Comlaw website using wikipedia as reference

[Two_dogs]

I originally posted this in the Computer/Internet Issues forum but decided it was more related to the sad demise of anything related to GA in this country.

Recently doing a little research on the comlaw.gov.au website and came across this in CAO 20.18. Para 9A.

IRU or inertial reference unit is a type of inertial sensor (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inertial_guidance_system) which uses gyroscopes (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gyroscopes) and accelerometers (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accelerometers) to determine a moving aircraft (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aircraft)’s rotational attitude and translational position over a period of time. On the actual site, a small pop up text box opens when one hovers over the text and the link is shown at the bottom of the browser. Firefox exhibits underlined text but Internet explorer does not.

At first I thought I had become victim of a text enhance virus of some sort. However, these are the only pop ups in the entire document and no other webpages I visit exhibit these pop ups.

When did the federal government start relying on wikipedia (the free (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_content) encyclopedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Encyclopedia) that anyone can edit (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Introduction).) for its definitions or references? (might slip on over there and do a little editing :E)

Are there standards and protocols in place, or is it just the work experience kid thought wikipedia might be a valid reference? :uhoh:

[PLovett]

It would only be there by way of ad hoc reference. It would have no legal standing.

[triton140]

I think 2D was pointing out whoever wrote para 9A of the CAO had cut and pasted from Wikipedia - without having the sense to remove the hyperlinks.

Busted :=

[Two_dogs]

Triton may be right ...

Inertial reference unit - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inertial_reference_unit)

An inertial reference unit (IRU) is a type of inertial sensor (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inertial_guidance_system) which uses gyroscopes (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gyroscopes) (electromechanical, ring laser gyro (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ring_laser_gyro) or MEMS (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MEMS)) and accelerometers (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accelerometers) (electromechanical or MEMS (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MEMS)) to determine a moving aircraft (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aircraft)’s or spacecraft (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spacecraft)’s change in rotational attitude (angular orientation relative to some reference frame) and translational position (typically latitude (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Latitude), longitude (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Longitude) and altitude (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Altitude)) over a period of time. Another name often used interchangeably with IRU is Inertial Measurement Unit (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inertial_Measurement_Unit).

Regardless of the plagiarism, the links should not be there. Have you ever seen any legislative text with links to outside sources?

As I referenced earlier, edited by anyone
Here is a random link to someone purporting to telling the truth

Up to six in 10 articles on Wikipedia contain factual errors (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2131458/Up-articles-Wikipedia-contain-factual-errors.html)

A study into, specifically, comlaw information on the massively popular website discovered 60 per cent of articles had factual errors. Wikipedia pages are edited by the public and this leads to both human error in factual information as well as, occasionally, those who want to sabotage entries. (My public editing)

I read it on the internet, it must be true.

[Squawk7700]

Interesting observation. When I first opened it up on the iPad and it bought up a PDF I thought you were dreaming until I randomly pressed on some words in the IRU paragraph and sure enough, Wikipedia opened. Hmmm.

[Flying Binghi]

http://www.pprune.org/jet-blast/376163-wikipropaganda.html