All of human knowledge is editable

Wikipedia is the only encyclopedia where there are more pages about secondary characters in the uk sonic the hedgehog comic then of main characters in medieval history. But that's the reason it's great. If you thought I was going to go the other way with that first sentence, so did I. But triviality is the spice of life. Too many people, academics mostly, complain about it's unreliability, without acknowledging that it's no more unreliable than a printed encyclopedia, or newspapers, documentaries or any other kind of information really. The only real difference is in a perceived accountability, the idea that at least the publisher of a book or newspaper can be sued for providing false information. But that rather depends, the manipulation of information is becoming incredibly transparent these days, to the point where previously rock solid faith in the printed word is crumbling. A true concensus reality is just around the corner and wikipedia's older pages show what kind of shape that will take, veering wildly between opposing extremes and eventually consolidating as nuance.