The ideal situation to which Wikipedia contributors\editors are striving for kinda makes desires to cite Wikipedia itself pointless. Well written Wikipedia article should not contain any information that has no original source attached. So it should always be available to switch from wiki article to original material doing citing. And it is that way as far as my experience goes.
Regarding alternatives. Academic papers serve different purpose and must not be used as navigation material. The only real alternative i know is the field handbooks.
Assuming "Cadence of Information is Constant" and we want to go into opposite direction (become "smarter") and increase the general effectiveness of, say, English then what are the other dimensions of the problem that could be helpful? In other words, in which directions existing languages can be improved?