The Wikipedia FA's aren't "random". They're a showcase of the best articles on the site, and are p a i n s t a k i n g l y vetted by the WP community. Getting your article on the front page is a very big deal. The FA process is one of the primary drivers of editorial quality on the site.
> Getting your article on the front page is a very big deal.
I'm sure it is. If I wrote that article that is. If on the other hand I just walked in through a front door it is as useful as a book of the month featured in a local library. It is essentially a random pick.
> The FA process is one of the primary drivers of editorial quality on the site.
Hold on. So you are saying that if it weren't for a carrot of being featured on the front page, the Wikipedia editors would've not been putting as much effort into polishing the articles as they do now. This is simply not true.
I think you're misinterpreting your parent comment; I believe he's referring to the fact that to become a featured article you must go through an extremely rigorous process that definitely improves the article it's applied to (see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Featured_article_crit... ). You end up with a thousand or so articles a year (rough guess, I'm not active on Wikipedia) that have gone through some or all of this process, which makes a surprisingly large dent. Also, after being listed as a featured article, it's theoretically held to that standard in perpetuity (in fact, Wikipedia has a group of people dedicated to maintaining these). Next time you're reading an article that seems exceptionally well written and researched on Wikipedia, check its FA status.
The people involved create the content on Wikipedia. If it's a big deal for them, it's a big deal for Wikipedia as a whole.
(to put it in web 2.0 speak: properly incentivizing users to submit quality user-generated content is essential to any crowdsourced website, and few incentives work as well as the recognition of your peers).
Type in "WP:FAC" into the search. Believe me, it's more rigorous than pretty much anything I've eve seen. About 6 years ago I wrote the article on exploding whales, and this hit the main page. Now it's not even featured any more!
People went a little exploding animal crazy, if I recall correctly :-)
I did a lot of things on Wikipedia. Perhaps my most lasting creations will have been [citation needed] and the admin's noticeboard. Though I have, perhaps, a somewhat dubious legacy, it was a fairly amazing experience - rather marred by the manner in which I had to leave the project.
