Wikipedia:Serendipity

Since Wikipedia articles are full of blue links to other Wikipedia articles, this can lead to the unusual, yet arguably pleasurable experience of starting out editing an article on distortion guitar pedals, then end up, several hours later, via the serendipity of clicking on blue links, to you editing an article on a French Revolution theorist that you've never heard of.

Whoa!! Did you just enter an Alice in Wonderland-type "rabbit hole" to another parallel universe? Did you accidentally cause a little rip in the space-time continuum that opened up a wormhole to another dimension?

No. Sorry to say, even though Wikipedia is highly awesome, it does not (yet, as of January 2024), offer parallel universe-rabbit hole or wormhole travel capabilities. If you have found yourself starting out on an article on your fave subject and you ending up writing about something completely unfamiliar to you, it happened due to the serendipity of clicking on one blue link after another.

This essay will explain, giving just one example, how an editor could make such an unexpected topic transition over an editing session, without realizing it.

Starting point: distortion pedals
Our editor is a riot grrrl who plays bass guitar in a feminist hardcore punk band...that is when she's not writing articles about important women for WP. She is interested in distortion pedals, as the growling "overdrive" of distortion effects is a key part of hardcore punk's edgy sound (and she's trying to get more "rumble" into her fuzz bass tone. As she edits the distortion (music) article, she finds out about cool ways to add grind and grunge to your tone. As she clicks through blue links on guitar effects units and heavy metal guitarists, she comes across a link to heavy metal music guitarist/composer Randy Rhodes. Intrigued, she clicks the blue link.

Randy Rhodes
Our editor is now reading about the life and career of metal guitarist Randy Rhodes. While correcting some grammar errors and fixing the formatting on a Wikitable, she reads that Rhodes was a sophisticated composer whose music was influenced by Classical music composers such as Ludwig Van Beethoven. She becomes interested in learning more about Beethoven, so she clicks the blue link.

Beethoven
While reading the Beethoven article, she fixes some capitalizations to comply with WP:MOS and deletes some vandalism, or what may be a test edit (someone added the phrase "Bla bla bla" at the start of a section). Then she reads that while Beethoven was initially so inspired by the French Revolution's ideals of liberty and equality that Beethoven dedicated his Third Symphony, the "Eroica" to Napoleon. However, after learning that Napoleon had become a despot and a tyrant, Beethoven scratched out this dedication and replaced it with "To the memory of a great" person. Our editor becomes interested in learning more about the French Revolution, so she clicks on this blue link.

French Revolution
While reading the French Revolution article, she right away notices some little typos and grammar errors and fixes them. There are also some missing references, which she fixes. While she is reading about the social and political upheaval in France that lasted from 1789 until 1799, which altered the course of modern history, triggering the global decline of absolute monarchies while replacing them with republics and liberal democracies, she found a reference to political theorists who called for the emancipation of the individual and the establishment of equality.

She clicked through blue links until she arrived at the article on Olympe de Gouges (1748–1793), a French playwright and political activist. Her feminist and abolitionist writings reached a large audience.

End point: Olympe de Gouges
Now our editor is reading the Olympe de Gouges article. Our editor had not heard of Olympe de Gouges until this editing session. After correcting some grammar errors and fixing some formatting snafus, our editor was intrigued to learn that de Gouges was an early feminist who demanded that French women be given the same rights as French men. In de Gouges' Declaration of the Rights of Woman and of the Female Citizen (1791), she challenged the practice of patriarchal male authority and the notion of male–female inequality. Our editor then becomes interested in learning more about other women philosophers and feminist theorists, so she clicks on more blue links...

Serendipity
From a distortion pedal article to learning about feminist philosopher Olympe de Gouges, all in the space of a few hours. Now that is cool!

Editing Wikipedia articles is a great way to learn more about topics you also know about. As well, though, by clicking on blue links, Wikipedia is also a great way to explore completely new topics and subject areas.

So, yeah, maybe we can say that Wikipedia does offer wormholes to other places (at least intellectually...WP can't transport-beam you to Proxima Centauri...at least not yet!).