Wikipedia:Consequences

This is an essay. It contains the advice or opinions of one or more Wikipedia contributors. This page is not an encyclopedia article or a Wikipedia policy, as it has not been reviewed by the community.

Edits to Wikipedia have consequences, both for the editors who make them, and for that everyone in the world with access to the English Wikipedia.

Presumably, edits to Wikipedia have positive consequences, both for editors and for the world, in both the short and the long term. For example, the more accurate a commonly used encyclopedia is the more accurate people who read the encyclopedia will be, thus improving the world. Editors seem to write about what they love and/or what they hate, so that editing may have inherent benefits such as catharsis.

Edits may also result in negative consequences to editors, such as WP:HATE and physical damage from long term computer typing.

Presumably, Wikipedia should and does attempt to have the most positive impact possible, both on individual editors and on the world in both the short and the long term, and to lessen its negative impacts as much as possible. For example, there should be more suggestions or incentives to compliment editors and articles than to criticize an article or an editor. The primary reaction users should have to Wikipedia articles should be compliments, with, if necessary, non-empty criticisms with suggestions for improvement, rather than, "This is a piece of crap."

• Wikipedia:Incentives
• Wikipedia:Wikipedia is in the real world