> is it so surprising that people tend to trust it more

Yes and no.

I think most people would agree that Wikipedia is, on the whole, a pretty great first resource on anything. It tries to be factual and accurate.

Most people would also agree that Wikipedia can be wrong or manipulated and should never be used for an authoritative source.

And then somehow a computer barfing up words distilled from magic internet concentrate is absolutely trustworthy?

I don't get it.

Many middle aged people might also remember a time when every adult in the world was shouting "don't believe everything you read online" and schools wouldn't let you cite wikipedia as a primary source.

That attitude seems to have gone away for some reason