Why does Wikipedia allow the pages to be changed by anyone?

Question

How does that make any sense?

Answer 1

That's what makes it such an unreliable source.
I seen many things there so misleading and untrue I don't know how some dare use the words expert and wikipedia in the same sentence.

Answer 2

The whole idea of wikipedia is collaboration and the sense that any information can be improved or added upon. This has made it the enormous resource it is today. There are certain pages that cannot be edited plus there are a team of editors around which make sure the system doesn't get abused or vandalised.

Answer 3

Here is what wikipedia has to say:

Wikipedia is written collaboratively by volunteers from all around the world. With rare exceptions, its articles can be edited by anyone with access to the Internet. The name Wikipedia is a portmanteau of the words wiki (a type of collaborative website) and encyclopedia.

Because Wikipedia is an on-going work to which in principle anybody can contribute, it differs from a paper-based reference source in some very important ways. In particular, older articles tend to be more comprehensive and balanced, while newer articles may still contain significant misinformation, unencyclopedic content, or vandalism. Users need to be aware of this in order to obtain valid information and avoid misinformation which has been recently added and not yet removed.

There are tens of thousands of regular editors - everyone from expert scholars to casual readers. Anyone who visits the site can edit it, and this fact has encouraged contribution of a tremendous amount of content. There are mechanisms that help community members watch for bad edits, over one thousand administrators with special powers to enforce good behavior, and a judicial committee which considers the few situations remaining unresolved, and decides on withdrawal or restriction of editing privileges or other punishments when needed, after all other consensus remedies have been tried. The site is owned by the Wikimedia Foundation, which is largely uninvolved in daily operation and writing.

Wikipedia's greatest strengths, weaknesses and differences arise because it is open to anyone, has a large contributor base, and articles are written by consensus according to editorial guidelines and policies. The MediaWiki software which runs Wikipedia retains a history of all edits and changes, thus information added to Wikipedia never "vanishes", and is never "lost" or deleted.

Studies suggest that Wikipedia is broadly as reliable as Encyclopedia Britannica, with similar error rates on established articles for both major and minor omissions and errors. There is a tentative consensus, backed by a gradual increase in academic citation as a source, that it provides a good starting point for research, and that articles in general have proven to be reasonably sound

Answer 4

Because its a user controlled site to try and build an empirical knowledge database encyclopedia

Answer 5

The idea is that experts on subjects want to share their knowledge freely. There are enough people and guidelines in place so that certain topics are restricted, and people are supposed to cite books and other legitimate sources to support those things which are written.

Answer 6

That's pretty much the definition of a Wiki.

Answer 7

if they get anything wrong...ANYONE can correct it...but that makes it unreliable at the same time...anyone might put down some RUBBISH information as a joke!

Answer 8

because they create an account and its very easy to edit them