The Daily Teaser — 15-1-2014: Wikipedia

You know, I couldn’t resist today’s theme, I really couldn’t!

Ten whole questions about Wikipedia … ?

You bet I couldn’t!

After all, I know I’ve come to rely on the site as a basic source of information, as have many others.

I’m also aware of one of the basic criticisms: that it’s “… unreliable, because it can by edited by anybody.”

My basic counterargument … ?  Goes like this.

You’ve looked something up on Wikipedia.   You’ve spotted a mistake in an article about about your favourite thing: band, tv show, football team, what have you.   Or job.   Whatever.

You’ve sat there, grumbled about it, and moved on.

Instead of doing something about it.   You know about the subject, have access to an accurate and correct reference about whatever the mistake is*, and have five minutes to do something to correct it.

And have done nothing.

Wikipedia is unreliable, NOT because it can be edited by anyone: but because the people who CAN do something about it, don’t.

That includes you and me.

WE are Wikipedia … !

~≈Â≈~

Moving on, yesterday’s Teaser saw Debbi† putting in her answers: along with laughing about the clip I’d shown her, yesterday, she also bagged five out of five.

Let’s see how she — and you — do with today’s Wikipedian questions, shall we?   Here they are, along with the How To, License and video … 

Q1) 15th January, 2001, saw Wikipedia formally go online.   Name either of Wikipedia’s creators.

Q2) What’s the name of the charity that runs Wikipedia?

Q3) The ‘Wiki’ part of the name comes from the Hawaiian word that means ‘fast’.   What word does the other part of the name come from … ?

Q4) How many active language editions does Wikipedia say it has: 276, 376 or 476 … ?

Q5) As of October, 2013, the Wikimedia Commons site hosted how many media files: 18 million, 19 million or 20 million?

Q6) What’s the name of China’s largest Wiki site … ?

Q7) One of the world’s other large Wikis — Sensei’s Library — is dedicated to which game … ?

Q8) Wikipedia has what it calls ‘Pillars’, or fundamental principals.   How many does it have?

Q9) Name one of those pillars.

Q10) Finally … what name is given to the pages where users can discuss any given Wikipedia article … ?

Here’s yesterday’s questions and answers …

Q1) 14th January, 1964, saw the birth of actor. Mark Addy: in which series did he play Robert Baratheon … ?

A1) Game Of Thrones.

Q2) 14th January, 1933, saw the Bodyline scandal reach its peak, during England’s Ashes Tour of Australia.   In which sport is The Ashes contested … ?

A2) Cricket.   (Not that I’m encouraging cheating … but England got whitewashed in the recent Tour: can someone work out a non-cheating way of doing something similar, on the next Ashes tour …?)

Q3) 14th January, 2002, saw the UK declared free of Foot and Mouth Disease.   By which government department … ?

A3) The Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs: or Defra, as it’s also called.

Q4) 14th January, 1973, saw an live concert by Elvis become the most watched live event of the time.   The concert was broadcast from which US state … ?

A4) Hawaii.

Q5) Finally … 14th January, 1950, saw the first test flight of which Soviet jet fighters … ?

A5) The MiG-17.

I’ll leave you with this thought …

“People take issue with individual aspects of Wikipedia all the time. But it’s kind of hard to hate the general idea of a free encyclopedia. It’s like hating kittens.”

Jimmy Wales.

And with this piece of poetry:

Moncrief, CA Routes, taking these first bouts,

That is how CA started in two thousand and four.

SPUI, Interstate 4, edited in fall oh-four

Washington, Atanamir, done at end of year

Begin with CASH, fight seventeen, move to WASH, get really mean

Over routeboxint, us and the stubs

CA CR, IH, Kentucky, N H, U S H

Virginia, West Virginia, and capitalization

We didn't start the fire,

It was always burning since the road's been turning

We didn't start the fire,

No we didn't light it but we tried to fight it

I 76 heated debate, two thousand six starting great

With projects like M D, Oklahoma, M O

The Big Apple N Y, North Carolina, M I

And a first attempt at naming conventions

New Portal: U.S. Roads, template U.S. Roads,

MN, Pennsylvania, Illinois, T X, V A

Massachusetts, New Jersey, Ohio in a hurry,

Created before the horrid S R N C

We didn't start the fire,

It was always burning since the road's been turning

We didn't start the fire,

No we didn't light it but we tried to fight it

SR NC starting live, exit list at I-95

Being deleted, merged, and some conceded

CASR 15, shield that is green

Got remodeled by SPUI, then everybody went kaplewey

Routeboxca, ANI, many gave off a sigh

Such as R S chen, P henry and JohnnyBGood

Move wars, ANI, mass moves, ANI

After that it went to the Med Cabal

We didn't start the fire,

It was always burning since the road's been turning

We didn't start the fire,

No we didn't light it but we tried to fight it

R F comment, many are to vomit

At what was spreading across U S R D

Moves reaching the Arbitration Committee

Mass moves, violation, right from your probation

Rschen started a poll, conventions were the goal

P 1 won it and the editors split

We didn't start the fire,

It was always burning since the road's been turning

We didn't start the fire,

No we didn't light it but we tried to fight it

N J O H W I G A V T, O R, C T I A

N Y C R, Harrisburg, kansas Projects

NE, NV, SC, WV

After this they said no more inactive projects

Page moves, E L G, Shields, I R C

MTF, redirects Newsletter, AID stress,

Assessment, "the evil king", Canada, 512theking

standardization, I'm sore, I can't take it anymore!

We didn't start the fire,

It was always burning since the road's been turning

We didn't start the fire,

But when we are gone it will still burn on, and on....

You have to sing it to this tune … 

*        Even if it’s something as simple as a spelling mistake.

†        Pointless bit of trivia for you, Debbi: did you know who played the bodyguard that Ford’s talking to, at the start of the scene … ?   It’s an actor called Dave Prowse: from Bristol, originally.   He, along side James Earl Jones, played the villain in a well know series of space operas …