Research suggests articles on Wikipedia are about as reliable as 'accurate' sources

Wikipedia openly displays edit history and editorial disputes to assess trustworthiness

Unlike a journal article, which may be reviewed by up to three people before publication, popular Wikipedia pages may be reviewed thousands of times by editors, potentially enhancing their reliability. Less reviewed articles still require reliable third-party sources and remain subject to verification by bots and administrators who can undo edits.

Wikipedia articles are read more than 16 billion times every month

Nearly 300,000 volunteers worldwide help write, edit, and fact-check articles on the site in real-time, striving to ensure content is authored from a neutral point of view. All pages are freely accessible and must include citations to reliable, published sources.

A 15-year bibliographic analysis identified systematic gender bias across Wikipedia

A 2024 study by the University of Barcelona found that 71.4% of all English biographies that appear on the front page are about men, and approximately one in five editors are women. Researchers suggest systemic imbalances in society further diminish women's contributions to the site by leaving them with less time to defend edits during editorial disputes.

Wikipedia allows users to vote for what the last article on the site will be

Labeled as "humorous" on the site, the "Last topic pool" page lists various conditions where Wikipedia's final article would be written, including various end-of-the-world scenarios, instances where humanity might cease to exist, cases of Wikipedia becoming corrupted or uneditable, and the possibility of all possible knowledge having been written about.

Wikipedia's sister sites include directories of travel guides, species, and media

Like Wikipedia, volunteers around the world contribute to Wikivoyage, Wikispecies, and Wikimedia Commons to create freely accessible repositories of knowledge. Other projects include Wikibooks, a collection of e-books and annotated texts; Wikisource, which features source documents and historical texts; and Wiktionary, a dictionary covering over 170 languages.

Coverage of the 9/11 terrorist attacks helped shape Wikipedia's editorial policies

Launched nine months earlier, the site was featured on Yahoo's news page, attracting traffic from information seekers as dozens of new editors created hundreds of articles, including memorials, conspiracy theories, and donation and volunteer pages. Discussions between editors would begin establishing rules for handling breaking news events.

Wikipedia arose from a failed, for-profit online encyclopedia

Nupedia was launched in 2000 by internet entrepreneur Jimmy Wales and internet project developer Lawrence Sanger, only publishing articles written by experts after a cumbersome seven-step review process. The two developed Wikipedia to allow the public to write articles for future review, but shifting to self-moderation contributed to Sanger's departure in 2002.

LonelyWiki compiles obscure Wikipedia articles with fewer than 2,000 annual readers

LonelyWiki calls itself a museum of forgotten knowledge. A "lonely article" features real prose, at least 500 characters, no stub placeholders, and under 2,000 annual views. Each one represents a person who decided something was worth documenting without editorial commission or trending news.

A pediatric journal ran 138 fictional case studies, and 61 were cited as real stories

The Canadian journal Paediatrics & Child Health issued corrections to 138 case studies published since 2000, acknowledging the cases were entirely fictional—a practice intended to protect patient privacy that was never disclosed to readers. At least 61 of the fabricated reports were cited as fact in other peer-reviewed journals a combined 218 times, including a 2006 Lancet article alleging an infant died from opioid-laced breast milk.

Philip Roth once tried to correct details on one of his novel's Wikipedia pages

The Wikipedia entry for Roth's 2000 novel "The Human Stain" alleges that the book was based on the life of Anatole Broyard, a Black American writer who "passed" for white, something he shared in common with the main character in Roth's novel, though Roth said that wasn't true. When Roth tried to correct the error, Wikipedia editors told him he would need a secondary source to back up his claim.

China has blocked the Wikipedia domain since 2015

The Chinese language version of the site had been blocked intermittently since 2004 due to pages featuring topics deemed controversial by the Chinese communist party, including the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests and Taiwan. Once Wikipedia switched to an HTTPS protocol—making it impossible to block individual pages—all Wikipedia pages were blocked.

Grokipedia is Elon Musk's rival to Wikipedia

Developed by xAI—a company Musk founded in 2023 to compete with OpenAI and Google—the site features a search bar where users can type in queries, which reports suggest are then answered by the same xAI model powering the Grok chatbot. Grokipedia describes Wikipedia as having "systemic ideological biases" and a "left-leaning slant."

Each scientific study adds incremental knowledge to existing understanding

On its own, no study serves as a source of truth or solves an existing problem indefinitely, though many can be analyzed collectively in a systematic review to build more confidence—the result of more data—in a conclusion. Studies can explore knowledge gaps or test an existing theory, which is always subject to refinement and improvement.

See this searchable resource about herbal therapies, including evidence and drug interactions

Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center has created this searchable resource of herbal supplements to inform the public about the purported uses of herbal therapies, the existing evidence about them, their mechanism of action, and any concerns about potential herbal supplement and drug interactions.

Critics of New Journalism believe the form shares unreliable information

After Gay Talese’s 2016 book on Gerald Foos was found to lack factual accuracy, criticism of New Journalism returned to the limelight. Some believe the narrative focus requires abandoning the facts and leaves too much room for writers to make up material rather than present what actually happened.

Bad Ancient: a site to fact-check claims about the ancient world

Peruse popular questions about ancient Rome, Egypt, Greece, and more, from whether Greek boxers were ripped or to what extent Alexander the Great conquered the world.

Hear why one author thinks college rankings may be irrelevant

For more than three decades, US News & World Report has released an annual ranking of the country's best colleges. An extremely influential list that can determine application volume, funding decisions, and more, the rankings have been compiled by a secret algorithm indecipherable to many on the opposite side of the table. Author Malcolm Gladwell attempts to unpack the calculation, ultimately raising the question: How relevant is the list?

True crime fans can derail lives with misguided accusations

In the wake of four stabbing deaths at the University of Idaho in November 2023, online sleuths, without any supporting evidence, were quick to point accusatory fingers at potential perpetrators. Poring over news reports, social media pages, and internet interactions can reveal viable information that can help solve crimes. Such (sometimes monetizable) behavior can also easily give rise to rumors and threats while impeding official investigations.(Some readers may experience a paywall.)

AI is not good at understanding satire

Social media has become rife with misinformation. In response, some organizations have deployed AI-assisted programs trying to curb the spread of this inaccurate content. The problem is that misinformation and satire, rhetorically speaking, often use the same kind of language, something AI struggles to understand.

Misleading measurements and fear-based reporting often exaggerate radiation risks

Daily exposure to radioactivity is common but occurs in low doses outside of locations near nuclear accidents like Chernobyl and Fukushima. Researchers have detected radiation in tuna, bananas, and the human body due to increasing instrumental sensitivity, not rising concentrations.

A 2020 study suggests just 6.7% of Tor network users visit sites on the dark web

It did not distinguish between visits to malicious sites and traffic to legitimate institutions with .onion domains, such as the BBC or Buzzfeed, and thus claimed that 6.7% of anonymized users engage in nefarious activity. The low percentage still highlights that most users of the technology underlying the dark web do not use it to browse the hidden portion of the internet.

The lack of diversity in DNA databases limits their applications

European ancestry dominates genetic research, hindering the usage of genetic databases for precision medicine for other groups, including African Americans, who face higher health risks due to genetic variants. Many Indigenous communities have also resisted genetic research due to past exploitation. (Some readers may experience a paywall.)

A prediction market was more accurate than most polls about the 2024 US presidential election

The idea that the median estimate of a group can be more accurate than individual expert estimates is called the "wisdom of the crowd," and dates back to the early 1900s. This theory can help explain the perceived value of prediction markets when it comes to polling and more.

How the most famous Ebola book, The Hot Zone, which sold 3.5 million copies and was translated into 30 languages, got aspects of the disease so wrong.

As of 2025, the most cited papers in science include a review of graphene, methods to improve image recognition, streamlining electron density calculations, and optimizing protein studies.

Doctors weigh in: Are wearable fitness devices useful or just entertainment?

In an age where technology is intertwined with our daily routines, there is an evolving relationship between healthcare professionals and the data gained from our wearable devices. This piece, published on The Verge, explores how doctors view and...

Uncertainties in measurements make finding gravity's Newtonian limit unclear

Although Newton's "universal" law is unreliable in strong gravitational fields when compared with the field equations of general relativity, it is still taught for its accuracy on everyday scales. However, gravity's effect on small scales is too weak to be measured reliably, its accuracy at atomic scales remains unknown.

Listen to an in-depth conversation on the links between Parkinson's disease and herbicide exposure and the challenging pace of scientific investigation.

Radioactive elements can introduce software errors because the ionizing radiation they produce can detach electrons from atoms, and computer code relies on the distribution of electrons.

Hookworm infection, though risky, may help fight certain autoimmune conditions by tamping down the immune system's inflammatory response.

Indefinite cloning of some endangered species may not sustain their longevity because cloning success rates decrease as genetic mutations accumulate.

Visualize how CRISPR-Cas9—a type of immune system used by single-celled organisms to attack invasive viruses—targets and makes precise changes to a gene's DNA.

A Yale student wrote a profound essay about the consulting industry's influence on elite college students that was published in a book of her writing after she died in a post-graduation car accident.

Studies suggest when you sleep is as important as how much you get, and syncing with your circadian rhythms may lead to less fatigue and improved long-term health outcomes

Netflix profits when you're not watching, and its movies are designed that way—read a detail-rich critical essay exposing lesser-known Netflix takes

Recent research found that the brain doesn't seem to massively rewire following amputation—upending earlier beliefs about the cause of phantom limb pain.

Browse a detailed visual analysis of over 200,000 similes—comparisons that often use 'like' or 'as'—from popular fiction to see how frequently writers the same idiomatic expressions.

Chaos theory—informally known as the butterfly effect—is the reason why weather forecasts are presented with probabilities rather than certainties.

Art theft is the third-largest source of criminal revenues worldwide, thanks in part to the subjective nature of valuing a work of art.

Many legends about George Washington, including his supposed wooden teeth and the story of cutting down the cherry tree, lack evidence.

This site reaches millions of visitors who are tired of AI chatbots and seeking human connection. Pretend to be an AI chatbot and ask questions, provide answers, and draw for people in real time.

A century of Billboard issues documenting the evolution of popular music.

The US Constitution is widely regarded as the longest-standing written national constitution still in force—see how it has influenced rights worldwide.

Explore an interactive map of battles from the American Revolution, along with detailed summaries of each engagement

Clever Hans was a 1900s horse that was believed to be able to solve math equations, tell time, and read and comprehend German, until a psychology student discovered how he got his answers.

Learn more about the history of fireworks, which dates back to an accidental invention during an alchemist's quest for information about immortality.

Poison ivy can cause rashes year-round since all parts of the plant contain urushiol, the oil that triggers our allergic response.

Famed poet TS Eliot rejected the manuscript for George Orwell's political fable 'Animal Farm,' writing that its criticism of authoritarianism was not 'the right point of view.'

Explore the history, structure, and species of Australia's Great Barrier Reef with this interactive journey narrated by Sir David Attenborough.

Frank Lloyd Wright's houses are historically hard to sell because they're old, subject to local landmark commissions, and often unfashionable