The task today was to get to know Wikipedia and search two topics using Wikipedia and determine whether the information was accurate, can you understand the topic and does it follow the Wikipedia guidelines.
The first topic I looked up was on South Africa. I found this topic very detailed and easy to follow and understand. The information is factual and relevant to the topic. I did not find any errors in the information nor did I find the information to be biased towards any one side of the country's history. Considering the shaky history of South Africa this is a very good thing. The people who have contributed to the article have fused together all the fundamentals of what South Africa is all about and how it got to where it is. However, in looking in the History tab of the Wikipedia page to see what changes had been made to the article, I did come across what I thought was a funny substitute in place for another word. Having said that it was offensive to who ever the statement was applied to. This change was obviously made as a joke and is a good example of what someone is able to do when using Wikipedia. Any changes could be made to any topic and if you were none the wiser you could just take it for fact, so don't. The people who edited this article did not follow the Wikipedia guidelines.
The second topic I searched was an article on Afrikaans, one of the official languages of South Africa. This article was accurate and gave me what I was looking for but there were so many spelling mistakes. It was obvious to me that an Afrikaans speaking person had added the article and was not proficient in their English spelling. Other than that it does follow the Wikipedia guidelines.
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