Wikinews is useless, huh?

It has — repeatedly — been said that Wikipedia is not the place for breaking news.

Forgive me for having little faith in the way things are being framed here; but, this is being framed as a "Wikinews is useless" meme. Yes, like more conventional media, such as CNN, Wikinews now has contributor-managed editorial control — Wacko Jacko's death probably made Wikinews around the same time as Wikipedia.

Again. Wikipedia is not the place to write the obituary (or as is more common, the wikt:hagiography) for the recently deceased.

There is a, shall we say, possessiveness contributors have about readers on Wikipedia. Attempts to cross-link the two projects, such as encouraging readers to contribute to the Wikinews obituary for Ted Kennedy, have been reverted out, and discussed into a ditch.

The draw between contributing to a top-10 website versus something down around 20-30k is obvious; the 'attitude' that accompanies apparently not wanting anyone else to be offered the choice is... not nice.

I'd say anyone working on this particular part of strategy should take the time to try and write an article on Wikinews. Then, come back 2-3 months later. It will still be the same. Wikipedia is the online successor to Britannica; Wikinews would like to be the successor to the archives of the New York Times and the Associated Press. --Brian McNeil 22:54, 18 November 2009 (UTC)

I agree with Brian. Too many people don't understand the difference between Wikipedia and Wikinews. While the two arguably share more in common between each other than with any other two wikimedia projects, they are still entirely different entities. I disagree with the notion that Wikinews serves a limited purpose due to the existence of Wikipedia. (p.s.: Brian, I thought we were somewhere in the top 14-15ks visited sites, not 20-30k?) Cheers.

Tempo. I was guessing conservatively. IIRC en.wn is around 14k; not for visits, but the alexa most-popular list. Comscore — which has a deal with the WMF — doesn't break down Wikinews in their public stats. Everything is lumped under the WMF umbrella thus Wikinews - in a small way - contributes to everyone saying "Wikipiedia is a top-10 website".

"wiki-wiki" means "quick-quick"? Wikipedia is that less, and less; flagged revisions will creep out from BLPs to increase and solidify the project's credibility. Wikinews has already done it; we're credible enough for Google News, but it's a major accomplishment to get the wikinews link-to-article to stick more than a day on Wikipedia. --Brian McNeil 23:29, 18 November 2009 (UTC)