Ask HN: How can we fix Wikipedia?
I think overall the wikipedia model has shown itself to be decently working.But (anecdata) I have my gripes with the way it handles evidence.My SO has a person (died already) in her family with a (relatively) short wikipedia entry. There are factual errors in the article. We know that, because we have original documents showing that the "facts" reportet in the entry are wrong.Due to the fact that the documents cannot be published online without breaking copyright laws we can't point to a correction.She communicated with an editor (or whatever his role was, but he had the right to approve or deny changes to the entry) who stated he could only allow changes to the "facts" if my SO could point to an online source (a credible one he said). Else he would deny changing anything. Or she should upload the documents to wikipedia if she had copyright on them.He didn't accept the idea to send the documents to him as proof. He made it clear that it is either the wikipedia way of determining the truth or none.We stopped. Since then I am asking myself how much of wikipedia is actually wrong and actively or passively denied from correction by these gate keepers.Wikipedia could offer a way to upload documents for editors to review without automatically making them publicly available. This would enable fact checking and correction.I had heard of it before but since this personal experience with German Wikipedia's "Blockwart" mentality I will never consider them a valid organisation for donations.