User:Penubag/Wikipedia is a reliable source

Wikipedia is an online encyclopedia that allows anyone to edit it unlike traditional information sources. Trust in traditional encyclopedias are vested in the reputation of certain authors. However, with the advancement in the information age leads to the differences between traditional ways and new ones. These differences lead many people to wrongly criticize Wikipedia and to not use it or not allow others to do so.

Many people who criticize Wikipedia argue that it is too easy to change and that absolutely anyone can edit it. Although most anyone can edit it, this is misleading. Edits to articles must be verified and cited, and malicious edits to articles are removed promptly. A study done by the University of Colorado Denver took a random sample of recent edits and found that vandalism lasted only a few seconds on average. Additionally IBM researchers noted similar findings and remarked Wikipedia's amazing self-healing capabilities. Further studies by UCD claim that 75% of articles are never even edited maliciously. So even though it is true that anyone can maliciously change it, the likely-hood of vandalism or falsity remaining past a few seconds are very slim. Other people question the general accuracy of Wikipedia. Nature, a renowned scientific journal, found Wikipedia to be just as accurate, if not more than their Encyclopedia Britannica counterpart and many other studies done by different organizations confirm this. The study took articles from both encyclopedias and their corresponding subject's experts reviewed each one in a double blind experiment. They noted that both encyclopedias had flaws but Britannica's had more serious flaws and inaccuracies than Wikipedia's counterpart. Other organizations that performed similar studies include the PC Pro Magazine, PC Plus, Stern Magazine, the Nova Southeastern University, and the German computing magazine c't, which compared Wikipedia, The World Book Encyclopedia, Microsoft Encarta, and Encylcopedia Britannica. They all note similar conclusions: although Wikipedia had errors, there were more serious errors in Encarta and Britannica's articles and concluded that there were “no more errors in the texts of the free encyclopedia than in those of its commercial competitors" (c't).

Other factors that makes Wikipedia more reliable than other sources are that it is being edited and monitored by hundreds of thousands of volunteers. Articles are updated so quickly that they practically conform to events as they unfold. While traditional encyclopedias might be revised annually, current affairs articles, as well as older articles being edited, are updated thousands of times an hour. That is important if one were interested in current affairs, recent science, pop culture, or any other field that changes rapidly.

Additionally, because Wikipedia is being edited by so many, articles on Wikipedia have an unbiased neutral point of view. Consensus must be reached among editors on how information is to be presented. In a journal done by Columbia Journalism Review, they state that information on the United States health care reform is extremely hard to find on the internet; many websites are biased and don't present the information fully or the details are just buried among pages of information. The journal says that finding out exactly what the health care reform was, was nearly impossible. However, they claim that Wikipedia was very succinct and provided both sides of the argument in a very unbiased view and explained the bare bones of what was going on. A review of Wikipedia by Library Journal, using a panel of librarians, explored controversial historical and current events, hoping to find “glaring abuses”, however, they concluded that they were pleased by Wikipedia’s objective presentation of controversial subjects. And from my experience, I have found these findings to be true. I once was writing a report on homosexual marriage but could not find a succinct place that would accurately present both sides of the argument and current advancements in the issue. Most sites turned up on Google were generally just throwing fire on their opponents; none of the sites had a clear reason for their standpoint nor had a comprehensive list of the current advances in the matter. Yahoo! News had a glaring leftward slant on the news and overall information was hard to find until I checked on Wikipedia. Not only was the information present in Wikipedia, it was unbiased, accurately addressed both sides of the argument, and included a comprehensive history of the movement.

Teachers and educators should not disallow or discourage the use of Wikipedia since it is a good place to begin research. Wikipedia lists its sources in context and in references which can be used for further research. Furthermore, students learn more by engaging in a process rather than following rules (such as not to use Wikipedia). Instructors should emphasize evaluation of the content of research material rather than the author’s credentials or other external markers. And Wikipedia makes doing this easy by showing and allowing discussion on “truth”. If someone wanted to navigate the “truth” via Wikipedia -- how statements were placed or where the discussions on a particular statement took place, it is possible by looking into the “history” and “discussion” pages on every entry. That is where the debates, reviews, comments, criticisms, and edit logs are located, and provides as a simple way of determining or engaging in current issues within an article. Other sources, such as Britannica, preach what only a few people have agreed upon and offer no insight to this discussion-- if it even exists.

Wikipedia is valuable because it remains one of the few reliable sources available. Although Google and other search engines provide hundreds of pages as potential sources, usually they are written by only a few people, if not only one person, which makes them more unreliable than Wikipedia. Pages that are written by a single person or only a handful of people are prone to factual errors, editorial bias, and missing content. Even if these websites were written by experts, whether information was wrong or content missing, there would be no one to correct it. And editorial bias is inevitable when written by a few people. Library books are always outdated and have the same problem as mentioned, and for the same, or better quality, Wikipedia doesn't cost a thing-- including a trip to the library. For quality information, Wikipedia is free. It is free of advertisements and all content is freely licensed and available for reuse. It is supported by the non-profit organization, The Wikimedia Foundation, which relies on donations to operate Wikipedia and its sister sites. The founder of Wikipedia said, “Imagine a world in which every single person on the planet is given free access to the sum of all human knowledge” (Jimmy Wales). This is an ideology that started as a goal to provide information available to all people whether or not they could afford it. In order to share the sum of all human knowledge with everyone, information on Wikipedia is accessible to anyone with internet access whether it be poor students in Nigeria, or a college student looking for information. The same cannot be said for other resources, especially ones that require paying or subscriptions. This is a new revolution in the information age and not using Wikipedia is not being a part of it.

As with any source of information, Wikipedia is not perfect. In this case, Wikipedia suffers more so from imperfections than other sources. Even though vandalism is usually repaired within a few seconds, there is a possibility that someone may view an article within this time frame and see an article in a vandalized state. Usually when this happens, it causes outrage and distrust in Wikipedia, which spreads virally. News outlets pick up on a few issues and broadcast the distrust to many others. This should only reiterates the need to verify and question all sources. In Wikipedia, a quick look at the “history” page of an article can determine who was the last contributor and what was edited. By looking over this interface, it is possible to determine the validity of any particular revision of an article. Even so, Wikipedia, or any secondary source, is generally not reliable enough to be cited as primary sources. The primary research pages or documents are generally preferred, although Wikipedia articles usually are written based off them and properly link to these sources.

Wikipedia is, no doubt, a valuable compendium of information. Based on a compilation of sources, Wikipedia is ranked one of the most reliable, unbiased, and updated sources in the world. This can be attributed the the huge numbers of editors involved in Wikipedia and their motivation. These editors are not motivated by money, fame, or their biasness, but the motivation to help complete a compendium of all human knowledge, which is much different from editors in other sources. Many of these people are doctors, professors, and librarians – much different from “the encyclopedia that any fool can edit”. I personally, feel much more comfortable using a source that is written by thousands of people, rather than a source written by one.