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this post was submitted on 13 Mar 2024
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If you think a centralized organization governed by legalism is opaque, just wait until you see a thousand islands of anarchy.
No I think it would actually be great. You could peek at two opposing views on the same article, for example. I'm sure some "instances" would be ripe with disinformation but what's it to you? Idiots are already lapping up disinformation like candy. It's not like wikipedia isn't filled with it already...
Post-truth as a service.
Wikipedia information is often made up of media reports and paid studies so we're already there.
If you read through this page you might even conclude that Wikipedia itself is "post-truth"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Wikipedia_controversies
At any point in time you could be reading a defaced or propagandized version of an article.
Not only is the noise ratio low, this seems like a good lesson in "encyclopedias are not primary sources nor arbiters nor authorities on information." Yes, people use Wikipedia that way anyway. No, baking in an even lower trust system does not seem like it's actually a fix to any of Wikipedia's problems.
I don't need opposing views on subjects, I need the most accurate one that's the best researched and sourced.
Good thing Wikipedia articles are always the best researched and sourced!
So? Is your alternative free of mistakes and bias?
I mean, much more often than not, and for the majority of the time, they are.
What's the alternative you're suggesting that would be comparably comprehensive but regularly more reliable...?
You don't see this statement as dogmatic? How do you feel confident in this other than just a feeling?
The majority of the time the articles would require actual expertise to make that evaluation with confidence. An individual can take a few minutes to verify the sources, but for so many topics it's not realistic to rule out omissions of sources that should be well-known, or even rule out that a source given provides an important broader context somewhere nearby that should be mentioned in the article but isn't. Can you be sure that the author is trustworthy on this subject? It's not enough to just check a single page mentioned in a book while ignoring the rest of the book and any context surrounding the author.
An expert on a very specialized topic could weigh with accuracy in on whether the wikipedia articles on their subject is well-researched and sourced, but that still won't mean they can extrapolate their conclusion to other articles.
I don't think they're suggesting wikipedia currently is "best researched and sourced," just that a federated alternative wouldn't automatically solve that issue.
So you're saying it would rely on each person to stay objective and use good critical thinking, instead of accepting the first thing they read and fall down an echo-chamber rabbit hole? Wikipedia definitely doesn't always get it right, but it does try to use a form of institutionalized objectivity.
This is such a rich statement to make from a social media site of all places. My guy have you even looked at what some of the instances on Lemmy believe in? How is a federated wiki site any different?
By all means use wikipedia if you wish. As I've already pointed out in another comment, Wikipedia is often edited by bad or nationalist actors that do go undetected for a while.
...isn't the good idea here to not enhance visibility of disinformation?
We're talking about the fediverse here. It's such a niche place and there are already wildly opposing views and information existing on Lemmy itself.
And that's not even mentioning the situation on bigger social media platforms and the broader web!