Sunday, September 03, 2006
Wikipedia - What do you think?
During class last week, we discussed Wikipedia a little bit. There seems to be some debate as to whether or not Wikipedia is an authoritative source of information. In the library world, most agree that Wikipedia is not the best place to go for information. What do you think?
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9 comments:
Kathryn,
I feel Wikipedia (and wikis in general) scare the status quo. The ability for people to write their own history may frighten some people. It would seem history has been written by the censors and/or the winners. Giving the average, every day person the ability to contribute is refreshing to say the least.
I saw Will Richardson give a presentation on wikis last year. A group of about 150 teachers were there, and we decided to test the accountability of information on Wikipedia. We made a subtle change to an obscure fact about Star Trek; the information we entered was erroneous. Within 3 minutes, someone had edited our change to the "correct" information. It was quite impressive. :)
-Joe
Wikis are completely new to me. I'm one of those people who hasn't had enough experience with them to really judge their accuracy. Joe's comment is interesting though- it makes me feel a little more confident in the wiki system.
Good question :)
In terms of accuracy, I think the wiki system conceptually points to an almost infallible system. A user reviewed and edited knowledge bank gives a humanistic slant on the idealized computer historian model. In such a model, history would be constructed by an unbiased database system that could peruse every available account of a thing or an event and derive a "realistic" picture of the thing or event. The wiki, on the other hand, channels real human knowledge (or opinion) into the same type of centered depiction of a thing or event.
That said, of course there will be mistakes. But I think the wikipedia is a great place to start synthesizing a search into just about anything. A dilligent researcher will always find alternative sources, right? And each one of those resources will have its intrinsic psycho-socio-political agendas. For example, as I child I really enjoyed history. I loved the story of Columbus and the first Thanksgiving and all that. Then I read Howard Zinn's 'People's History of the United States' and my mental paradigm was turned upside down.
Now I have no idea what or who to believe. But I'll start satisfying just about any curiosity with the wikipedia.
-Ben
I use Wikipedia quite alot. In general I think it is great. I did google search for "free online encyclopedia", Wikipedia was #1. the other sites did not even compare.
It may not be the best source of information but if one site has to be the most popular online encyclopedia you could do alot worse. Encarta?
I love the extensive use of hyperlinks in the articles. It makes it easy to get lost in it hours.
Thanks to all of you who commented so far. I think the main concern for librarians is that Wikipedia is a different process for organizing information. It being a different process means that some kind of "change" had to happen, and I think that many librarians are nervous when change comes around. However, our whole system of thinking is changing in order for us to keep up with everything.
Digitization is just one of the areas where libraries are changing, concerned with preservation - assuring access to past materials that are damaged/damageable - and currency - we are making sure to purchase books/journals that we can make available online so that more students have access to them.
At the same time, I wonder how one knows the authority of the author of the entries in Wikipedia. How I define something may be totally different than how the rest of the class defines it, so I am still a little concerned about the accuracy of the information, although I do find it easy to get lost in there, as Ted mentioned in his comment, clicking from one reference to another and finding out more and more about things I don't know anything about. When I was in there today, I found out that Steve Irwin died - I had no idea. How awful.
I really enjoyed the comments. I especially liked your comment Ben about how you read about history when you were in grade school and then read a book later on in life that obliterated what you learned.
Jade, I find myself using Wikis mainly for project management at this point.
Joseph, I think you made a great point in mentioning the Will Richardson presentation and how quickly the misinformation you entered was changed by someone who was more of an authority on the subject.
Thanks again for sharing your ideas!
I posted my definition for Ed Tech to the wikipedia site. The author of the original reverted it back to is definition in 4 minutes.
While that doesn't address the authority issue, it does identify a quick response.
Would anyone like to test the system's ability to produce a modified appropriate definition?
I used Wikepedia to check the definitions of some words. In my opinion, it's a comparatively accurate place to get the information on the internet. Wikepedia is a very comprehensive online encyclopedia, but I think the users also should keep skepticism attitude toward the information they get from this source.
There certainly is some debate about the usefulness, or perhaps more importantly, the authority, of information presented on Wikipedia and other similar wikis.
I for one find them most invaluable, especially when dealing with new entries into the field of IDT (Ed Tech). Last semester I was looking for research, definitions, and various of aspects of podcasting. With the phenomenon of podcasting still being relatively new, any sort of dictionary or reference text had no information to offer me. But by using Wikipedia, I was able to get information on many aspects of podcasting, and help make my project and my further goals in the Ed Tech program a success.
With so many of the Wikipedia articles maintained by "experts" in the field, I think it will only be a matter of time until the world begins accepting it as a valid source of information. And when it comes to finding out information on cutting edge technologies and theories, Wikipedia is quick to catch up, and adjust to changes or new information as soon as it arrives.
Thanks Baird, Feng and Bryan for your comments. I especially appreciated your comment Bryan about the fact that Wikipedia's helpful in that it keeps up-to-date with the latest in the technologies in IDT. I found it most useful especially this past Friday when I was trying to figure out how to set up an RSS feed on my website. It was very helpful. Thanks again for your comments.
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