Hatin' On Wikipedia

Broadway runs east of Seventh Avenue north of 45th Street. Donald Trump owns an office building on Sixth Avenue. Lee Brown, the early 1990s police commissioner who presided over the highest murder rate in the city's history, was a hero in the war against crime.

In what otherwordly New York City can this be true? In the wacky world of Wikipedia, the engine of ignorance "compiled by volunteers" and masquerading as a legitimate reference work. Its unreliability is not exactly news - it's the bane of educators who must teach pupils not to trust it.

For all its popularity, Wikipedia is an agent of intellectual negation, based on the seditious idea that truth is subjective. Let anyone weigh in on the Boer War, or cyclotrons, or hula hoops - surely, the theory goes, if mistakes are made, they'll be promptly corrected by more knowledgeable contributors to the site or by in-house editors. - New York Times

Here is the entire article. What the author doesn't realize is that he can go in and change the inaccuracies. What's he waiting for?!

Wiki Blamed For Failing Rates

WIKIPEDIA and other online research sources were yesterday blamed for Scotland's falling exam pass rates. The Scottish Parent Teacher Council (SPTC) said pupils are turning to websites and internet resources that contain inaccurate or deliberately misleading information before passing it off as their own work.

The group singled out online encyclopedia Wikipedia, which allows entries to be logged or updated by anyone and is not verified by researchers, as the main source of information.

Standard Grade pass rates were down for the first time in four years last year and the SPTC is now calling for pupils to be given lessons on using the internet appropriately for additional research purposes "before the problem gets out of hand". - Scotman.com

Like others have said, this is ridiculous; Wikipedia is a great starting point for research.

Wikipedia is Reliable

Don't listen to anyone who tells you otherwise. In a recent study, wikipedia was matched up against the likes of Encyclopedia Brittanica. Wikipedia articles contained four serious errors while Brittanica contained three. Further research shows that when matched up directly against E.B, wikipedia prevails as the most accurate.

What do librarians think of Wiki? In 2006, librarians from the Library Journal concluded that the free encyclopedia has their stamp of approval. Despite this, only 400 or so articles have referenced wikipedia in print.

News and media organizations and publications have even gone as far to prohibit employees from looking at wikipedia for fact checks.

The main criticisms of wikipedia are not on whether the website is reliable or not, but rather on the concept and contributors. Since "anyone" can edit articles, the topic of article bias is immediately discussed.

Speaking of "anyone," highly trafficked and controversial pages often prohibit unregistered users from editing.

Someday (soon hopefully), wikipedia be looked upon as a reliable source. Right now, on August 1st of 2007, the website is credible and has won the approval of critics, however, some (like teachers) are completely oblivious to this fact which means we won't be able to reference the media machine in any writing we do.