Re:Wikimedia Foundation v. NSA
by nickpsecurity on Monday June 26, 2017 @03:49PM
(#14639729)
That's a good analysis. One extra thing to consider with your model is Wikipedia may or may not be accurate on a topic. I find it's often correct on IT stuff but even that slips on occasion. When using it, I have to check the references and/or corroborate them seeing what turns up in Google.
So, even then it's more like Wikipedia AND Google instead OR.
This is a good point. I'm generally bullish on Wikipedia, for a lot of topics I don't even worry about cross-referencing. But the safest stuff is a mix of popular and objective (e.g. "who was in that movie again?").
For political, technical, or obscure topics that becomes a much tougher question. The political issue is obvious, but I'm surprised at how often I go into the weeds on something mathematical or simply unpopular and find that Wikipedia is off the mark. I wouldn't trust it for those topics without further Googling.
My internet use would be vastly worse without Google, it's true. But these days, perhaps 90% of my Googling is optional - I already have a strong guess at which site will give me what I want, the search bar is just a faster route to get there. If I want Stack Overflow, or Wikipedia, or Genius, or Nationmaster, I already know that's where I want to go. When Google's top result answers my question via a site I've never been to, that's a huge win for Google. When they answer it via a Wikipedia link, well...
I'd still give Google slot 1, but it's not as obvious as it was pre-Wikipedia.
(To fact-check this comment, I Googled "Google" and "Wikipedia", to get to the Wikipedia page for each. Kind of telling.)