What is Wikipedia?

Wikipedia is a vast digital repository of information created by the inhabitants of Earth, representing humanity’s most ambitious attempt at cataloging everything they know about their planet, the universe, and themselves before the arrival of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to Earth.

For a species that only recently stopped hitting each other with rocks, it was quite impressive.

The project operated on a peculiar principle: that anyone, anywhere, at any time could write or edit articles about anything. This democratic approach had the advantage of being able to harness the collective knowledge of millions of humans. It had the disadvantage of being able to harness the collective knowledge of millions of humans.

The fundamental flaw in Wikipedia—and indeed in any encyclopedia written by Earthlings about Earth—is that humans are spectacularly ill-equipped to write objectively about themselves. It’s rather like asking a Zrillan Driftfish to write a critical review of its own nutrient sphere. The Driftfish may well have strong opinions about the curvature of the sphere and the flavor of the algae film on its walls, but it has never seen a plasma tide, a gas-giant’s storm sea, or, for that matter, a slightly larger nutrient sphere with a better algae flavor.

The Hitchhiker’s Guide to Earth, by contrast, employs actual editors—beings who have visited multiple planets, survived at least three apocalypses (two of which were their own fault), and can spell “bureaucracy” in the native tongues of at least 630 planets without looking it up. These editors also have the crucial advantage of not caring terribly much about Earthlings’ feelings.

Wikipedia’s “citation needed” tags were humanity’s touching attempt to maintain accuracy, though they were often added by people who themselves had no citations, creating a sort of infinite regress of uncertainty that philosophers found either deeply troubling or hilarious, depending on how much they’d had to drink.

Wikipedia is also a noble venture, providing information to readers completely free of advertising, only asking for a small donation of $2 per year if its readers happen to be able to spare two bucks. Thus, the future of the site is often mired in uncertainty, unlike The Hitchhiker’s Guide to Earth, which shamelessly profits off of any eyeballs, human or otherwise, foolish enough to venture onto its website.

Wikipedia, however, does contain an impressive amount of information about cats, which is perhaps the one subject on which humans could claim genuine expertise.

Current Status: Still running, still being edited, still arguing about whether a hot dog is a sandwich.