I get tremendous use out of wikipedia, because it almost always has an article on any anime I'm interested in. Can't get that in a traditional encyclopedia.
Now, I'm an old lefty, so I try to avoid talking politics. I've watched my country become much more conservative as its population has aged. However, most of my friends and relatives are very conservative, and don't see things that way, and I frequently have more respect for their opinions than I do for my own, knowing how often I've been wrong in my life. :)
I've learned, to my sorrow, that most people -- even those that think themselves very rational -- can't handle being proven wrong -- even in very concrete, virtually irrefutable terms. And, unfortunately, I think that's at the root of the "wikipedia controversy". (No, I don't think it exists.) Given that any forum made up of people will never reach consensus, wikipedia has come closer than any other body of knowledge has, outside of extremely specialized forums like electronics journals.
Of course, if a better option comes along, I'll be happy to use it, but none of the alternatives that have been brought to my attention were created to get the facts right. They exist only to push their own agenda. I'm always happy to see someone else speaking out, but they're going to have to put in superhuman effort to beat wikipedia.
