(Richard Bos) writes:
> Richard G. Riley <> wrote:
>
>> Richard Heathfield <> writes:
>>
>> > In other words, it suffers from the same problem that any wiki suffers from
>> > - editing can be carried out by anyone, no matter how ignorant.
>>
>> Or, in all fairness, how well informed. No different from any techy
>> newsgroup really where google will reveal all sorts of wrong answers,
>> misleading information and general rubbish : invariably bad data is unremovable
>> though - giving Wikis the edge when uptodate and well maintained.
>
> Wrong. On any techy newsgroup, when misinformation is published, one
> will generally find a follow-up posted that corrects the bad
> information, and that correction is just as unremovable as the
> original
Not wrong at all. There might well be corrections and followups but the
original bad info/posts tends to stay there. Surely you dont refute that?
> rubbish. On a Wiki, when misinformation is posted, anyone can correct
> that misinformation - and anyone else can, _and will_, re-uncorrect that
> correction just as quickly.
If they have malice aforethough this could be a problem. See the Beorge
Bush wiki for an example.
> On a newsgroup, the winner is the reader with the patience to read the
> entire thread rather than the single post. On a Wiki, the winner is
> the
Some can be somewhat long and winding :-;
> poster with the most patience to keep re-"correcting" this rubbish
> poster who keeps asserting that void main() is bad C, and the patient
> reader, no matter how patient, loses out.
>
>> Wikis are, in general, a good thing IMO. They are certainly gaining in
>> popularity.
>
> Popularity means nothing. James Blunt is also gaining popularity, and
Popularity often means that people find a use for them : and in techy
areas its not really the equivalent of "oh, hes gorgeous" ...
> he's probably the worst example of nothingness to rise to the Top of the
> Pops recently - and that's some accolade given the existence of Girls
> Disallowed.
>
> The mere existence of Wikis is, in general, a good thing. _Relying_ on a
> Wiki, for anything, but especially for correctness, is quite egregiously
> unwise.
I would nearly always cross check a wiki. But it is fast and convenient
and I think you are being a little too distrustful. Certainly with
setting up some Linux systems recently they were invaluable whereas
usenet was a hotchpotch of coflicting threads that invariably ended up
in slanging matches.
A wiki might have errors, it is usually concise enough that finding the
errors doesnt take long. This is not the case with millions of usenet
threads : there is invariably NOT a summary post hiliting who was wrong
and who was right.
A wiki certainly is not a replacement for usenet discussions.
>
> Richard
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