Talk:Montauk Point Light
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[edit] Huge Factual Mistake By Newsday in article criticizing Wikipedia
You can't make this up. Newsday in an article by a reporter and six contributors criticizes Wikipedia coverage of Long Island. But the very first item cited by Newsday (the Montauk Point Lighthouse has a huge factual error. The April 17, 2007 article is headlined "Consider the source As a matter of fact, Wikipedia isn't always right on LI" You can read it here
The article's first criticism is about the lighthouse which reads:
- The landmark Montauk Point Lighthouse is mentioned in Wikipedia as having been completed in 1792, which Newsday stories show was finished in 1796.
You can see that blurb with photo here.
The Wikipedia article on the Montauk Point Lighthouse in the third paragraph states:
- Construction on the lighthouse was authorized by the Second United States Congress, under President George Washington in 1792. Construction began on June 7, 1796, and was completed on November 5, 1796.
If you look at the history, the information has been in there virtually from the start with virtually no vandalism.
If this mistake had been made in Wikipedia it could have been corrected instantly. On Newsday the mistake is forever.
I can't imagine an opportunity for a better argument on the merits of Wikipedia!!! I'm not quite sure how to spread the word on such a huge gaff (that should have been easily checked by Newsday). Americasroof 14:45, 18 April 2007 (UTC)
- As far as I can see, they mistakenly reported that we had made an error. You could ask them to print a retraction, but it's not as exciting a story as if they claimed a different (and wrong) date to us. As far as I can tell, both the Wikipedia article and Newsday agree that the lighthouse was completed in 1796. The reporter seems to have misread our "construction authorised in 1792" as us saying that the lighthouse was built in 1792. Just sloppy reporting on their part. Carcharoth 01:32, 26 April 2007 (UTC)
[edit] WikiProject class rating
This article was automatically assessed because at least one WikiProject had rated the article as start, and the rating on other projects was brought up to start class. BetacommandBot 21:58, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
[edit] Coordinate change
The coordinates listed for the lighthouse is off. These are the actual coordinates:
41.07093,-71.8571
Someone should do something about it. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.22.244.119 (talk) 20:43, 24 November 2007 (UTC)
[edit] Why was this moved to "Light"
This article was moved to "Montauk Point Light" which according to the edit summary was per "earlier discussion." That discussion occurred no place here. Most of the articles on Wikipedia still refer to it as "Lighthouse." The master articles on lighthouses still refer to them as lighthouses. The USGS map (and official USGS naming designation) refers to it as "Lighthouse." Why was this done? Americasroof (talk) 18:36, 12 May 2008 (UTC)
