Wiki science/Wikipedia's success

What is Wikipedia?
Wikipedia (Wiikii - Peedi- a), is an encyclopedia which everyone can edit. You don't need an account to edit (you can edit by IP), though, creating an account is free. With a click of the edit button on a page, you can change information. Founded back in January 15, 2001, by Larry Sanger and Jimmy Wales, Wikipedia has over 110+ million visitors in the United States of America alone, with 700 million edits (by several registered accounts on Wikipedia), and over 200 versions of Wikipedia in different languages.


 * Not necessarily related, but at the same time on the same topic. It should be mentioned that there is a Simple English Wikipedia, which is a Wikipedia which uses "simpler" vocabulary, so non native English Speakers/children can comprehend. Atcovi (Talk - Contribs) 19:42, 28 October 2015 (UTC)

Why is it so famous?
Most likely due to the fact that the first website you see when you look up someone/or a word (other than dictionary.com). Due to the google bots looking for sites for google search, the content of Wikipedia (with over 4 million articles) makes it to the top since it has so much content. And, Wikipedia most likely won't die out, since Wikipedia is constantly being edited every second you refresh the "Recent Changes" Button. Hence, it being the 6th most popular Website on the Internet (according to Alexa internet rankings), it also tends to be a hot spot for vandalism. Which, we will review through with this section.

Vandalism
What is Vandalism? In wiki terms, vandalism is the removing of content/changing content into nonsense, gibberish, or false information, for harmful goals against Wikimedia. Usually, people who "vandalize" are known as, Vandals (see page on "Trolls", somewhat related to Vandals, here: Wiki science/Trolls).

See Wiki science/Wikipedia's success/Spotting vandalism for information on what to do when you spot vandalism

Collection of vandalism in one day
This will be a wikiexpirement to see how many harmful edits I can find on Wikipedia
 * 10/26/2015
 * https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Mr._Thug&curid=37332741&diff=687596144&oldid=668661285
 * https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Caravel&diff=687595303&oldid=683787516
 * https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=PlayStation&curid=13392949&diff=687596810&oldid=687596771
 * https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Climate_of_Mars&curid=9596342&diff=687596914&oldid=687596852
 * https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Logic_error&curid=1488075&diff=687596930&oldid=687596409
 * https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Doc_(computing)&curid=310564&diff=687597068&oldid=687596677
 * https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=The_Way_of_the_Master&diff=687597271&oldid=683663313
 * https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Keystone_Pipeline&curid=11675105&diff=687632003&oldid=687631892
 * https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Slavery_in_Cuba&diff=prev&oldid=687629529
 * https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Miniature_pig&curid=22921336&diff=687632432&oldid=687388831
 * https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Mariana_Trench&curid=19036&diff=687632710&oldid=687257666
 * https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk:Abraham_Lincoln&curid=2301&diff=687633028&oldid=687344472
 * https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Melissa_Franklin&curid=1442735&diff=687633321&oldid=687427528
 * https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Jacob_Rees-Mogg&curid=6617581&diff=687633543&oldid=687633238

Well, what we have learned, from my lurking of recent changes, that the stereotype, "Majority of IPs are vandals", is false, as 80% of the IP edits I've went through were constructive edits. But, the "several edits each click of the RecentChanges button" is true. Please note that I haven't had a lot of time to go through Wikipedia (admitting it that it's a boring task), so this experiment is most likely not accurate. A full, in depth experiment will take place another day, but for now, I don't think you should judge Wikipedia just by this experiment. Atcovi (Talk - Contribs) 19:40, 28 October 2015 (UTC)
 * What have I learned?