Top 10 Worst Things About Wikipedia

I love Wikipedia as much as the next person, but that doesn't make it any less annoying than the rest of the big websites out there.
The Top Ten
Vandalism

A lot of vandalism isn't even clever. If it goes unnoticed for a while (yes, this occasionally happens), it's sometimes a real pain to clean up. It's sad to see that some people would rather destroy something than build it.

I wonder what kind of person thinks it's funny to replace an entire article about Abraham Lincoln with "LOLZ HEZ the sucks" or some other nonsense. I guess it takes a stupid person.

I once looked up John Lennon, the musician, and someone had replaced his entire youth with a biography of John Lenin, founder of the USSR. I hate Wiki vandals.

It is uncensored

When you try to edit out inappropriate language from articles, your changes are often reverted, and you may even be threatened with a block. The site is supposed to be friendly for all viewers, but when unnecessary profanity is included in articles, such as in the B-52 bomber article, it ruins the experience. This is one of the reasons I had to install an advanced profanity filter.

IP addresses get blocked, preventing other people from editing
Gender bias and sexism
Factual inaccuracies

This is mainly a problem when it comes to updating outdated information. Source-obsessed individuals revert any edit that tries to update an article simply because there's no "reliable source."

Yes, there are some factual inaccuracies in articles that are not constantly monitored. At least some are locked to prevent vandalism and misinformation. If the source looks skeptical, Google is your friend.

This issue is much worse than vandalism because you might get an important fact wrong, believing it was accurate because Wikipedia told you so! I guess you just have to be smart enough to check two or three other sites.

Misinformation

I see a lot of misinformation on that website, and it gets worse every time when an article is full of fake information.

This is one of the reasons they've been petitioned in the past.

Racial bias
Sockpuppets
People who take the site way too seriously

These major users can get away with reverting all edits from casual contributors and sending them talk messages threatening to have them blocked if they don't adhere to their impossibly high standards.

All it takes is for you to delete someone's non-constructive edit before they start harping on you, claiming you're destroying their right to free speech or asserting that there is an underground conspiracy against them.

Some people use it as their Facebook. I thought I was sad...

Requires citations for everything

I must admit I kind of like this because I sometimes use Wikipedia as a quick guide to see whether something is well-known. But yeah, that sounds very frustrating.

This makes it harder for me to create a good article and not have it get deleted. I've created six that were removed.

The Newcomers

? Articles using inappropriate language
? You can't delete your account
The Contenders
Typos

Typos are especially common in articles regarding anime, Asterix, and all the other stuff that hardly gets English attention.

Well, you can just simply edit it, even without being registered on the site.

So annoying! If you really watch Winx Club, you should know that it's spelled Sophix, not Sofix.

Incomplete details

Wikipedia is generally very accurate and easy to use. However, there can often be a lack of information. This problem is especially aggravated by a very strict application of the notability guideline, which means that some people, groups, companies, events, etc., that aren't deemed noteworthy often have no page on Wikipedia.

Wikipedia is never complete, so there will always be incomplete details here and there.

Edit wars
Image fair use policy

It's funny watching them change their policy on what images can and cannot be used every other day, and then complain that Wikipedia's articles are useless without images.

This is annoying. It has led to good pictures being shrunken, which makes them less pleasant.

Overzealous admins

The website claims that all users should practice civility towards each other. Evidently, that doesn't apply to administrators. About 75% of them are some of the most power-hungry, emotionally unstable people out there. All you have to do is disagree with them once, and BAM! You're gone for life.

Yeah, admins in general (not just on Wikipedia) nowadays are just highly abusive, unlike before.

I agree. There are so many overzealous admins on this site.

Japanese, English, etc., Wikipedia have very different articles regarding an item

That's right, because the Spanish Wikipedia isn't the same as the English Wikipedia, many things are different: the information, the album covers (in the Spanish version, there aren't images for the album covers), and many other things.

For some reason, the French Wikipedia is the only one with a page about El Goonish Shive, despite it being an American webcomic. You'd think it would have a page on the English Wikipedia, but nope!

Copyright paranoia

For a free-content encyclopedia that allows you to plagiarize its content, they sure have a big fit if you don't put every little letter into your own words. Then they pounce on you for point-of-view violations.

Political pushers

Ah yes, the ones whose lives revolve around Googling stuff they agree with and pushing it onto other people. Seriously, read the rules, folks. Your essay about how the War in Iraq was the right way to go or about the vast anti-communist conspiracy doesn't belong here.

I'm a moderate conservative, and I hate it when people (yes, even conservatives) push their views on others. If we didn't have conservatives and liberals, there would be no point in being America.

It is propaganda when referring to political bias and is alt-left.

Deletionism

I voted for Willy on Wheels, but this is annoying too. Deletionism is an extension of taking the site too seriously and treating it like a paper encyclopedia (which it is not). It is often cited as a top reason why Wikipedians leave.

Teachers don't let you use it

I can kinda see why, though. It isn't always reliable. I think they should at least let you use it as long as there are sources to back it up.

This is so annoying. You always use Wikipedia for work, then when you hand it in, the teacher says, "What were your sources?" Oh, shut up.

Then you visit the site and figure it out yourself the next day: I don't know what I am teaching today.

The Seigenthaler biography incident

It was a hoax that claimed he was a suspect in the assassinations of John F. and Robert Kennedy.

Willy on Wheels

The infamous page-move vandal now has millions of unoriginal, uncreative clones. Boring!

Trolling

I want the real answer, not some nonsense that obviously makes no sense.

Userbox wars

Anyone who was a member in 2005 remembers how controversial userboxes were. People thought it was worth banning members and doing mass deletions over a set of harmless HTML. Such drama!

People who vote Birdo in the worst Mario character polls

Daisy is infinitely worse!

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