Talk:Criticism of Wikipedia

Note: This is the Talk page for the Wikipedia article on external criticisms of Wikipedia. Users interested in discussing their own problems with the project should go to the Village Pump where there are specific sections for dealing with various issues.

For critical examination of Wikipedia by Wikipedia itself, see Wikipedia:External peer review/Nature December 2005 (40 science articles) and Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2005-10-31/Guardian rates articles (7 articles of general interest).

Carolyn Doran and "hive mind"

Can someone think of a good addition to the "hive mind" section that uses Wikipedia's response to the Carolyn Doran article? Most of the stuff I add to articles seems to get reverted, so I'm not even going to try. --Fandyllic (talk) 11:06 AM PST 6 Jan 2008

Article on Wikipedia in the Harvard Educational Review

This article may be related to this page:

Fall 2009 Issue of the Harvard Educational Review

High School Research and Critical Literacy: Social Studies With and Despite Wikipedia by Houman Harouni

http://www.hepg.org/her/abstract/742

"Drawing on experiences in his social studies classroom, Houman Harouni evaluates both the challenges and possibilities of helping high school students develop critical research skills. The author describes how he used Wikipedia to design classroom activities that address issues of authorship, neutrality, and reliability in information gathering. The online encyclopedia is often lamented by teachers, scholars, and librarians, but its widespread use necessitates a new approach to teaching research. In describing the experience, Harouni concludes that teaching research skills in the contemporary context requires ongoing observations of the research strategies and practices students already employ as well as the active engagement of student interest and background knowledge."

Andy Schlafly and Conservapedia

Hi. I changed the wording of this line in the "liberal bias" section:

The belief in a liberal bias at Wikipedia led to the creation of Conservapedia.

To:

Andrew Schlafly's belief in a liberal bias at Wikipedia led to the creation of Conservapedia.

But my change was undone by an admin and I'm not sure why. The 2nd version is more accurate, because it was Schlafly in specific who created Conservapedia after he accused Wikipedia of having a liberal bias. The 1st version is much more vague and implies that it is a "generally accepted belief" that Wikipedia has a "liberal bias". Does anyone else have an opinion? Thanks.--Louprothero88 (talk) 21:02, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

Indeed, I prefer your wording as well. It was apparently User:MBK004 who reverted it, but there is no explanation in the edit summary. Most likely the revert was just a mistake, if the user does not object within the next couple of days you can safely reinsert your edit. --Saddhiyama (talk) 21:18, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

Agreeing as well, though the wikilink to Schlafly can be dropped since it just redirects to Conservapedia. I have notified MBK004 of this thread. Prolog (talk) 21:37, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

Agreed, I was reverting lots of vandalism at the time and thought someone had just inserted someone's name for fun. That being said, since it is a redirect, it can be safely dropped or turn the redirect into a stub. -MBK₀₀₄ 04:08, 11 February 2010 (UTC)

Done thanks.--Louprothero88 (talk) 05:24, 11 February 2010 (UTC)

No mention of the pedophile problem on Wikipedia?

There should be a mention of pedophiles operating on Wikipedia, and that Wikipedia has come under criticism for this. You might also mention my criticism (and report to the FBI) of Commons for its realistic depictions of child molestation. --Larry Sanger (talk) 18:17, 12 April 2010 (UTC)