References to
Wikipedia in popular culture have been widespread. Many
parody Wikipedia's openness, with individuals vandalizing or modifying articles in nonconstructive ways. Others feature individuals using Wikipedia as a
reference work, or positively comparing their intelligence to Wikipedia. In some cases, Wikipedia is not used as an encyclopedia at all, but instead serves more as a character trait or even as a game, such as
Wikiracing. Wikipedia has also become culturally significant with many individuals seeing the presence of their own Wikipedia entry as a status symbol.[1]
In a July 2006
episode of the satirical comedy The Colbert Report,
Stephen Colbert announced the
neologism "wikiality", a
portmanteau of the words Wiki and reality, for his segment "
The Wørd". Colbert defined wikiality as "truth by consensus" (rather than fact), modeled after the approval-by-consensus format of Wikipedia. He ironically praised Wikipedia for following his philosophy of
truthiness in which intuition and consensus is a better reflection of reality than fact:
You see, any user can change any entry, and if enough other users agree with them, it becomes true. ... If only the entire body of human knowledge worked this way. And it can, thanks to tonight's word: Wikiality. Now, folks, I'm no fan of reality, and I'm no fan of encyclopedias. I've said it before. Who is Britannica to tell me that George Washington had slaves? If I want to say he didn't, that's my right. And now, thanks to Wikipedia, it's also a fact.
We should apply these principles to all information. All we need to do is convince a majority of people that some factoid is true. ... What we're doing is bringing democracy to knowledge.[2]
According to Stephen Colbert, together "we can all create a reality that we all can agree on; the reality that we just agreed on". During the segment, he joked: "I love Wikipedia... any site that's got a longer entry on
truthiness than on
Lutherans has its priorities straight." Colbert also used the segment to satirize the more general issue of whether the repetition of statements in the media leads people to believe they are true. The piece was introduced with the tagline "The Revolution Will Not Be Verified", a play on the song title "
The Revolution Will Not Be Televised" referencing how the mainstream establishment that Wikipedia cites as Reliable Sources will not support significant change, throwing doubt on the idea that Wikipedia is
truthful.
Colbert suggested that viewers change the elephant page to state that the number of
African elephants has tripled in the last six months.[3] The suggestion resulted in numerous incorrect changes to Wikipedia articles related to elephants and Africa.[a] Wikipedia administrators subsequently
restricted edits to the pages by anonymous and newly created user accounts.
Colbert went on to type on a laptop facing away from the camera, claiming to be making the edits to the pages himself. Because initial edits to Wikipedia corresponding to these claimed "facts" were made by a user named Stephencolbert, many believe Colbert himself vandalized several Wikipedia pages at the time he was encouraging other users to do the same. The account, whether it was Stephen Colbert himself or someone posing as him, has been blocked from Wikipedia indefinitely.[4] Wikipedia blocked the account for violating
Wikipedia's username policies (which state that using the names of celebrities as login names without permission is inappropriate), not for the vandalism, as believed.
Ukrainian composer
Andriy Bondarenko wrote a musical piece, "Anthem of Wikipedia", which was performed in a concert devoted to the 15th anniversary of Wikipedia in
Kyiv in 2016.[8][9]
A Tribe Called Quest referenced Wikipedia in their 2016 song "Mobius", with the line "Ooh, child, things are gonna get easier, 'Long as they get my page right on Wikipedia."[10]
In webcomics
References to Wikipedia have been made several times in the webcomic xkcd. A facsimile of a made-up Wikipedia entry for "malamanteau" (a
stunt word created by Munroe to poke fun at Wikipedia's writing style) provoked a controversy.[11][12]
In humor
In 2017, Paul Little wrote in The New Zealand Herald that "Wikipedia may be good at a lot of things, but no one's ever accused it of being able to tell one end of a joke from another" in reference to its
Dad joke article. Little accused Wikipedia, "the formerly reliable online encyclopedia" of choosing a poor example of the humor genre,[13] although a 2023 survey would reveal that particular joke was the most commonly heard "dad joke" in the United States.[14]
During the
Russo-Ukrainian war, a meme titled Battle of Techno House 2022, which features footage of a Russian soldier's failed effort at opening a door, went viral and was reposted millions of times.[15] Media coverage included discussion of an initial Wikipedia page for the incident/meme, which lampooned the event by using Wikipedia formatting generally used only for actual battles, making it seem like a real battle. The belligerents in the "battle" were humorously listed as "Russian Soldier" and "store door" with the battle results referred to as a "decisive door victory" and "pride" referred to as one of the Russian casualties.[16][17][18] The humorous content was later removed from the Wikipedia page.[19]
Contexts
Wikipedia is not always referenced in the same way. The ways described below are some of the ways it has been mentioned.
In June 2011, Wikipedia received attention for attempts by editors to change the "
Paul Revere" article to fit
Sarah Palin's accounting of events during a campaign bus tour.[26][27] The New York Times reported that the article "had half a million page views" by June 10, and "after all the attention and arguments, the article is now much longer ... and much better sourced ... than before Palin's remarks."[28]
In October 2018, Jackson A. Cosko, a former staff member for US Senator
Maggie Hassan, misused Hassan's computers, after he had been fired, to edit Wikipedia to
dox several Congresspersons, including Sen.
Mitch McConnell. Cosko pleaded guilty in April 2019.[32]
In May 2006, British chat show host
Paul O'Grady received an inquiry from a viewer regarding information given on his Wikipedia page, to which he responded, "Wikipedia? Sounds like a skin disease."
Comedian
Zach Galifianakis claimed to look himself up on Wikipedia in an interview with The Badger Herald,[37] stating about himself, "...I'm looking at Wikipedia right now. Half Greek, half redneck, around 6-foot-4. And that's about it... The 6-foot-4 thing may be a little bit off. Actually, it's 4-foot-6."
General information source
Slate magazine compared Wikipedia to the fictional device
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy from the series of the same name by
Douglas Adams. "The parallels between The Hitchhiker's Guide (as found in Adams' original BBC radio series and novels) and Wikipedia are so striking, it's a wonder that the author's rabid fans don't think he invented time travel. Since its editor was perennially out to lunch, the Guide was amended 'by any passing stranger who happened to wander into the empty offices on an afternoon and saw something worth doing.' This anonymous group effort ends up outselling Encyclopedia Galactica even though 'it has many omissions and contains much that is apocryphal, or at least wildly inaccurate.'"[38] This comparison of fictional documents in the series, is not unlike the mainstream comparisons between Wikipedia and professional Encyclopedias.[39]