

For comparison, Wikipedia now covers all but two of the topics covered in the Macropædia, the chief exceptions being industrial "Beverage production" and "Arts of Native American peoples". However, the Britannica has hitherto given better coverage to these general topics.

Timeliness and readability

One strength of Wikipedia is its timeliness. Traditionally, new editions of print encyclopedias were released every few decades, as their information become noticeably outdated. In 1933, Elkan Harrison Powell introduced the idea of "continuous revision", in which every article is revised on a systematic schedule and the entire encyclopedia revised and reprinted every few years to incorporate the changes; most encyclopedias now employ continuous revision. Wikipedia takes "continuous revision" to its ultimate limit — almost all articles may undergo revision at any time — allowing the project to incorporate article concerning current events and recent developments in science, politics and culture. For example, the 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake article in the English-language edition, was cited frequently by the press in the days following the event.

Even the best reference work is of limited use if it is poorly written and unintelligible to its audience. Wikipedia benefits from a large community of proofreaders, who may detect errors and ambiguities; for comparison, the Encyclopædia Britannica employs only twelve copy editors. It also fosters the developement of clearly written articles through various collaborations such as the "featured article" process. On the other hand, the number of individual contributors to the project — millions, if unregistered users are included — is far greater than any print encyclopedia; this can result in large variations in tone and style between (and sometimes within) articles; common policies and style guidelines within each language edition attempt to address this.

Biases

Encyclopedia editors have a responsibility to keep articles as free of bias as possible. Historically, even the best works have suffered from bias; for example, the "Lynch Law" article of the 11th edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica describes the Ku Klux Klan as a "protective society" and defends its actions. Even expert editors may exhibit prejudice; a classic example is Dr. George Gleig's rejection of the Newtonian theory of gravity — a theory long accepted within the scientific community — in the 3rd edition of the Britannica.

Although Wikipedia has a policy on maintaining a neutral point of view, a few zealous editors may seek to influence the presentation of an article in a biased way. This is usually dealt with swiftly and, in extreme cases, biased editors may be banned from editing. In general, Wikipedia's editors also strive to be complete — to include all aspects of a topic and reflect the prevailing consensus in the scholarly community.

Reliability

Main article: reliability of Wikipedia

Readers of an encyclopedia must have confidence that its assertions are true. In traditional scholarship, confidence is established by appealing to the authority of anonymously peer-reviewed publications and of experienced experts. However, as experts can disagree, and any one may be biased or mistaken, peer-reviewed publications are considered to have higher authority. Most encyclopedias include both of these; for example, the 699 Macropædia articles of the 2007 Encyclopædia Britannica give both references and the names of the authorities that wrote those articles, many of whom are leading experts in their fields. By contrast, most of the ~65,000 Micropædia articles neither give citations nor identify their authors; in such cases, the reader's confidence derives from the reputation of the Britannica itself.

Wikipedia appeals to the authority of peer-reviewed publications rather than the personal authority of experts. It would be difficult to determine truly authoritative users with confidence, since Wikipedia does not require that its contributors give their legal names or provide other information to establish their identity. Although some contributors are authorities in their field, Wikipedia requires that even their contributions be supported by published sources. A drawback of this citation-only approach is that readers may be unable to judge the credibility of a cited source. The reader must be satisfied on two points: first, that the cited source is a genuine publication and, second, that it supports the assertion made by the article. Although the first point is usually easy to check, the second may require significant time, effort or training.

Wikipedia's reputation has improved in recent years, and its assertions are increasingly used as a source by organizations such as the U.S. Federal courts and the World Intellectual Property Office — though mainly for supporting information rather than information decisive to a case. Wikipedia has also been used as a source in journalism, sometimes without attribution; several reporters have been dismissed for plagiarizing from Wikipedia.

The English-language Wikipedia has introduced a scale against which the quality of articles is judged; roughly 1200 have passed a rigorous set of criteria to acquire the highest "featured article" status; such articles are intended to provide a thorough, well-written coverage of their topic, and be supported by many references to peer-reviewed publications. Wikipedia has been described as a "work in progress", suggesting that it cannot claim to be authoritative in its own right, unlike more established encyclopedias. Despite its shortcomings, however, many hold out hope for its future. An analogous historical example is provided by the Encyclopædia Britannica, whose first edition was of uneven scholarship, but which rose to great heights in its later editions; the elegant words of its first editor, William Smellie, pertain to Wikipedia as well:

“ With regard to errors in general, whether falling under the denomination of mental, typographical or accidental, we are conscious of being able to point out a greater number than any critic whatever. Men who are acquainted with the innumerable difficulties of attending the execution of a work of such an extensive nature will make proper allowances. To these we appeal, and shall rest satisfied with the judgment they pronounce. ” — William Smellie, in the Preface to the 1st edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica

Criteria which indicate substantial failings

Performance on core topics

Vital articles lists 1182 articles on topics that can be considered essential. These topics should have articles of the very highest quality. So do they? In fact, of those 1182, only 72 are featured articles. This means that 94% of the essential topics that should have excellent articles fall short of the standard.

Do they fall short by a long way? 131 are listed as good articles, which, according to Template:Grading scheme, means that 'other encyclopedias could do a better job'. 133 are listed as articles which are either stubs or have a cleanup tag. The rest, presumably, are B-class or start-class on the assessment scale, meaning they require substantial work before they will match or exceed the standards found in other encyclopaedias.

Performance on broader topics

There are about 1,300 featured articles. There are also about 1,700 good articles. However, there are currently 6,998,617 articles on Wikipedia. This means that slightly more than 99.8% of all the articles on Wikipedia are not considered well written, verifiable or broad or comprehensive in their coverage. A useful exercise is to critically read ten random articles. It is very likely that most or even all will contain poor writing and unsourced material.

Maintenance of standards

Do articles which are judged to have reached the highest standards remain excellent for a long time, or do standards decline as well-meant but poor quality edits cause standards to fall over time? There are currently 340 former featured articles, so that more than 20% of all articles that have ever been featured are no longer featured. An FA that is not actively maintained inevitably declines; for an example see Ryanair, which attracts large numbers of highly biased edits which have wrecked a formerly excellent article. Sun's lead section was reduced to a few short sentences by an editor who either hadn't read or didn't understand the guidelines on what a lead section is supposed to be, and no-one has restored the previously existing summary. A whole section of Mauna Loa was removed by a vandal in November, and was not restored for a month. Generally, if the primary author of an FA does not take care of it, checking changes up to several times a day, it is likely to have its quality compromised by unnoticed vandalism or, far more damaging in the long term, well-intentioned but poor quality edits.

Rate of quality article production

Many argue that Wikipedia is a work in progress and that, given time, all articles will reach very high standards. Unfortunately, this is not borne out by the rate at which articles are currently being judged to meet featured article criteria. About one article a day on average becomes featured; at this rate, it will take 4,380 years for all the currently existing articles to meet FA criteria. Given the ongoing approximately exponential growth rate of Wikipedia, which will see it double in size in about the next 500 days, on current trends there will never be a time when all articles have been brought up to high quality.

Special:Recentchanges provides evidence that the rate of addition of substantial encyclopaedic content is low. You may find it informative to look at the last 200 recent changes and count how many of them are directly building the encyclopedia. That means observing reasonably sound content being added (and not under a 'trivia' header) to an article that is not a borderline AFD candidate. (The info on bytes added/removed narrows the search quite quickly.) Typically this reveals less than ten substantive article-space change in 200.

Food for thought

If Wikipedia just aimed to be a social site where people with similar interests could come together and write articles about anything they liked, it would certainly be succeeding. However, its stated aim is to be an encyclopaedia, and not just that but an encyclopaedia of the highest quality. Six years of work has resulted in 3,000 articles of good or excellent quality, at which rate it will take many decades to produce the quantity of good or excellent articles found in traditional reference works. Over 1.6 million articles are mediocre to poor to appalling in quality.

Open questions

• Why has the system failed to produce a quality reference work?
• What can be done to change the system?
• Is radical change required, or just small adjustments to the current set-up?
• Does this matter, given that Wikipedia is one of the most popular websites in the world?
• What is Wikipedia really, and what do we want it to be?
• Are volunteer editors suitable to meet our future objectives?
• Are articles really NPOV?
• Are the statistical measures introduced by this essay relevant to the conclusion drawn by the essayist?

See also

• Wikipedia:Wikipedia is not failing