• shneancy@lemmy.world
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    4 days ago

    Ozzy Osbourne’s death was first announced to UK media, first article i could find came from the BBC and released 8:11pm

    how is it that a Wikipedia editor outsprinted the first article and made the first death edit at 8:08pm?

    • TheTechnician27@lemmy.world
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      4 days ago

      Some of it’s going to be down to a major news org like the BBC being much more careful to make sure he’s really dead. With Wikipedia, that’s a fuck-up, but almost anyone can make it, and it can easily be undone. With the BBC, that kind of fuck-up would haunt them for years. I’ve also read that Sky News may have been the first to confirm his death. Looking at that edit, the editor didn’t mention a source; they just "was"d him. Bad practice by Wikipedia’s standards but worked out in the end.

      I think it’s a point of pride that we can be so up-to-date, but as a tertiary source, we rely on the credibility of secondary sources like the BBC to have any semblance of usability and order. I think we’re running different races, and we couldn’t run ours if they didn’t run theirs.

      • shneancy@lemmy.world
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        4 days ago

        ahh fair alright, Sky News released a short article at 8:05pm

        when looking for it it was difficult to dig through a billion copy pasted sources, half of which were paywalled or "tUrN oFf yOuR aDbLocK"walled :')