It stinks of WMF propaganda. Using WP to "push their ideas" does happen, but is also a standing joke in many scientific circles. Smart people tend to realize that Wikipedia content has problems and is not fully reliable. But don't ask Nicholas Jullien, a recent en-WP import from French WP; he gives off an odor of Wiki-Fannery.This article is a first draft of an analysis of the relationship between the availability of a scientific journal as open access and the fact that it is cited in the English Wikipedia (note: although it speaks of "Wikipedia", the article looks only at the English pages). It is a preprint and has not been peer-reviewed, so its results should be read with caution, especially since I am not sure about the robustness of the model and the results derived from it (see below). It is of course a very important issue, as access to scientific sources is key to the diffusion of scientific knowledge, but also, as the authors mention, because Wikipedia is seen as central to the diffusion of scientific facts (and is sometimes used by scientists to push their ideas).
Much more informative:
Yeah, THIS I can believe easily. WP has used "fake academic journals" and predatory publishers as "reliable references", and gotten away with it. No one has any idea how commonplace the practice is.→ The regressions seem to indicate that the reputation of the journal is not important to be cited in Wikipedia.
→ Predatory journals are known to be more often open access than classical journals, which means that this result potentially indicates that the phenomenon of open access reduces the seriousness of Wikipedia sources.
For even more disgust, read the Andreas Kolbe item below it, about Japanese WP becoming biased by right-wingers trying to rewrite Japan's history during World War II. THAT is truly disgusting.
