User:Tamzin/Wikipedia:This just in!

This is an essay. It contains the advice or opinions of one or more Wikipedia contributors. This page is not an encyclopedia article, nor is it one of Wikipedia's policies or guidelines, as it has not been thoroughly vetted by the community. Some essays represent widespread norms; others only represent minority viewpoints.

Wikipedia is used to dealing with major news events or stories. We've developed all sorts of procedures and guidelines to deal with them the most effectively. However, every now and then there is a breaking-news story (often a crime, act of terror, or the like) that gets so much attention that both the MediaWiki software and the Wikipedia community are unable to keep pace. As a general rule, this happens in the cases of articles on events that have, or are widely expected to soon have, major lasting social or cultural ramifications. Edit conflicts are rampant, and five or six edits may go between the insertion of vandalism or unconstructive material, and its reversion. And throughout all of this, hundreds of thousands of people are viewing the article. The stakes are very high. If we screw up badly, Wikipedia winds up on the news. Throw in a little bad luck, and the Foundation gets taken to court. In some cases, we even risk disseminating false information that can lead to crimes or irreparable character damage against innocent people. So here are a few things to keep in mind when editing an article on a major news event:

Normally, if the New York Times or the BBC report something, we can pretty much declare it to be true. But during major stories, they're scrambling for information just as much as we are. If the Times says "sources are reporting that such-and-such," we write The New York Times has quoted sources as saying.... If 10 reliable news outlets say something, check to see if they're all just going off of each other, or off of the same unnamed source. Especially if the story involves crime, you can almost be guaranteed that there will be some detail of the story that every major news outlet will report, and then, sometimes even days or weeks later, retract en masse.

There's been some sort of major crime. The media reports something about it. The cops ask a few witnesses if this sounds correct. The witnesses, whose blurry memories the media were going off of in the first place, say they think so. The media ask the cops if it's true. The cops say they're pretty sure it is. The media reports that the police are confident that the story is correct. If no one in an official position is willing to go on the record saying, so, though, it's best to treat the information in the article with a grain of salt.