The Wikipedia Effect 

The Wikipedia Effect is the tendancy for inquisitive people to become caught in an endless series of pages on the popular open-encyclopedia, "Wikipedia", to which they are forced to read every single page they've opened.

This tends to happen thanks to Wikipedia's inter-linking model, which links important words in a particular article, to an entire article on that word. The trend can then easily cascade from there, ending in dozens of pages that a user finds interesting.

"Don't you just love The Wikipedia Effect? It sure is a good way to stave off boredom."

The Wikipedia Effect by ceosion December 24, 2008

The Wikipedia Effect 

A high degree of accuracy in a generally editable information system (like Wikipedia) which is derived from the law of large numbers: while some inaccuracies may be occasionally saved into the system, the number of edits per hour with accurate information makes the system "self-healing." Thus, over time these social information systems tend to be statistically more accurate than similar systems published by a closed source, such as a small number of editors.

While Bob's Game Maps are pretty good, the GameMap Wiki tends to have better, more timely information. Because of the Wikipedia Effect, the GameMap Wiki gets new updates to game worlds near real-time, whereas Bob takes several weeks to get his updates done.

The Wikipedia Effect by Hiltonian May 18, 2011