This page was originally written in August 2017
Wikipedia is a mixed bag. A lot of the time, the articles are pretty good. But if you’re inclined to academic pickiness, linking out to an article on Wikipedia could be a problem. Because anyone can edit it, even if an article is good now, it might not be good three months later. So you write a post, you direct a reader to the Wikipedia article for a decent overview of some related topic, and then you might be leading them directly to a newly ruined article. Here’s how to avoid that problem.
Let’s take the article Rephaim. You go to the article, copy the URL, whip up a link, and you get this link: Rephaim. It’s okay today, as I write this. I don’t know if it’s okay when you’re reading it.
There’s a neat little tab near the top of the article that says “View History.” Just click on it, and you’re redirected to this page: Revision History. Because Wikipedia is susceptible to bad edits, the website keeps a record of every revision ever made, so that editors, if necessary, can reinstate an old version. But it’s also useful if you write online. Just pick a version you like. In my case, I like the current version. In this case, I’ll click on the version as of July 3, and I get this link: Rephaite. That link will never change.
So, if you’re linking to Wikipedia articles, I recommend linking to specific revisions. Of course, if you trust the editing community enough, you could always take a risk and link to the moving target of an article the ordinary way. Your call.
This page is released under the CC0 1.0 license.