making wikipedia better

EVERY NOW AND then i come across someone from an academic background who scoffs somehow at wikipedia. i say, as calmly and politely as possible, 'kindly sit down, shut up, and make the fucking thing better'. wikipedia has its faults but making it hard for you to improve it is not one of them: along with linux it's one of the great collaborative projects of our age. if you don't like it, make it better.

ryan holiday* has some good advice on how to meaningfully contribute to it. as he says, 'the last thing you should do is act like you're entitled to the benefits without paying for your share.'

1) Fix grammar and spelling
2) Work on pages for books you read, as you read them
3) Double or triple source citations
4) When you're reading an news article that mentions hard sales figures for something (for example, that certain book sold 20,000 copies) add it to the product or artist's entry. Those are rarely ever featured on Wikipedia and are great, credible support. They are also really easy to cite.
5) If you go to a decent university, use your schools account for Lexis Nexis to dig up old press than other people can't find. A lot of interesting stuff is stuck behind the pay wall.
6) Delete PR fluff when you see it. (this entry is a good example. You could do this page a big favor using only the delete key)
7) When you see articles tagged for Notability, add sources until you can delete the tag. You can usually find enough through Google News.
8) Link relevant articles together. Every good article should have a See Also section, if it use it to connect the dots as you find them. (or create the section)
9) Cite books whenever you can, they are much harder to dispute and give you more room to paraphrase.

*ryan holiday both a) reads and blogs about a lot of old greek and latin authors and b) curates a website with pictures of cute dogs doing silly things. he's an interesting guy, in short, and i usually enjoy what he has to say.

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