In 1996, Bill Gates said “Content is king” to indicate the web development way: the production of new valiant information content is the right way to be successful on Internet. The team of wikiHow has taken these instructions literally and they have developed a portal which wants to “help the entire world to learn how to do anything”. Excellent. You can learn how to polish your nails, to create a paper mask or how to calculate the Easter date (these are some examples from the home page of today). But how to sail around the world? wikiHow has published an article titled “How to sail around the world”, a so ridiculous article we couldn’t help ourselves.
Here’s some slips:
” If you’re lucky, you may be able to find someone you trust who can give you a free ride just for being the charmer that you are”. Of course. Who knows, you also could find a golden pot at the end of a rainbow. Anyway, if you find it, please write to us.
” Buy your own boat and learn how to sail. If you have about 70,000 Euros to spend, you could just buy your own boat and get it up to snuff – provided you have the sailing skills, of course.” The key words in these sentences are “about” and ” skills”.
” Carry a firearm and bullets with you if you have them. Keep them in a safe but accessible location. Better safe than sorry”. No comment.
” And in case of hurricanes or pirates, what do you do? If waves crush on the bow, how do you react? If a man falls into the water, what do you do?” wikiHow doesn’t provide any instructions.
But our favourite slip is: “Being sick when you’re away from good doctoral care could mean the end of your trip. Try to keep healthy and check your health during your crossing”. So, take care of your health. And this is an excellent advice….
They often write that six articles wouldn’t be enough to explain certain matters (we’ll spend the next hours looking for some matters which needed more than six articles, may be “How to create the world”). But the most serious point is that there is no reference to sailing experience, an aspect we consider essential to give credibility to an article whose aim is, after all, interesting.
After 20 years, an increasing number of businessmen reply to Bill Gates by saying that “the relationships are the king, not the content”. So, please do a good thing: click on the article, read it until the end (you should read it if you have had a blue day) and then leave your opinion. ” Have you found this article useful?”, wikiHow usually asks. If you’ll say not,as we think, you can explain why. Among the options, “I couldn’t follow the provided instructions” is maybe the best. We will have done a good thing for Internet, at least.
