When Wikipedia took over the Internet, many researchers and intellectuals initially distrusted the online encyclopedia. How on earth could the swarm intelligence’s contributions be accurate on every conceivable topic? Wikipedia seemed reliable if you wanted to find out about things you barely knew anything about. However, as soon as you looked up topics that related to your own area of expertise, errors, oddities, arbitrariness and inaccuracy became noticeable. Almost like reading the newspaper. I generally trust the print editions of reputable newspapers as long as they cover politics and world events, but every time I read an article about something I know about – like philosophy or science – I come across small but annoying errors (but surprisingly, this has never influenced my opinion of the rest of the newspaper coverage).
