I think Encyclopedias are supposed to provide the reader the basic information about a certain subject and give sources where he can further study the subject.

While I agree that Wikipedia is not perfect, I'd say it usually does this.

an encyclopedia contains anything the authors feel is interesting or important and since this one is a wiki, the authors are anyone interested.
in any case, it isn't intended to be a primary source and probably shouldn't be used as such

Well, the problem is that there is little verifiable content.. these days wikipedia is the source people go to to verify things... I find the most interesting part of the site the links it gives to original content... far more interesting then the distilled views of 2 or 3 people.

I find Wikipedia to be fairly accurate (and useful) for technical stuff. Nevertheless, for anything important, I would always verify the facts. Typos are quite common in books and sometimes people reproduce the mistakes of others without checking so even if the authors are reasonably fastidious, you cannot assume it is entirely reliable - no single source of information should ever be considered entirely reliable.

Kaled.

Well, the problem is that there is little verifiable content

Does anyone find the references footnotes, or absence of them, useful in determining the validity of the data? I see many Wiki's with "this claim requires validation" (paraph.) or a footnote to a resource. If you actually use the footnotes and follow the links in them, it gives you a good idea as to the reliability.

No?

I have looked at references on Wikipedia, and sometimes they are good, pointing to a more detailed/in-depth and authoritative source, but more often they are to webpages that are no different than any ordinary webpage you would find on Google. In fact, often I have already read them. So that's not helpful, IMO.

I have found that the "requires validation" marker is often put up on any statement that might come from a ideological perspective that someone doesn't agree with or has an axe to grind about. It isn't necessarily an indicator that someone is policing the article to ensure its objectivity. There are people who appear to do nothing all day but troll Wikipedia for ideas that offend their worldview.

I have also noticed a trend in print in the past few years to shove in footnotes everywhere in order to make the writing seem more authoritative, but these references almost always lead to bogus sources, like articles the author himself has written or to articles in pop magazines and other trash. It seems that the same force is at work in Wikipedia now--references for the sake of appearing authoritative rather than in order to provide any actual in-depth or authoritative information.

I like wiki, use it everyday. However, they do rank higher than they should for many keywords. But what do you expect when they have millions of pages on the internets pointing to their website. Of course they are going to rank high for every single page they create.

My biggest complaint about wiki, their site search is useless if you have a spelling mistake.