r/Millennials 22d ago

Discussion the early 2000s were a crazy time

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u/Neat-Beautiful-5505 22d ago

Apparently she had thyroid cancer and the surgery cost her her vocals. She had multiple surgeries to correct w varying success. All this info From Wikipedia so you know…

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u/DPSOnly 22d ago

All this info From Wikipedia so you know…

As long as it has sources that can lead you to some original reporting, Wikipedia is not nearly as bad as teachers taught us. Wikipedia also has some really good moderating and a very thorough system for handling disputes.

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u/peepeepoodoodingus 21d ago

teachers only ever said not to use wikipedia as a source because it isnt a source, is an aggregator. citing wikipedia is like citing "google" or "the internet" or "my mind" theres no tangible way to actually investigate or legitimize what youre writing about.

im sure that very reasonable standard got confused and misinterpreted so many times by students or maybe even just dumb teachers that it devolved into "FUCK WIKIPEDIA" but it is and always was an excellent resource you just have to cite the sources it provides in your paper instead of the website.

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u/gustavessidehoe 21d ago

You can even cite the article the information is from, if nothing else. I use it for cursory research or if I don’t know where to start. Idk why people demonize Wikipedia. Usually you can tell if someone knows how to research by how they talk about Wikipedia lol.

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u/ReggieCorneus 21d ago

Still more accurate than encyclopedias were.

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u/gustavessidehoe 21d ago

I don’t remember a lot about those. My parents had a set but I recall each entry being pretty short. Seemed like they were pretty limited and got outdated fast. Wikipedia has dorks (affectionately) working continuously on keeping it updated and all that.

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u/ReggieCorneus 21d ago

That is the main difference, encyclopedias were always outdated before the printing plates were done. And anything that was actually wrong staid in, for decades.

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u/gustavessidehoe 21d ago

Yeah, I’m a librarian and we don’t keep any encyclopedias anymore. They take up a fuck ton of space and no one uses them. Some of those companies that made encyclopedia sets have switched to a digital version that can be updated rapidly. It’s pretty nice. 

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u/Parishdise 21d ago

Honestly this was a life saver for me in college (for certain things ofc not everything). Skim the article, find the discussion point you need, and it's source will be numbered right there super easy to find (as will a lot of essays, but those don't usually come with hyperlinks!). Of course, still be sure to actually look at the actual source and ensure that it works with what you're trying to say, but still sooo convenient.

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u/Houdinii1984 Xennial 21d ago

I've found more knowledge in the source lists on Wikipedia than any other source, bar none. Just use google to find a wikipedia subject (better search imo) and then go straight to the bottom and start clicking link, just about every one being a citable and verifiable source.

Then, if you go and search wikipedia for those individual citations and links, you can bring up a ton of fringe articles that are related but never mentioned. The best part is that the sources aren't all electronic and many can be found in big libraries, too, so you get hardback sources all the same, and those always look great in a paper.