I am a Dragon. I emerge from my Egg. The Economist has a survey on Open-source business (subs req). The usual suspects - apache, linux - come up, and of course so does wikipedia. And naturally enough (since this is a pile of econ journos who know b*gg*r all about wiki) they make the traditional mistakes...
- Saying that the George Bush article is edit-locked. It isn't. Go visit it and confirm that for yourself; check the edit history to see that it has been unlocked for a while (though I think it was semi-protected (i.e. no anon edits) for a bit).
- Misunderstanding policies: A blunt new policy was promulgated: "Don't be a dick.". Well, [[WP:DICK]] does exit (though its really a meta: page) but its more a statement of principles than a policy.
- Misunderstanding the who can edit: Wikipedia changed its rules so that only registered users can edit existing entries, and new contributors must wait a few days before they can start new ones.. This is obviously false, as an attempt to edit while not logged in, or a glance at a page history, will confirm. The true bit is that anon users can't start new pages.
The good point about wiki is that false info can be removed and corrected. How long will it be before the Economist corrects its mistakes?
Email this entry to a friend
View the Technorati Link Cosmos for this entry
Comments
The good point about wiki is that false info can be removed and corrected. How long will it be before the Economist corrects its mistakes?
In the very next issue, if you point this out to them. They usually put it in a footnote in the relevant section.
[I emailed them. We shall see - W]
Posted by: JW Tan | March 17, 2006 1:33 PM