Showing posts with label nespaper. Show all posts
Showing posts with label nespaper. Show all posts

Thursday, March 22, 2007

The quality of wikipedia entries

This is what happens when you let generations educated by TV edit articles that are supposedly informative. When you search in Wikipedia today the word "subliminal", among other gems, you find:
Many references deal specifically with the military. An episode of The Simpsons involved Bart and his friends joining a boy band, the Party Posse. While watching a video for the Party Posse, Lisa notices the phrase "Yvan Eht Nioj" being repeated continuously by belly-dancers. She plays the video in reverse and finds that it means "Join the Navy". Also, an Uncle Sam "I Want You" poster can be seen in the video frame by frame. The joke was that the United States sends subliminal messages in order to recruit people. In addition, the art of "superliminal messages" was demonstrated to Lisa;
Not that I have anything against cartoons, Bart Simpson, or Wikipedia editors. But come on, read the article, it is full of "citation needed" (I think it means the data has to be verified) and movie and tv trivia. Is this what one looks for in a source that is supposed to be "as good as Enciclopedia Britanica"? It reminds me of the "news" of the Spanish "newspaper" 20minutos.es.
It seems that the boundaries between news, knowledge and entertainment are more blur than ever. At the end of the Wikipedia article on "subliminal", there is -today- an anemic link to "further reading". And sure enough you are going to need a lot of further reading after visiting that page and getting nothing!
(UPDATE 9/4/07 - This entry today is "longer than William Shakespear entry" see what I mean?)

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