Does Wikipedia really matter?

[Peter Damian]

When any bad news about Wikipedia is published, you often see it dismissed on the message boards, and often on Wikipedia itself, with some comment that it is not meant to be taken seriously. No one meant it to be a 100% reliable source. One of commenters on this forum said something like that too. Something like, its value is to help some guys in a pub who have a bet about some piece of trivia, e.g. who played Dr Who in the 1971 series.

On the other hand this suggests there are many people who do take it seriously:

Someone who I consider one of the most tech-savvy of my friends once reacted to a skeptical comment about Wikipedia with absolute incredulity that I would consider it a less-than-trustworthy source. I hope he sees this article.
http://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/ar ... ml#1341167

So, is Wikipedia important? If it isn’t, I’ll be really pissed off having taken nearly two years out of my life to write a bloody book about it.

[The Joy]

Since everyone uses it, whether casually or for serious research, it darn well does matter. Information literacy is dying and people do not have the skills to analyze and criticize online information.

I ranted forever on Wikipedia Review, for example, about how Wikipedia's article on Chamberlain-Hunt Academy (T-H-L) was cited as giving students "bare-bottom paddlings." The editor, Alarics (T-C-L) a.k.a. Colin Farrell, who put that in cited his own ad-hoc corporal punishment website as a source and used a DeviantArt poem as his source for the bizarre punishment. I searched for hours trying to find student testimonies or anything about that punishment, but I found nothing except copies of the Wikipedia article on scraper sites and people linking to the article (or Mr. Farrell's site) and proclaiming it was true! It infuriates me that this school was libeled and denigrated because of some fool's ill-research and sexual proclivities.

When I come to an "encyclopedia," I do expect that the information has undergone some vetting and review by people knowing what they are doing just as I expect medical textbooks to explain surgery to doctors. Yes, we should have a society in which everyone learns to analyze and criticize information, but how deep do you to go? Assume everything written is phoney and you can't trust anybody?

Ugh...

[Poetlister]

It matters as long as it comes at or near the top of lots of Google searches so that, thousands and maybe millions of times a day around the world, people are using it as a serious work of reference.

It matters because it is at least sometimes (and people here rarely point this out) better than the alternative, which is an even worse piece of nonsense.

[Hex]

I ranted forever on Wikipedia Review, for example, about how Wikipedia's article on Chamberlain-Hunt Academy (T-H-L) was cited as giving students "bare-bottom paddlings." The editor, Alarics (T-C-L) a.k.a. Colin Farrell, who put that in cited his own ad-hoc corporal punishment website as a source and used a DeviantArt poem as his source for the bizarre punishment.

That reminds me of Fastifex (T-C-L), who spent a lot of time in 2006 edit-warring to insert sections about spanking into various articles (for example wooden spoon), and editing articles about the cat'o'nine-tails, birching, mooning, buttocks, etc., and various kinds of male underwear, in between his main activity of gnoming articles about Catholic saints and doctrine.

Ah, Wikipedia.

Ugh...

I predicted that video was going to be this... so close!

[iii]

As long as it is easily accessible from the first page of most Google searches, it matters. As long as students keep using it as a starting place for their research, it matters.

I don't know that I've met anyone who thinks that Wikipedia doesn't "matter". Everyone I know acknowledges that it acts as a repository of material to which they find occasion to appeal from time to time.

In the long run, however, I think it will settle itself out as being too inflexible to be truly useful as a reference. Most American village demographic data included at that website is cited to the 2000 census, for example, and I'd put at least even money on the idea that it stays that way until Wikipedia is shut down.

[lilburne]

I think it will become the separator of the masses. Much like prep schools used to be in the past. There will be those that use it, and those that know not to.

The later will generally manager the former.

[EricBarbour]

In the long run, however, I think it will settle itself out as being too inflexible to be truly useful as a reference. Most American village demographic data included at that website is cited to the 2000 census, for example, and I'd put at least even money on the idea that it stays that way until Wikipedia is shut down.

You just stumbled over a major issue: age and validity of references. I have found that the average web reference in WP articles dates from 2008
and has a 19% chance of being a dead link. Once an article is "finished", meaning no one is interested in editing it manually any longer, the references
slowly degrade from age. This is why giving Googled references some kind of preference is a really, really bad idea in the long run.

[Coffeepusher]

I've had people ask me similar questions, and I have come to terms with my answer. Wikipedia is usually one of the top 3 choices in any google search which means that a large group of people rely upon it as a source. However by the very nature of the project it has some problems. I have found poorly written articles, I have found articles that favor a specialization within a broad topic, I have found articles that are needlessly detailed, and I have found articles that are obviously written from a self interested position. The thing I rarely find are articles that are actually wrong. While there are notable examples of vandalism and malicious intent, overall the editing process tends to take care of false information really quickly. The biggest disputes tend to revolve around what facts are actually worthwhile and small details within the article.

I think that fact is worth considering, while we as editors are very critical of the quality of the encyclopedia, we rarely encounter false information that has been there a long time.

[Vigilant]

I've had people ask me similar questions, and I have come to terms with my answer. Wikipedia is usually one of the top 3 choices in any google search which means that a large group of people rely upon it as a source. However by the very nature of the project it has some problems. I have found poorly written articles, I have found articles that favor a specialization within a broad topic, I have found articles that are needlessly detailed, and I have found articles that are obviously written from a self interested position. The thing I rarely find are articles that are actually wrong. While there are notable examples of vandalism and malicious intent, overall the editing process tends to take care of false information really quickly. The biggest disputes tend to revolve around what facts are actually worthwhile and small details within the article.

I think that fact is worth considering, while we as editors are very critical of the quality of the encyclopedia, we rarely encounter false information that has been there a long time.

Hmmm...

And what is your opinion of the recent Qworty case?

[lilburne]

I just pressed the random article button a couple of times and I have to say that I was impressed by this work on Matu, Kalewa (T-H-L) by Dr. Blofeld (T-C-L). I never knew he had it in him.

[Coffeepusher]

Again, rarely do we encounter problems as a whole. Qworty is the exception that proves the rule. with 4,239,319 articles on the english wikipedia, Qworty was a big problem that needed to be dealt with, but honestly isn't capable of destroying the project. Hell, if he vandalized a different article with every single edit he made, then he only could have affected 0.25% of the encyclopedia.

[Vigilant]

Again, rarely do we encounter problems as a whole. Qworty is the exception that proves the rule. with 4,239,319 articles on the english wikipedia, Qworty was a big problem that needed to be dealt with, but honestly isn't capable of destroying the project. Hell, if he vandalized with every single edit he made, then he only could have affected 0.25% of the encyclopedia.

You presumption that Qworty is alone is ... disturbing.

However, I can't help but notice that you did not answer my question directly.
You provided a lovely answer, just not an answer to my question.

Can you please answer my question directly?

[Peter Damian]

we rarely encounter false information that has been there a long time.

Let's take that as the hypothesis. Can you put a range around 'long' and 'rarely'?

[Coffeepusher]

My opinion on Qworty:
My opinion is that I am glad he is no longer editing, and frankly I am surprised that he not only slipped through the cracks years ago but I am equally shocked at how his behavior was tolerated in heated discussions. In the short time where I was aware of him I saw him escalate and bully people in ways I didn't think was possible without being banned. I can't imaging that this behavior was new but I haven't really cared enough to check his talk page edits through time.

To answer your question Peter
Rarely: personal observation, but I really can't remember the last time I looked up an article and said "that's wrong." Frequently I do say "oh shit, someone dumped their lit review again." but wrong is infrequent at best.
Long: I read somewhere that the average vandalism lasts about 3-5 min. and when I encounter vandalism it hasn't been there for very long.

[lilburne]

I think that fact is worth considering, while we as editors are very critical of the quality of the encyclopedia, we rarely encounter false information that has been there a long time.

Jagged85? This is my current favourite

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magnate#Ma ... in_England

and it only took 3 years before the Richard II 1345 nonsense was removed:
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?tit ... =533557002

but you still don't know whether any of that paragraph is correct or not. In fact given that Richard II became king in 1377, the clean up is self contradictory.

Academics estimate that the Court of Chancery formally split from and became independent of the ''curia regis'' in the mid-14th century,
...
Under Richard II it became practice to consider the Chancery separate from the ''curia''; academic William Carne considers this a key moment in confirming the independence of the Court of Chancery.

the article still hasn't rid itself of 1345/Richard II nonsense it has just hidden it a bit.

[Midsize Jake]

Can you please answer my question directly?

But he did, though. He wrote that Qworty is "the exception that proves the rule," which is to say that if you say that a proposition is true and then something comes along whose existence proves that the proposition isn't true, then the proposition must therefore be true!

Then he used the common WP'er deception-strategy of "so many articles, no one person can do that much damage." Like it doesn't matter what the damaged articles are about, even if they're BLPs or the sorts of things that cause people to riot in the streets - as long as the percentage is still good, as long as there are still 4.3 million other articles that weren't damaged by that person.

In other words, he came up with two bogus rationales in just one paragraph. He's a model of efficiency!

[Coffeepusher]

Can you please answer my question directly?

But he did, though. He wrote that Qworty is "the exception that proves the rule," which is to say that if you say that a proposition is true and then something comes along whose existence proves that the proposition isn't true, then the proposition must therefore be true!

Then he used the common WP'er deception-strategy of "so many articles, no one person can do that much damage." Like it doesn't matter what the damaged articles are about, even if they're BLPs or the sorts of things that cause people to riot in the streets - as long as the percentage is still good, as long as there are still 4.3 million other articles that weren't damaged by that person.

In other words, he came up with two bogus rationales in just one paragraph. He's a model of efficiency!

Actually that is a common misconception about the statement "the exception that proves the rule." What that actually means is it is an exception to the rule, but the fact that it is noted as an exception states that there is a rule in place, but that rule has been violated in this instance. That is unless, of course, rules have the burden of 100% accuracy, then your criticism is correct.

your second statement confuses me. This post is about the project as a whole, and I was just trying to bring it back to the entire project and the topic of this post. I'm not trying to imply that Qworty is insignificant in his behavior, just that, as it relates to the question of "is wikipedia important" one editor is in fact insignificant scope wise.

[Vigilant]

My opinion on Qworty:
My opinion is that I am glad he is no longer editing, and frankly I am surprised that he not only slipped through the cracks years ago but I am equally shocked at how his behavior was tolerated in heated discussions. In the short time where I was aware of him I saw him escalate and bully people in ways I didn't think was possible without being banned. I can't imaging that this behavior was new but I haven't really cared enough to check his talk page edits through time.

Fair enough.
I disagree with your conclusion.
Many, many people last for years on wikipedia with a very similar approach to those with less power.
Qworty was a serial defacer of BLPs. He is far from unique.

One more question if you don't mind, what's your opinion on the Fasttimes68/Little_green_rosetta situation?

[Coffeepusher]

Pretty much the same. I don't know anything more about them than you have already brought up in the LGR post (I didn't bother clicking your external links, I felt like I could trust you on what they contained), but I don't like Sockpuppets or Sockmasters one bit and think they should not be allowed to edit.

[Vigilant]

Pretty much the same. I don't know anything more about them than you have already brought up in the LGR post (I didn't bother clicking your external links, I felt like I could trust you on what they contained), but I don't like Sockpuppets or Sockmasters one bit and think they should not be allowed to edit.

I've heard told that you edited very closely with LGR.
Are my sources mistaken?

[Peter Damian]

To answer your question Peter
Rarely: personal observation, but I really can't remember the last time I looked up an article and said "that's wrong." Frequently I do say "oh shit, someone dumped their lit review again." but wrong is infrequent at best.
Long: I read somewhere that the average vandalism lasts about 3-5 min. and when I encounter vandalism it hasn't been there for very long.

1. I look at stuff every day that's wrong. I wrote about this here http://wikipediocracy.com/2013/04/15/du ... -sausages/ . The hoax is still there, by the way, despite Malleus having edited the article last week.

2. 'Average vandalism' is misleading, it refers to the vandalism that is discovered. You need to understand conditional probability. See my point about the hoax above. It is difficult to spot, not being crude vandalism.

Actually the fact that people like you believe those faux statistics shows how much Wikipedia really matters. As long as people believe it's accurate, it will be important.

I'm not entirely sure you are being serious of course. What is your opinion on Little green rosetta?

[Coffeepusher]

Depends entirely on what you are asking. I don't have a personal relationship with LGR, I didn't stalk his edits, and the Erica Andrews article was the only time I followed him to a page and that was based on a post on the BLPN not due to the fact that LGR was the poster. From my knowledge he never edited anything in German Philosophy, Support groups, or Scientology.

[Midsize Jake]

Actually that is a common misconception about the statement "the exception that proves the rule." What that actually means is it is an exception to the rule, but the fact that it is noted as an exception states that there is a rule in place, but that rule has been violated in this instance. That is unless, of course, rules have the burden of 100% accuracy, then your criticism is correct.

That's not what it means at all. There needn't be an "exception" to prove the existence of a rule, and in any event, you seem to be talking about rules that can be "violated," as in laws and regulations. We're talking about what is typical and what is atypical. The facts remain that people like Qworty are not as atypical as you would like us all to believe, everyone on Wikipedia has different motivations (many of which are highly suspect), and there's no clear to tell who intends what, much less why.

Your second statement confuses me. This post is about the project as a whole, and I was just trying to bring it back to the entire project and the topic of this post. I'm not trying to imply that Qworty is insignificant in his behavior, just that, as it relates to the question of "is wikipedia important" one editor is in fact insignificant scope wise.

The problem is with the term "scope wise." To the victim of defamation or some other damaging activity, the fact that 4.3 million other articles are "still doing just fine" is irrelevant, and the victimizing editor is not insiginificant at all. And if the victim has substantial media access, what you do by allowing the "exception" ends up devaluing the (unpaid) work of everyone else whose motivations are non-victimizing.

[Coffeepusher]

Actually that is a common misconception about the statement "the exception that proves the rule." What that actually means is it is an exception to the rule, but the fact that it is noted as an exception states that there is a rule in place, but that rule has been violated in this instance. That is unless, of course, rules have the burden of 100% accuracy, then your criticism is correct.

That's not what it means at all. There needn't be an "exception" to prove the existence of a rule, and in any event, you seem to be talking about rules that can be "violated," as in laws and regulations. We're talking about what is typical and what is atypical. The facts remain that people like Qworty are not as atypical as you would like us all to believe, everyone on Wikipedia has different motivations (many of which are highly suspect), and there's no clear to tell who intends what, much less why.

Your second statement confuses me. This post is about the project as a whole, and I was just trying to bring it back to the entire project and the topic of this post. I'm not trying to imply that Qworty is insignificant in his behavior, just that, as it relates to the question of "is wikipedia important" one editor is in fact insignificant scope wise.

The problem is with the term "scope wise." To the victim of defamation or some other damaging activity, the fact that 4.3 million other articles are "still doing just fine" is irrelevant, and the victimizing editor is not insiginificant at all. And if the victim has substantial media access, what you do by allowing the "exception" ends up devaluing the (unpaid) work of everyone else whose motivations are non-victimizing.

I'm willing to agree with you on this...we have different understandings of of Exception that proves the rule, but overall I do agree with your conclusions.

[Vigilant]

Actually that is a common misconception about the statement "the exception that proves the rule." What that actually means is it is an exception to the rule, but the fact that it is noted as an exception states that there is a rule in place, but that rule has been violated in this instance. That is unless, of course, rules have the burden of 100% accuracy, then your criticism is correct.

That's not what it means at all. There needn't be an "exception" to prove the existence of a rule, and in any event, you seem to be talking about rules that can be "violated," as in laws and regulations. We're talking about what is typical and what is atypical. The facts remain that people like Qworty are not as atypical as you would like us all to believe, everyone on Wikipedia has different motivations (many of which are highly suspect), and there's no clear to tell who intends what, much less why.

Your second statement confuses me. This post is about the project as a whole, and I was just trying to bring it back to the entire project and the topic of this post. I'm not trying to imply that Qworty is insignificant in his behavior, just that, as it relates to the question of "is wikipedia important" one editor is in fact insignificant scope wise.

The problem is with the term "scope wise." To the victim of defamation or some other damaging activity, the fact that 4.3 million other articles are "still doing just fine" is irrelevant, and the victimizing editor is not insiginificant at all. And if the victim has substantial media access, what you do by allowing the "exception" ends up devaluing the (unpaid) work of everyone else whose motivations are non-victimizing.

I'm willing to agree with you on this...we have different understandings of of Exception that proves the rule, but overall I do agree with your conclusions.

It's interesting to me that your views appear to be so centered on what's good for the wikipedians and not what's good for the subjects of BLP/viewers of wikipedia.

[Coffeepusher]

"It's interesting to me that your views appear to be so centered on what's good for the wikipedians and not what's good for the subjects of BLP/viewers of wikipedia."
I have no idea how you came to that conclusion.

[Vigilant]

"It's interesting to me that your views appear to be so centered on what's good for the wikipedians and not what's good for the subjects of BLP/viewers of wikipedia."
I have no idea how you came to that conclusion.

My apologies.
I was distracted by something IRL and conflated you with someone else.

[Coffeepusher]

No worries. Cheers all around!

[Woden.Ragnarok]

You know what, while errors exist in the encyclopaedia - most people know now to check the sources (if they exist) rather than take it at face value.

Compare that to any other encyclopaedia (Britannica for instance) and most people will unwaveringly believe its right, what's more its regularly used as an argument on wiki "Well Britannica says it so it must be true." even when a primary source (say a BLP or relative of a BP) have since issued a citable statement that it's not true.

No we can just point people to Wikipedia:Errors in the Encyclop%C3%A6dia_
Britannica that have been corrected in Wikipedia (T-H-L) and that make wikipedia's short-fallings all right.

[Vigilant]

You know what, while errors exist in the encyclopaedia - most people know now to check the sources (if they exist) rather than take it at face value.

[HRIP7]

I've had people ask me similar questions, and I have come to terms with my answer. Wikipedia is usually one of the top 3 choices in any google search which means that a large group of people rely upon it as a source. However by the very nature of the project it has some problems. I have found poorly written articles, I have found articles that favor a specialization within a broad topic, I have found articles that are needlessly detailed, and I have found articles that are obviously written from a self interested position. The thing I rarely find are articles that are actually wrong. While there are notable examples of vandalism and malicious intent, overall the editing process tends to take care of false information really quickly. The biggest disputes tend to revolve around what facts are actually worthwhile and small details within the article.

I think that fact is worth considering, while we as editors are very critical of the quality of the encyclopedia, we rarely encounter false information that has been there a long time.

Welcome. Nice avatar!

[EricBarbour]

I've had people ask me similar questions, and I have come to terms with my answer. Wikipedia is usually one of the top 3 choices in any google search which means that a large group of people rely upon it as a source. However by the very nature of the project it has some problems. I have found poorly written articles, I have found articles that favor a specialization within a broad topic, I have found articles that are needlessly detailed, and I have found articles that are obviously written from a self interested position. The thing I rarely find are articles that are actually wrong. While there are notable examples of vandalism and malicious intent, overall the editing process tends to take care of false information really quickly. The biggest disputes tend to revolve around what facts are actually worthwhile and small details within the article.

I think that fact is worth considering, while we as editors are very critical of the quality of the encyclopedia, we rarely encounter false information that has been there a long time.

Yes, welcome. I might note that "wrong information" is an issue, but it is only one of a long list of baked-in problems Wikipedia has with its database,
and with its userbase. Having performed a massive statistical analysis of Wikipedia for the book, I can tell you things even the WMF is not aware of.
Believe me, there are a LOT of problems in there. Some of them are so big and diffuse, that repairing them might not be possible.

[Vigilant]

Having performed a massive statistical analysis of Wikipedia for the book, I can tell you things even the WMF is not aware of.
Believe me, there are a LOT of problems in there. Some of them are so big and diffuse, that repairing them might not be possible.

You tease.

[Coffeepusher]

Thank you HRIP7 and Eric. I love TMCM, so the avatar was an easy choice. Haven't seen you around lately HRIP, good to see you again.

[roger_pearse]

So, is Wikipedia important?

In online message boards you will routinely find people argue from it as an authority, and, when queried, respond with some of the PR claims about "more reliable than Britannica".

[Poetlister]

personal observation, but I really can't remember the last time I looked up an article and said "that's wrong."

That could just mean that you rarely read articles on subjects where you are already such an expert that you don't need to read the article because you know it all already.

He wrote that Qworty is "the exception that proves the rule," which is to say that if you say that a proposition is true and then something comes along whose existence proves that the proposition isn't true, then the proposition must therefore be true!

"Prove" here means "tests out" not "demonstrates to be correct". An exception that proves a rule is one that leads you to ask if the rule is correct. You may decide that the rule is wrong or, on the contrary, that the apparent exception can be explained away.

[thekohser]

...but honestly isn't capable of destroying the project.

It's funny how Wikipedians think the biggest concern is whether their "project" is destructible or not; when the big concern should be whether a healthy Wikipedia will destroy scholarship or not.

My opinion on Qworty:
My opinion is that I am glad he is no longer editing

Another lovely assumption with no proof. In fact, if we know how agenda-pushing Wikipedians work, we should assume that he's already editing again.

[HRIP7]

"Prove" here means "tests out" not "demonstrates to be correct". An exception that proves a rule is one that leads you to ask if the rule is correct. You may decide that the rule is wrong or, on the contrary, that the apparent exception can be explained away.

Actually, while that is a nice point, the actual origin of the saying is different (at least according to Gary Martin). The word that is generally being misunderstood is not "prove", but "exception". Here is Mr Martin himself:

The exception that proves the rule

Meaning

Normally with these meanings and origins the meaning is well-understood or self-evident and the interesting aspect is how, where and when the phrase originated. This one is a little different - it's the meaning that is generally not understood.

To the untutored ear it might appear to mean 'if there's a rule and I can find a counter-example to it, then the rule must be true'. This is clearly nonsense; for example, if our rule were 'all birds can fly', the existence of a flightless bird like a penguin hardly proves that rule to be correct. In fact it proves just the opposite.

So, and here the maxim 'a little learning is a dangerous thing' comes into play, it has been suggested that it's an alternative meaning of the word prove that is the source of the confusion. Prove can mean several things, including 'to establish as true' and 'to put to trial or to test'. The second option is what is used in 'proving ground', 'the proof of the pudding is in the eating', etc. It could be argued then that the phrase means 'it is the exception that tests whether the rule is true or not'. In our example the existence of a bird that can't fly would put the 'all birds can fly' rule to the test (and find it wanting).

That's all very well and most people would be happy to stop there. Unfortunately, when we go back to the legal origin of the phrase we see that it doesn't mean that at all. It's the word exception rather than prove that is causing the confusion here. By exception we usually mean 'something unusual, not following a rule'. What it means here though is 'the act of leaving out or ignoring'.

If we have a statement like 'entry is free of charge on Sundays', we can reasonably assume that, as a general rule, entry is charged for. So, from that statement, here's our rule:

You usually have to pay to get in.

The exception on Sunday is demonstrating that the rule exists. It isn't testing whether the incorrect rule 'you have to pay' is true or not, and it certainly isn't proving that incorrect rule to be true.

Origin

It's a legal maxim, established in English law in the early 17th century. Written, as law was in those days, in Latin:

Exceptio probat regulam in casibus non exceptis

and is interpreted to mean ‘exception confirms the rule in the cases not excepted’

It has (slightly modified) examples in print going back to at least 1617:

Collins: Indefinites are equivalent to vniversalls especially where one exception being made, it is plaine that all others are thereby cut off, according to the rule Exceptio figit regulam in non exceptis.

While not the earliest citation, this, from Giovanni Torriano's Piazza universale di proverbi italiani, or A Common Place of Italian Proverbs, 1666, expresses the idea clearly:

"The exception gives Authority to the Rule."

[Bielle]

"Prove" here means "tests out" not "demonstrates to be correct". An exception that proves a rule is one that leads you to ask if the rule is correct. You may decide that the rule is wrong or, on the contrary, that the apparent exception can be explained away.

Actually, while that is a nice point, the actual origin of the saying is different (at least according to Gary Martin). The word that is generally being misunderstood is not "prove", but "exception". Here is Mr Martin himself:

The exception that proves the rule

Meaning

Normally with these meanings and origins the meaning is well-understood or self-evident and the interesting aspect is how, where and when the phrase originated. This one is a little different - it's the meaning that is generally not understood.

To the untutored ear it might appear to mean 'if there's a rule and I can find a counter-example to it, then the rule must be true'. This is clearly nonsense; for example, if our rule were 'all birds can fly', the existence of a flightless bird like a penguin hardly proves that rule to be correct. In fact it proves just the opposite.

So, and here the maxim 'a little learning is a dangerous thing' comes into play, it has been suggested that it's an alternative meaning of the word prove that is the source of the confusion. Prove can mean several things, including 'to establish as true' and 'to put to trial or to test'. The second option is what is used in 'proving ground', 'the proof of the pudding is in the eating', etc. It could be argued then that the phrase means 'it is the exception that tests whether the rule is true or not'. In our example the existence of a bird that can't fly would put the 'all birds can fly' rule to the test (and find it wanting).

That's all very well and most people would be happy to stop there. Unfortunately, when we go back to the legal origin of the phrase we see that it doesn't mean that at all. It's the word exception rather than prove that is causing the confusion here. By exception we usually mean 'something unusual, not following a rule'. What it means here though is 'the act of leaving out or ignoring'.

If we have a statement like 'entry is free of charge on Sundays', we can reasonably assume that, as a general rule, entry is charged for. So, from that statement, here's our rule:

You usually have to pay to get in.

The exception on Sunday is demonstrating that the rule exists. It isn't testing whether the incorrect rule 'you have to pay' is true or not, and it certainly isn't proving that incorrect rule to be true.

Origin

It's a legal maxim, established in English law in the early 17th century. Written, as law was in those days, in Latin:

Exceptio probat regulam in casibus non exceptis

and is interpreted to mean ‘exception confirms the rule in the cases not excepted’

It has (slightly modified) examples in print going back to at least 1617:

Collins: Indefinites are equivalent to vniversalls especially where one exception being made, it is plaine that all others are thereby cut off, according to the rule Exceptio figit regulam in non exceptis.

While not the earliest citation, this, from Giovanni Torriano's Piazza universale di proverbi italiani, or A Common Place of Italian Proverbs, 1666, expresses the idea clearly:

"The exception gives Authority to the Rule."

Interesting. Thank you.

[Peter Damian]

Again, rarely do we encounter problems as a whole. Qworty is the exception that proves the rule. with 4,239,319 articles on the english wikipedia, Qworty was a big problem that needed to be dealt with, but honestly isn't capable of destroying the project. Hell, if he vandalized a different article with every single edit he made, then he only could have affected 0.25% of the encyclopedia.

What is 'the rule' you are talking about here? Qworty proves the exception to what rule?

[simsa0]

I just give 4 reasons why I think Wikipedia is not or not any longer important:

1) Wikipedia's most comprehensive and most visited language versions come from affluent nations. It's affluent societies, not poor or developing ones, that produce AND consume this open content. It is ironic that Wikipedia's goal -- to make "all human knowledge" available to everybody on the planet -- obviously doesn't resound much in those parts of the globe its authors think would benefit the most. This is not only due to the fact that "western content" and biases are irerlveant for most local communities and societies around the globe. It is also the result of a western concept of knowledge that focuses on independence from any knowing subject, wherin the objectivity of the content and the accessibility for the many rest. But in most societies around the globe, be it agrarian or nomadic, be it literal or oral societies, this separation of knowledge from the knowing subjects isn't shared. Knowledge is depndent on persons, it is a "know how", not a "know that". With this comes thirdly that for most people Wikipedia is simply a compendium of irrelevant information: you don't heal the stomach pain of your child, or build a house, or learn a language by reading an encyclopaedia. In sum: there are structual reasons why only the rich, not the poor, use Wikipedia.

2) Wikipedia not only relies on a crowdsourced wiki-process whose open licenses make possible the contribution and reuse of tiny contributions of content. It also relies on the structural feature of articles and lemmas, into which those "content donations" are organized. But given data-mining, semantic web, big data, automated text-processing, and developments in automated text-generation, we will have search- and editing-software that will crawl the web to find the most relevant information relative to a given search query. The queries will pull together information from a myriad of sources, all distributed and no longer confined to one site. In the near future, knowledge will no longer be laid down in form of articles. Rather, those articles will be written automatically as we proceed from one query to the next. Given this development, Wikipedia stands at the end of an era of media history, not at the beginning, as it is still structured like a printed book, not like a chatter on the marketplace. Search- and editing-algorithms will circumvent and thus replace Wikipedias's static features of article and lemmata in a few years time.

3) For Wikipedia there are not many easy "content donations" left to attract. To provide new content or edit exiting ones now takes more and more time for which the "content donation model" of Wikipedia and its "barnstar-reward-system" isn't well suited. As Wikipedia's growth slows and editors depart, the housekeeping / curation of the existing texts becomes more and more cumbersome. And as the rather dogmatic style of many admins in the decision of editing-problems has already shown, the crowdsourced process of text-generation isn't well suited for the curation and enhancement of existing pieces. The quality of Wikipedia's main language versions will thus deteriorate, not improve.

4) Wikipedia has never been a good encyclopaedia. Its main advantage isn't content but easy access: just two or three clicks in your browser is much more convenient than getting up from your chair to look into your printed dictionary on the shelf. With its easy access and Google's ranking Wikipedia became the dominant provider for encyclopaedic information on the planet, supplanting all other online alternatives. For your quick-and-dirty research over your breakfast news this is good enough. But the consequence is an encyclopaedic monoculture and thus a depletion in (qualified) perspectives only a plurality of sources, dictionaries, and encyclopaedias can provide. So instead of embarking on a sinking ship and trying to enhance Wikipedia's quality, people should put their energies into convincing publishers to make their specialized encyclopaedias and dictionaries available online. We need the already existing dictionaries and encyclopaedias freeely accessible online. For that we will need publicly funded endowments that reimburse publishers for making their copyrighted content freely available. Those publishers would keep their copyright (and coming with that: their obligation to curate the content) but would be paid by the public.

[Update to #4 : The problem of encyclopaedic monoculture prevails regardless of the quality of Wikipedia. Even if only Nobel Prize winners had written its articles, the loss of a plurality of other dictionaries and encyclopaedias means a loss, not a gain in knowledge. The reasons for this monoculture are twofold: a) the prevalence of Wikipedia due to its easy access and Google's ranking; and b) the refusal of main publishers to make their dictionaries and encyclopaedias easily (i.e., freely) accessible.]

[Zoloft]

Welcome to Wikipediocracy, simsa0.

[Hex]

While not the earliest citation, this, from Giovanni Torriano's Piazza universale di proverbi italiani, or A Common Place of Italian Proverbs, 1666, expresses the idea clearly:

"The exception gives Authority to the Rule."

Ooh. That's a keeper. Thanks Andreas!

[HRIP7]

Welcome to Wikipediocracy, simsa0.

Welcome indeed.

[simsa0]

Welcome to Wikipediocracy, simsa0.

Welcome indeed.

Thank you, Zoloft & HRIP7. Looks nice arond here :)