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[Citation Needed]: The Best Of Wikipedia's Worst Writing

by Conor Lastowka, Josh Fruhlinger

Series: Citation Needed (1)

MembersReviewsPopularityAverage ratingMentions
652408,163 (3.29)63
Do you need help telling the difference between a Renaissance Pope and an oracular octopus? Do you need details on what inappropriate body parts the attendees at Wing Bowl expose to one another? Do you need an accounting of which movies in the Air Bud series contain the fewest fart jokes? Fortunately, all these facts are lovingly recorded on Wikipedia, thus fulfilling the dreams of generations of scholars who worked towards a compendium of the world's most vital information. But how can you find these details, hidden as they are among boring facts about science and history and stuff? Fear not: For nearly two years, the blog [Citation Needed] has sifted through The Best of Wikipedia's Worst Writing. A thousand entries later, Conor Lastowka and Josh Fruhlinger have handpicked over 200 of their favorite examples of putrid prose and collected them here. Each entry features hilarious commentary from the authors, but they're confident you'll already be laughing by the time you get to it. Praise for [Citation Needed] "Wikipedia has long been my favored source of dubious scholarship, unverified assertions, press-release hagiography, and confusing recaps of comic books in long run-on sentences. It is not merely that this material is USEFUL to a writer of fake trivia. There is also a strange pleasure that comes in witnessing very bad writing and wondering at the human mind that conceives it, and why that mind is so preoccupied with the drama behind the scenes of House Party 4. I am just glad that I now have the best of the worst, all hilariously annotated by Fruhlinger and Lastowka, and all bound in one non-internet volume such that I can enjoy these bits of grim, awkward human poetry without feeling tempted to get into a huge online fight over the weight of Mr. Belvedere." -John Hodgman "You will not be surprised to discover many of Wikipedia's worst writing comes from entries with nerdy subjects, include Care Bears (and their suspect genders), Adult Diaper fetishes, bizarre assumptions about He-Man characters, and more. I'm convinced Topless Robot readers will love the hell out of it...Frulinger and Lastowka are not nearly as mean-spirited as I am and about five million times funnier. The book is available here at Amazon for $11. If you have a Kindle, the ebook is only $1, which is the most absurd entertainment value I've seen in quite some time." -Rob Bricken, ToplessRobot.com… (more)
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» See also 63 mentions

Showing 2 of 2
I love looking on Wikipedia and finding all the crazy things that people have edited into the articles. That being said I was extremely excited when I came across this book. I was prepared to be amazed with all the funny things in this book but I was disappointed in it. I didn't feel like most of the Wikipedia passages were funny, or worth reading, and the author's comments on them very rarely funny. This book could have been great, but sadly it didn't live up to all the funny things I could find on Wikipedia myself. ( )
2 vote dpappas | Feb 17, 2012 |
This is a fake review. I am also going to use some code like this. And how about a link? http://www.cnn.com
1 vote | timspalding | Oct 4, 2012 |
Showing 2 of 2
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» Add other authors

Author nameRoleType of authorWork?Status
Lastowka, Conorprimary authorall editionsconfirmed
Fruhlinger, Joshmain authorall editionsconfirmed

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Wikipedia in English (1)

Do you need help telling the difference between a Renaissance Pope and an oracular octopus? Do you need details on what inappropriate body parts the attendees at Wing Bowl expose to one another? Do you need an accounting of which movies in the Air Bud series contain the fewest fart jokes? Fortunately, all these facts are lovingly recorded on Wikipedia, thus fulfilling the dreams of generations of scholars who worked towards a compendium of the world's most vital information. But how can you find these details, hidden as they are among boring facts about science and history and stuff? Fear not: For nearly two years, the blog [Citation Needed] has sifted through The Best of Wikipedia's Worst Writing. A thousand entries later, Conor Lastowka and Josh Fruhlinger have handpicked over 200 of their favorite examples of putrid prose and collected them here. Each entry features hilarious commentary from the authors, but they're confident you'll already be laughing by the time you get to it. Praise for [Citation Needed] "Wikipedia has long been my favored source of dubious scholarship, unverified assertions, press-release hagiography, and confusing recaps of comic books in long run-on sentences. It is not merely that this material is USEFUL to a writer of fake trivia. There is also a strange pleasure that comes in witnessing very bad writing and wondering at the human mind that conceives it, and why that mind is so preoccupied with the drama behind the scenes of House Party 4. I am just glad that I now have the best of the worst, all hilariously annotated by Fruhlinger and Lastowka, and all bound in one non-internet volume such that I can enjoy these bits of grim, awkward human poetry without feeling tempted to get into a huge online fight over the weight of Mr. Belvedere." -John Hodgman "You will not be surprised to discover many of Wikipedia's worst writing comes from entries with nerdy subjects, include Care Bears (and their suspect genders), Adult Diaper fetishes, bizarre assumptions about He-Man characters, and more. I'm convinced Topless Robot readers will love the hell out of it...Frulinger and Lastowka are not nearly as mean-spirited as I am and about five million times funnier. The book is available here at Amazon for $11. If you have a Kindle, the ebook is only $1, which is the most absurd entertainment value I've seen in quite some time." -Rob Bricken, ToplessRobot.com

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