• shneancy@lemmy.world
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    2 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?

    • Saleh@feddit.org
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      2 days ago

      Obviously someone in the BBC was salty that he didn’t get to write the article on Ozzies death, so he quickly edited it in the Wikipedia so he could claim the “first” bragging rights.

      • shneancy@lemmy.world
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        2 days ago

        what is still strange to me is that the BBC article was one of those coverages they do - where they update the page as new information flows in (or they just decide to say something more). and the first part of that at 8:11pm is just a short paragraph

    • TheTechnician27@lemmy.world
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      2 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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        2 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 :')