Abandon all hope, ye who enter here

Fragment of a discussion from Talk:May 2011 Update

There is more than a little truth here. Indeed, I am wondering if Wikipedia has not passed its peak already when it comes to quality: there is a lot of persistent garbage and it does not appear to be decreasing (one can remove misinformation, but it always appears to return). The www is full of junk, and it appears to drifts into Wikipedia again and again.

On the upside, cathedrals were built using not all that much in the way of planning. They were built by craftsmen, under whose hands the cathedral grew organically. However, many a fine cathedral has been destroyed by envious people ("not our cathedral!"). - Brya 10:42, 17 May 2011 (UTC)

Brya10:42, 17 May 2011

Yes, it does take time, decades/centuries. I saw a great comment from w:A_C_Grayling on development of knowledge gathering - "At times sceptical challenge has been seen as a serious threat to the project of attaining knowledge."[ref1] He was talking about progress in the middle-ages. It appears Wikipedia finds itself maturing through its own dark ages. Just a few centuries for you to wait. A lot of the user talk pages I have visited have a finality to them with a shared common experience of their work deleted over time.

Suggestion: The "no loss of knowledge when editting" campaign should get higher visibility.

[ref1] Ideas that matter, by A C Grayling (2010), Page 168.

Geoffjw197807:55, 30 May 2011