Using Wikipedia: Crash Course Navigating Digital Information #5

Let's talk about Wikipedia. Wikipedia is often maligned by teachers and twitter trolls alike as an unreliable source. And yes, it does sometimes have major errors and omissions, but Wikipedia is also the Internet's largest general reference work and as such an incredibly powerful tool. Today we'll discuss using Wikipedia for good - to help us get a birds-eye view of content, better evaluate information with lateral reading, and find trustworthy primary sources.
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[@WikimediaUK]

Thanks from the Wikimedia community! We really appreciate when people create content that helps explain to people how the site works and how people should engage with it. We love what you guys do. We support the Wikimedia community in the UK, but our sister charities run events all around the world if people want to learn how to edit Wikipedia and improve free knowledge online.

[@shubh5614]

Thank you wiki, very cool

[@pan_bacchanal]

+++

[@ACivillage]

do something with the bias thing

[@CheCheDaWaff]

@@ACivillage This is something the Wikimedia foundation has been working on actively for years.

[@kevinconrad6156]

What bias. The bias of facts? @@ACivillage

[@emmathepineappleyt4418]

Teens at school: *smokes in the bathroom* Teachers: Ehh - Teen: *breaks a window* Teacher: Ehh - Teen: *uses Wikipedia for a source on their report* Teachers: HELL NAW

[@King-fz8iw]

Underrated so true

[@colinflack4517]

don't cite wikipidia as a source, cite the sources at the bottom

[@kevinconrad6156]

If one is citing a basic fact like atomic weight of an element I don't see why Wikipedia is not a definite source.

[@andresvillanueva5421]

@@kevinconrad6156 For basic facts, yeah, go ahead.

[@thomasr.jackson2940]

Kevin Conrad I have certainly used it for such things. On the other hand, I have also used in as a first source in my professional field and have had to correct cited facts.

[@thomasr.jackson2940]

Don’t cite them until you read them, and often assess their value and reliability. Lots of lazy, poorly informed, and agenda driven editors out there.

[@Chamelionroses]

@@thomasr.jackson2940 conservapedia is one of those with agendas. Lol

[@cristad.7295]

For a brief 2 minutes in 2017 (or was it '18) Wikipedia listed Paul Ryan under 'Invertebrates'

[@krisselissan6539]

Most of my University professors have actually told me that the best way to get started on a project or paper is to either read the wikipedia article on it and then go through its sources, or to just go through the sources. One of my Linguistics professors told us in our first lecture to prepare for the next one by reading the assigned chapter as well as the Wikipedia article on whatever feature we would be discussing. She always begins her lectures with a question round, where you can mention things you read on Wikipedia that were not included in the book. If it’s a false piece of information she corrects it, if not she integrates it into her lecture, which in my opinion is a fantastic method.

[@kalaash8025]

i've long taught middle and high school students that wikipedia can be a great source of sources, but, as you said, not a source that you'd actually cite in a school assignment.

[@bee5120]

Back in my college days, I always relied on Wikipedia as the starting point for my research papers. The External Links are what leads to actual credible info since most of it lead right back to academic published journals of sciences and psychology.

[@nickb2245]

I'd always been told you can't cite an encyclopedia... or a wikipedia. Has there been some weird blanket shift that I missed? (IE not 'don't use' but 'don't cite')

[@barnowlcom]

@@nickb2245 It remains forbidden to mention Wikipedia at the baccalaureate level of the American Public University System (APUS).

[@rdreher7380]

One thing I've often noticed about Wikipedia, it's articles about mathematics are often impossible to understand. They are full of esoteric jargon and explanations, explaining simple things with way more advanced things. I think this likely says something about the kind of people who end up editing these pages, probably people immersed in their field not really thinking about how to explain a concept to those that don't have all their technical background, or maybe are too eager to get down everything about a topic without understanding how much that confuse someone, especially in math. It's a very good point in general that Wikipedia is biased towards having more information on topics that are popular among their community. My impression over the years has been that generally "nerdy" things do quite well. Just an impression though.

[@IronLotus15]

I agree. Only the people that write the damn pages can understand it...

[@somedragontoslay2579]

Yeah! I actually use Wikipedia as my measure of how much I understand something about maths: If I understand it, I'm level God.

[@STAR0SS]

Wikipedia pages aren't courses. They are more like references where you can find the information you need. If I don't remember what the Fourier transform of 1/x is I can quickly check on the Fourier transform page to find the answer. If I don't know what the Fourier transform is I need to take a math class or buy a book.

[@ArawnOfAnnwn]

While that's definitely one reason for such pages, they're also a deliberate choice. Wikipedia intentionally prioritizes accuracy over accessibility, in order to not mislead people. For deep domain-specific pages, like math or chemistry, that means they choose to present the information in its precise, scientific form. Why? Because paraphrasing or simplifying it into plain English often makes it lose its meaning. It's written that way in scientific papers because that's the only way to accurately represent the information, simple language simply isn't upto the task. For example, consider the simple Russell's Paradox. While not math, it does reside in the related field of logic. The Wikipedia page for that is mostly written in plain English, because the paradox is understandable in plain English. However, it also includes the formal notation version of it. This is important as that's really the only reason why the paradox 'really' has power, and is respected as a true paradox in the community. For instance, the famous Liar Paradox that preceded it - "this statement is false" - sounds like a bit of a party trick, just some clever wordplay. Yet it's stood for thousands of years because logicians have recognized it's a lot more than that, it's a real contradiction. Russell's Paradox is similar - it gives off that too clever by half kind of impression. Indeed a lot of paradoxes do. They only count because they've been formally expressed in the precise language of logic and found valid. And many others that can be said in everyday language are considered false because they don't stand in formal logic. Now simple logic is by far more amenable to translation into plain English than complex math. And so the Wikipedia logic pages mostly have simple English explanations. But with advanced math, there's simply no recourse. It often makes no sense in our ordinary fallible natural languages, if it can even be sensibly translated into it. You must have come across plenty of mathematical trickery from your friends while growing up, or in social media memes (for instance, all those fallacious 'proofs' to show that, say, 2=1 or some such thing). It's very easy to come up with that in math, even more so than with clever wordplay in logic, but of course they don't survive proper formal procedures. When explaining to lay audiences, mathematicians usually fall back on analogies and metaphors, but they know well enough that those are imprecise because the actual operation is highly abstracted. Just the act of trying to translate it into normal language causes it to become imprecise, indeed in a sense the 'layman' version is a lie. The lesson to take from this is that those topics aren't for beginners. You're going to have to do a lot of learning to be able to truly understand the highly abstract topics being written about there. Wikipedia is there for you if and when you do understand the subject, but it won't simplify it for you if that fundamentally changes its meaning.

[@somedragontoslay2579]

@@ArawnOfAnnwn While I agree, I think that sometimes wikipedia goes over the top; even things as simple as individual numbers and basic operations start with too much jargon. I don't think those precise details should be avoided on those articles since that's the way to say to the public "Hey, there is more about this topic than that you learned at kindergarten", but maybe they should have their own special section of the article instead of starting so heavy. Either way, I'm happy whenever I understand Wikipedia.

[@camiloiribarren1450]

And we all know Wikipedia is great as a starter site to understand the basics of topics

[@narrator69]

Wikipedia is a great place to go and find links to relevant information on a topic, I usually just head right to the sources section and rarely read the actual article.

[@Chamelionroses]

Conservapedia , and some other parody wikis on the the other hand not so much. Lol

[@menschlicherroboter6791]

My teacher doesn't let us use wikipedia because she says some of the information in unreliable

[@kevinconrad6156]

Sorry for her. Some of the information anywhere is unreliable.

[@ambidexter2017]

Are you John Green's brother? You look just like him!

[@lhfirex]

Wikipedia: pretty good for getting info most of the time. Wackypedia: only good for getting info on April Fool's Day. I also think we should write some John Green fanfic called "The Fault in Our Star-Nosed Moles" but I know I'm not up to the task. All I have is the title. Somebody please take up this torch.

[@rev.rachel]

There are also some university libraries and other academic institutions that are particularly interested in digital scholarship who hire someone as a “Wikipedian-in-residence.” Their entire job is to expand and tweak Wikipedia articles, especially on topics related to specialties of the university’s professors or the items in its special collections, for instance, to increase their reliability and the completeness of their information.

[@benran6124]

OMG ! I've just realised you're John Green ! My favorite author ! I've watched many of your helpful videos especially those about history and I did not recognize you ! ugh , how foolish of me Thank you for all your efforts in this youtube channel and mostly your fascinating books !

[@Beryllahawk]

I am so glad that you used the phrase so much. "It's a great place to *start* looking for information." Exactly, exactly, exactly that. I wish more English teachers would get with it and make that clear to their students, instead of of harping on and on about "don't ever use Wikipedia" as if it were the Mos Eisley of websites. I mean, yes of course don't go citing Wiki articles as your main source of a quote or fact! But why can't the teachers - oh I don't know, how about a revolutionary idea - TEACH the kids to use the site in an appropriate manner???

[@Inerize]

I'm amazed how often people undervalue Wikipedia! It's the best thing Internet has ever created, after KZbin of course 😂

[@Languslangus]

Never. NEVER. Use Croatian Wikipedia.

[@legoboy468]

American girl Croatians are people from Croatia, an Eastern European country in the Balkans Edit: had the wrong mountain range at first lol

[@LRuth53]

@@legoboy468 Croatia is in the Balkans not the Caucuses

[@sylvester01ful]

I agree. Encyclopedias are indispensable as starting points for researching a topic, just as a dictionary is the best starting place for words. Even if you think you know a topic or a word, it is a good idea to review it beginning a research project. Wikipedia has been successful, not just because the internet is more powerful than an old fashioned printed book. Its success is mostly because everyone in the world is invited to fact-check it: professors, professionals, journalists, eye-witnesses, etc. Reference sets will always be a necessary educational tool. Wikipedia's use of technology gives it the same advantage Gutenberg's press had over ancient scribes.

[@bee5120]

Back in my college days, I always relied on Wikipedia as the starting point for my research papers. The External Links are what leads to actual credible info since most of it lead right back to academic published journals of sciences and psychology.

[@DeegeCar91]

Never has advice had a more immediate positive impact on my life. I was just reading a wikipedia page and thought, huh, this looks like everything from an about page on a website. Then I checked the sources and most of them were the primary source. I looked at the top of the page, and realized it was already flagged for looking like an advertisement, and citing excessive or inappropriate references to self published sources. Time for a new tab! Maybe next time I'll look at the flag header first, instead of ignoring it...

[@amineaboutalib]

maybe you can even edit the article to make it better! :)

[@robertotoledo107]

Wikipedia is where you take the first paragraph of your intro, the rest is consulted in more peer-reviewed articles, magazines, books, etc.

[@jackanderson6966]

This video must be shared with every english teacher ever

[@thomasr.jackson2940]

Checking the references is terribly important on Wikipedia. It is common, I find, especially in more controversial articles, for the references cited to support particular statements not only are of poor quality, but frequently do not actually support the statement that cites them. While you certainly told of the importance of checking references, I do wish that you had emphasised this a bit more, perhaps with its own example in the Thought Bubble. But the gist of your article, that Wikipedia is a great source when used correctly, is very much true.

[@harmonycollier7209]

This is adressed with lateral reading.

[@nashvilleriveraquinio6432]

Finally, I have a KZbin crash course video on how to use Wikipedia properly. I am seriously frustrated on how people doesn't get it. Wikipedia can still be used as long as it has a verifiable source. Now, I have proof. Thank you.

[@ethan-loves]

I find this Crash Course series especially empowering. Thank you for it! I consider it a great service to humankind.

[@mariodavidpalacio]

I freaking love this course. I know, you said it before, but it really is an extension of Media Literacy, which opened my eyes to certain things. THANKS!

[@modestysnooze6154]

This series makes me so happy.

[@cupwave2]

As a 7+ year user and editor of Wikipedia, thank you! Informative content about how to use the site properly like this are very appreciated.

[@primitivism]

I edit Wikipedia articles almost every day and do hereby approve this video.

[@kevinconrad6156]

I edited the 'India Ink' article in Wikipedia years ago to add its use in microbiology. My wording is gone but the use is still in Wikipedia.

[@MyPisceanNature]

As the eldest of 5 siblings, I approve of the shots taken at Hank in this video.

[@TheMaplestrip]

Really accurate video, glad to see such a good representation of Wikimedia :) I am particularly happy that you included "citing an encyclopedia of any kind is not a great look for research projects." This is pretty key info.

[@dilnoza2168]

Can you make a video about college essays?

[@ARedVelvetBunnie]

Yessss I’m a college student yet I still can’t write a good essay 😂

[@dadmom9602]

Yes I need it too😄

[@dilnoza2168]

@@ARedVelvetBunnie LOL ,I'm a high school student but I don't know what to do and how to write the college application essay {°~°}

[@dilnoza2168]

@American girl Ik,I can't but I would like to learn 😪

[@dilnoza2168]

@American girl I'm not that much a good student so I want to write an effective essay at least 😪

[@sgerbic]

Thank you. I run a Wikipedia editing team that specializes in science and pseudoscience. I'm going to use this video for our training as a good overview of Wikipedia.

[@brycelahm1283]

CrashCourse is my favorite KZbin channel. I love how he uses the correct term of Football for ⚽️

[@george9592]

Thank you crash course for making this series, I personally have issues with trusting information I find and never know what to trust which make it difficult if I want to learn more about something. I hope this series can help me learn to research more efficiently, thank you again.

[@LuinTathren]

I think Wikipedia is an invaluable resource for quick information. Just watch the tags and you'll be able to see what statements are controversial. Thanks for the video!

[@camillarose3072]

Loving this series.

[@nicole-secondaryemail-mort9617]

Love this topic. Excellent crash course as always. Thank you!

[@dezigerator]

As an educator, I'm really pleased with the awesome content of this video but also with how slowly John speaks in comparison to earlier crashcourse series. I've tried to use crashcourse world history in class a couple times only to have my students not be able to follow the rapid spoken information whatsoever.

[@biggerdoofus]

Sorry if he mentioned this already and I didn't notice, but Wikipedia is also really good for looking up certain types of functional information. A lot of common mathematical equations and programming algorithms have their own wikipedia pages that may or may not be accurate in terms of speed and usefulness, but will show the actual working forms. I've literally used them unchanged before on minor hobby projects and saved a bunch of time. The pseudocode is often pretty good too.

[@flyingkoala8823]

This is one of those kinds of videos that everyone should watch. Well done 😊

[@SirlonMata]

Thank you John! Great show!

[@akavienne]

Every research paper I wrote in college started with wikipedia. It's a great source of basic information for most topics and I still use it when I want a quick overview of a subject.

[@jemal999]

THANK YOU!! As a long time Wikipedia user and occasional supporter, I have been trying to get this point out literally for years.

[@simonesardeiro]

A new way to do science ... loving it

[@gianordano]

I’m a teacher and I approve this message. I have to defend Wikipedia almost every day from colleges who dogmatically condemn it as unreliable. Students are amazed when I recommend them to start their research by reading up on Wikipedia. This topic shouldn’t be hard to grasp. It’s not rocket science. It’s not even brain surgery. If you don’t believe me, look it up on Wikipedia.

[@sandymiller8244]

Why not send your students to library databases where articles are fact checked first? They are typically free and accurate.

[@gianordano]

Sandy Miller That is a great idea. However, most databases, from my experience, are not free and not every school library subscribes. At my current school students do have access to certain databases, mostly newspaper databases. In Sweden, where I teach, there is a online free database containing published academic papers from universities. Ambitious students sometimes go there. But, the point of this video is that Wikipedia is a good place to start. Like Green stated, it’s great for getting a birds eye view. I’m not suggesting Wikipedia should replace other, more credible, sources.

[@sandymiller8244]

@@gianordano I guess I am lucky to have better libraries where I live :). The problem with using a source that may not be correct is that you may have to unlearn incorrect information. If I had a medical problem, I would go to a medical expert first rather than ask someone who does not have authority to provide the information. Good discussion.

[@gianordano]

Sandy Miller You are right to point out the risk of having to “unlearn” wrongful information, but that is more an argument against relying on a single source rather than the reliability of any particular source. Even if you go to a doctor for medical advice I would say it’s sound advice to get a second opinion if it’s an important matter. It doesn’t mean your doctor isn’t a reliable source, simply that you remain skeptical. Same goes for scientific papers. Even if they are peer reviewed and published in a respected journal I would never rely on any single source for reaching a sound conclusion. Also, good talk. I never engage in comments. I might have to do it more often. Of course, I can’t really reach a conclusion based on this single experience. 😏

[@ARedVelvetBunnie]

Thank youuuu thank you for making educational videos about researching 😭

[@autoreimg]

This is really important information to have as a student, great job guys. DFTBA!

[@kittfedoroff4495]

"Or a cat, if you're one of those people"?? LOL Another excellent series. So, I'll be waiting for your Crash Course on Lacrosse. Thank you, John Green, for sharing your amazing talents and life (thru Vlogbrothers). DFTkeepBeingA!

[@dot.O]

It's crazy to think that there are people who don't know how to properly search for answers on the internet. Just curious how many people use Googles search Settings and Tools button?

[@crediblesalamander8056]

It's partially Google's fault, most search queries are done on mobile these days, and using Settings and Tools is a pain there.

[@bee5120]

Most people aren't even aware that they can filter their search keywords by using queries with "AND", "NOT", & "OR" (i.e. "drag AND physics" will just give you search results based on drag forces in physics while eliminating other useless "drag" related queries such as "drag race" and "drag queen"). And that wildcards like "*" before or after a keyword can pull many topics that has that particular word. (i.e. "bus*" will pull everything from "bush" to "business" as long as it starts with "bus").

[@BlueyMcPhluey]

but then what do I search to find drag queen physics? what is the average velocity of a death drop

[@sandymiller8244]

@@bee5120 also site:gov will limit results to government sites which is good for medical research because you can get things from that national library of medicine or the CDC. type:PDF can show results of scanned journal articles.

[@linecey1984]

EXCELLENT VIDEO, very good advice

[@amylizbrarian]

As someone who teaches undergraduates how to evaluate information, I also highly recommend CQ Researcher. I call it the “academic wikipedia” because it has brief introductory articles on lots of topics, citations for further reading, etc. but is a little more consistent than wikipedia. Also, it can be great for choosing a topic, and it has overviews on controversial issues that can introduce you to common arguments on both sides of the issue.

[@lo3769]

Thank you - I also teach undergrads and did not know about this!

[@GabrielKnightz]

"Is there any knowledge in the world which is so certain that no reasonable man could doubt it?" ~The Problems of Philosophy by Bertrand Russell

[@dahawk8574]

I doubt it.

[@JoPeter27]

On the back of my seventh-grade biology book was a picture of a star-nosed mole. It's been ten years and it still haunts me.

[@chrissscottt]

Nice work John, and thanks for saying 'Magic Bullet' rather than the oft misused 'Silver Bullet'.

[@impulsetones6727]

please make a series on geology..really looking forward to it.

[@MakeMeThinkAgain]

Wiki is also good for quickly wandering through related information. You can start at one layer an easily dig deeper or move laterally in a way that would be hard to equal with online sources and impossible to equal with offline sources. Also, primary and secondary sources are not inherently dependable either. You always have to use your judgement when evaluating new information.

[@anshumanmishra2012]

i always trusted wiki and always will ! thanks for confirming it john !

[@hacker010010101]

amazing content!

[@katiecallsit]

I need a crash course! 😎

[@eaglesoverfi3352]

Good trick for Wikipedia: Most major topics have a simple english translation, which breaks down even the most complex topics to a 6th grade reading/comprehension level.

[@AustinSnider]

"All of your friends... should probably be people." Well said.

[@pan_bacchanal]

Thank you SO MUCH for this, you making world a better place

[@connecticutaggie]

Thanks great example of how to use the Internet. Wikipedia is a great example of open collaborative information - something that would have been difficult to achieve prior to the Internet. It is very different from the concept of vetted/trusted information sources that we used to had to depend on. These are still available; and, some are very good; but, as you pointed out, they can bring their own bias which is not always easy to detect. Wikis do have their challenges; but, they also provide the ability of harvesting the diverse knowledge of MUCH larger pool of contributors. Years ago I contributed some information that that very few people knew and I just happened to know because I was in the right place at the right time. When I am no longer here, that information might have been lost. It wasn't groundbreaking; but, when you multiply that by the billions that use Wikipedia, the opportunity is huge. Wikis are just a tool like any other, they are most useful when kept sharp by caring hands and used by careful and skillful hands. Anyone who finds and error or an opportunity to contribute shouldn't leave the error to have something to complain about; but, rather, make a change and contribute to build for the future.

[@dinornis]

2:18 Ha! The star-nosed mole is one of my favourite Wiki pages to go through. It is the absolute treasure trove of weird and fascinating information (they're also one of my favourite mammals, and I'm usually not a big fan of mammals).

[@dinornis]

If you're a regular user of Wiki and you're signed in with an account, there's a whole bunch of 'Gadgets' you can select - the list is really worth going through for easy navigation! Enabling XTools shows stats about the page history (number of revisions, editors, pageviews, watchers etc) and 'Display an assessment of an article's quality in its page header' gives a rating (such as A/B/C-class) to suggest whether the article may be complete, factually accurate, a stub etc. Fwiw, the note that article quality can be dependant on community is a good one. There's been an ongoing debate as to whether macrons are used in pages containing Māori language, with some pretty dodgy reasoning for dropping the macron (seen as whitewashing by many), and this has caused several pages to be edited back to the 'English' versions. So it's good to acknowledge that there's still a degree of bias that influences articles.

[@juliak7654]

Brings back memories from the scavenger hunts that often lead us to Wikipedia :)

[@Flow86767]

*Yes John Green vidéo!*

[@cellocoversimprov5660]

0:25 Hey! Bad John! No use bias!

[@tessat338]

One of my college friends, who also was awarded a MacArthur Fellowship, is an internationally recognized expert on star-nosed moles. I once saw him on a NOVA documentary.

[@manh385]

Great work

[@akabanekarma3153]

Crash Course is really the best 🌞🌞

[@angharadstone4779]

Everybody needs to watch this (exceptions for professional fact checkers and librarians who have been the wiki's before Wikipedia)

[@TheTexas1994]

One of the other things about Wikipedia that’s different than other encyclopedias is this: you don’t have to pay for it. It gives anyone with an internet connection access to its content and not just those who pay for it.

[@sorayacatfriend]

Is this video a re-upload, cause I remember seeing it in the subscriptions a few weeks ago.

[@qwertyman1511]

aren't you acting in this video?

[@radagastwiz]

He's not playing a role in a scripted drama, he's presenting a scripted non-fictional topic. Very different.

[@qwertyman1511]

@@radagastwiz but still acting, be it as himself.

[@milton5417]

QWERTY man Umm... I think it would be hosting in that case, not acting. 🤔

[@MKPiatkowski]

@@qwertyman1511 He's a presenter in this video, not an actor. The highly trained actors I work with would be appalled to have this placed in the same ballpark as what they do. Acting requires entering into a world outside yourself.

[@Elfos64]

I'm an amateur media reviewer, and I need to use Fan-made wikis for certain shows to see things like which episodes a recurring but non-main character appears in or what supplementary material I lack access to say and whether they're worthwhile enough to track down. Those such wikis are generally reliable to trust single source from, or at least used as a guide to narrow down your search in the extensive canon.

[@ClintEPereira]

Encyclopedias are usually tertiary sources--secondary AT BEST. Always check for the original sources when doing research. Dig, dig, dig!

[@Tsuyara]

Wikipedia tries to be tertiary, not secondary though. It's actually interesting that primary sources aren't really the ideal reliable way, you'd generally want a meta analysis.

[@Cxquon]

Did anyone else's teacher make them do a slideshow on this?

[@Marco_Onyxheart]

Hey, John is basically an actor in Ant-Man and the Wasp. Ant-Man was reading The Fault in our Stars, so John Green is actually canon in the Marvel Cinematic Universe

[@Felixkeeg]

One of my professors always says: "You have the power of the internet nowadays. Wikipedia is the best stepping stone into any topic and I wish we had it, when I was still a student"

[@BillyOnYouTube]

You made my little sister cry with your perfect literature, sir! Curse you!

[@DuranmanX]

Another helpful hint from someone who uses Wikipedia a lot; you can learn a lot by how much articles a page has in different languages. For instance, despite toilet paper orientation being much more wordier than Harappa (6K words vs 2K words), Harappa has 60 different articles in different languages and toilet paper orientation only has 15

[@bee5120]

Back in my college days, I always relied on Wikipedia as the starting point for my research papers. The External Links are what leads to actual credible info since most of it lead right back to academic published journals of sciences and psychology.

[@beren171]

You should stop spamming the other comments with this one, it looks bad.

[@vaibhavtripathi4951]

3:35 yeah, Wikipedia become adult. When was her birthday. Okay, I check on Wikipedia.

[@adamrhome8055]

Mr. Green I noticed how @ 2:00 into the video about dispelling the myths about Wikipedia, you cite Wikipedia as a primary source when referring to Wikipedia's reference statistics. Well played Mr. Green, well played assuming Wikipedia is a credible resource to accurately track and publish its own user's statistics. Sometimes the simple act of counting is hard, so might you have any additional sources to led credence to that conclusion or at least a one that might appear to be a little less biased?

[@ScottKorin]

Wait ... wait... wait The person who founded Taco Bell was actually named Bell? That's amazing!

[@aniamirza]

I swear to god i saw this video day before yesterday and hank green was talking in it

[@marisaashikawa7108]

After this I had to check out the toilet paper orientation thing

[@MenschenImHaus]

Can you make a video about the use of stock photos?

[@SlowToe]

Critical thinking, skeptic critical thinking. It's beautiful and powerful.

[@fran6b]

As CrashCourse state it, Wikipedia is big. Starting there, CrashCourse could emphasis on the way to evaluate the quality of an article more than the quality of Wikipedia in general. Did you know that Wikipedia have a label to identified «featured articles» which is reserved only to very well written article based on rigorous standard? In English, on the 5,800,713 articles, there are presently 5,451 featured articles. But nice video, indeed!

[@KingsleyIII]

For some reason teachers don't like Wikipedia, but Wikipedia's sources are just fine!

[@bee5120]

Exactly! Back in my college days, I always relied on Wikipedia as the starting point for my research papers. The External Links are what leads to actual credible info since most of it lead right back to academic published journals of sciences and psychology.

[@adm0iii]

Again, Wikipedia is the best place to start learning a new subject, but it's possible a lower-quality source can get into an article and stay for a hours or days before another editor notices and corrects it.

[@kevinconrad6156]

True, but the sources sited might also be much more biased than the Wikipedia article that is group corrected. One must always evaluate any new information. For some things like chemical elements Wikipedia is as good as any other source.

[@Tfin]

There shouldn't be corrections that don't have sources that can be cited themselves.

[@emilyniedbala]

I was doing a research paper on Nerdfighteria and found it very difficult to find curable sources for general information on how Nerdfighteria began because it’s about/history page links to its Wikipedia article- is this then a citable source if approved by the topic?

[@SpirusOfH]

This series is definitely important to a great many people, but I really found myself thinking "well, duh" a lot of times. A lot of the conclusions have been the axioms that I have lived by for many, many years and I guess I always assumed everyone else did as well.

[@biggusdickus9652]

On an Indonesian talkshow not to long ago, they invited a self proclaimed royal of the Sunda Empire. He talked about "history" and "claims" which sounded a lot like funny stupid conspiracy theories, like the NATO being formed in Bandung, Indonesia. We laught at him and for some time he became a meme. Then, he started to change the NATO wikipedia page to fit his delusion. Someone reported him to the police, and as far as I know, there is a law against spreading misinformation in Indonesia. I actualy agree. Do you think laws like that are necesary to protect democracy, or is it against democracy? It´s something to keep in mind. Btw, thank you for the content John Green. I've always been a fan.

[@slickstretch6391]

I love source-surfing on wikipedia.

[@MrChillerNo1]

10 years of Wikipedia with aproximately an one hour a day, has broaden my mind more than the school system ever could.

[@ScottKorin]

FYI, John's wikipedia no longer mentions that he is an author -- as of September 2018. So this video is old ;)

[@emilyniedbala]

Wait, did John actually delete Hank’s Wikipedia at one point?

[@0nlyjob]

Nice introduction, thanks. Peer review is what makes Wikipedia work. Community contributed content is a powerful concept. However standards of neutrality are not well established like when "vaccine controversies" page was renamed as "vaccine hesitancy"...

[@JamieJosef]

The movie G-Force permanently scarred me. I can never look at star-nosed moles the same

[@joshbobst1629]

Heard on Crash Course tonight: "citizens of the internet". Whew!

[@kimgezerguerzo5646]

Way back 2012 my professor said that your Thesis on Chapter 4 that they not include Wikipedia as the reference on our studies. Which is True.

[@LeftistCommentary]

Beat me to it!

[@nair.127]

I like Wikipedia. I mostly look up movie plots. When something I'm watching is annoying me. That way I don't care if I watch the rest. I know roughly how it ends. That's usually enough. Cheers

[@fromscratchauntybindy9743]

I like Wiki, but I'm also glad to not be studying formally anymore, it seems all so overwhelming nowdays. Although at least at Uni I had access to peer reviewed jourals etc that are normally behind a paywall.