What Wikipedia thinks it is

Article cluster:
What Wikipedia is, What Wikipedia thinks it is, Mention of wiki in articles, What Wikipedia claims to be, Mention of Wikipedia in articles

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en:Wikipedia thinks it is an en:encyclopedia - and some call it many other things. But what it thinks it is is quite simple to verify. The en:mention of wiki in articles is useful to track, as any claim that Wikipedia is a good or bad example of something is subject to editing by any party. Wikipedia entries describing abstract concepts, rather than analogies or meta-discussions, define what it thinks it is - exactly. An attempt to seriously define What Wikipedia is must include at least the following (if not, then go edit those articles now).

Things that Wikipedia article authors claim Wikipedia is:

• Encyclopedia - first and foremost
• A Homepage for victims of computer addiction
• Free content
• Open content - same distinction as for source code?
• a Puffball
• Simpson's paradox insofar as ... ?
• Open source movement - see Wikipedia3 for current source
• Collaborative tool, when it's working
• Dictionary specifically an idiom dictionary,
• Copyleft
• a GNU Free Documentation Licensee
• Cyberspace for librarians
• Bomis non-profit project, see funding
• brainchild of RMS and LMS
• Camel case application - formerly
• Style guide - to the degree that articles serve as examples
• Linus's Law
• Doublespeak sometimes
• User:AnonymousCoward-authored (part of it including this article)
• a very limited Semantic network,
• Request for comment on every article
• List of timelines on just about everything
• List of newsgroups for reference
• Volunteer labour - especially of the Wikipedia:Volunteer Fire Department,
• an Amateur project
• a Biography collection
• a high-tech alternative to the en:Dewey Decimal System
• Hierarchy of editors?
• a collection of Esoteric knowledge
• 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica resurrected
• Previews of many books, papers, films, etc.
• Peer review
• Persuasion technology when it's 'neutral'
• Public domain text integrated with the rest
• Postmodernism
• Anarchism
• Toponymy
• Anti-copyright
• Consensus
• a body of Instructional capital
• the thing that had its second birthday on January 15
• the thing that passed 100,000 articles on January 25
• the thing that passed 1,000,000 page views on...?
• the thing discussed in the Meta-Wikipedia

Technologically, it has been reasonably described as any of the following:

• Wiki software - see Wikipedia3
• a popular Website
• a Common Gateway Interface-based service
• until en:January 2002 the software running it a was a CGI script in en:Perl.
• a lot of Scanner output
• a service that may run on Wikipedia4
• one of a List of WikiWiki websites
• an Open Site - for those not IP-banned
• future Root nameserver namespace, more egalitarian?
• a InterWiki relative
• a UseModWiki relative
• a WikiWiki process
• a World Brain prototype
• a Machine learning bootstrap database?
• a Main Page - one of many

In addition, Wikipedia editors purport it to be examples of these concepts:

• Wikipedians' work
• Wikipedia:Brilliant prose eventually
• an Encyclopedic Network in many languages
• a WikiBiblion = bibliography
• a en:cluster fuck? See mention of wiki in articles
• a continuous en:flame war? See mention of wiki in articles
• always a bit of Talk:VANDALISM IN PROGRESS at any given time
• A body of debates about itself
• ideally the product of writing an Article a Day
• Wikipedia:Spoiler warning - please! more of these!
• A lot of spoilers for fiction including games
• many collected faux pas which there are also plenty of
• Free publicity for strange ideas.
• A body of policies and guidelines - eventually leading to a Wikipedia board manual?
• partly an adaptation of Nupedia articles
• an FAQ - a really big one on everything
• Neutral point of view examples - mostly good, some bad - contrast Natural point of view
• collected obsessions of Wikipediholics
• Wikipediholic drug of choice
• many Category schemes - typically all competing
• Variously motivated people cooperating somehow
• A source of NEWS - see also Wikinews
• Disruption of its own content or community, frequently
• Nonsense - deleted as fast as possible but never so fast as to remove it all
• Requested articles that exist only as titles
• Readers' FAQ answered - no matter the subject
• Novels outlined, previewed, critiqued
• Source of great ideas for slogans for Banners and buttons - see picket term
• Statistics about everything
• no access to user logs
• not a Holiday yet
• Namespaces - several of them
• Minimalist main page counter-example
• Glossary of terms of art, for pretty much every art
• Help on almost everything
• claims About itself, which should reference this article
• Announcements regarding itself
• Manual of Style and source of good and bad examples
• Questions about neutrality of history itself
• Mailing lists for making all the real decisions
• Libel lawsuits waiting to happen
• Welcoming to newcomers
• Wikipedia:Accountability
• Instructions on how to edit a page - some might say it only 'has' this rather than 'is' this.
• Embassy to the world
• Big - just big
• Logos and slogans about everything - see picket term
• a thing with a dark side
• Overview FAQ that makes other claims re: Wikipedia
• a relationship to Nupedia
• a way to spread the Esperanto language
• Policies and guidelines for everything
• Dewey Decimal System alternative - as above
• a means of building Wikipedia membership
• a project to build an Encyclopedic Network

It is claimed controversially to be an example of other things in talk files:

• many Free Links that we do not charge for
• Perfect competition - one way to describe an edit war
• a tragedy of the commons applied to text
• Plagiarism - although we discourage that - see en:copyright
• a Chinese fire drill?
• Figure of speech dictionary?
• Idiom dictionary?
• EPR paradox example?
• Main Page chatter?
• A melting pot of very diverse authors

It could also be said to be a couple of other things harder to classify:

• Product of much reverting from vandalism
• Showcase for Larry's Text?
• a way around Internet censorship in China?
• Geographic references - an atlas maybe?
• The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy's big encyclopedia - see en:Earth - mostly harmless?
• Project Galactic Guide perhaps?
• User:Maveric149's personal domain?
• Everything2 replacement?
• Monopoly on violence competitor? Anarchy?
• List of encyclopedias and why wiki is better?
• Slashdot effect embodied?
• aen:neural net which is capable of "thinking" about itself

An earlier version of this article can be found at What Wikipedia is.

March 03

• Wikipedia thinks it is a en:Coalition of the willing

May 2003

• Wikipedia thinks it is not censored - or does it?