If you ever want to know why you shouldn't trust Wikipedia for anything meaningful, this essay/letter from author Philip Roth should help you out.
Roth happened to be reading the entry for his novel, The Human Stain. He noticed an error; the article said he drew inspiration for Stain from a certain person's experiences. He knew he had actually drawn the novel from a different person's experiences and actually didn't really know the person the entry claimed influenced him. He had a representative contact Wikipedia with his concern; they responded by saying they needed secondary sources to back up Roth's claim.
In the essay, Roth goes into great detail about how the incidents in the life of a friend of his led to the novel, a story of a college professor hounded because of innocent comments deemed racially insensitive.
I'm pretty sure that's one that the Encyclopedia Britannica wouldn't have gotten wrong.
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