Wikipedia. Yes, that darned web based encyclopedia is making the news again – albeit a little late. Jimmy Wales made the BBC News last month when he said,
“You can ban kids from listening to rock ‘n’ roll music, but they’re going to anyway. It’s the same with information, and it’s a bad educator that bans their students from reading Wikipedia.”
It isn’t surprising that he would take that attitude since he’s the co-founder of Wikipedia. And, I really wonder if he’s not right when he says that it’s bad to “ban” Wikipedia. I think that it detracts from what we as educators should be doing if we go around banning certain things from student use. We should be talking with them about the proper use of Wikipedia in the classroom or for an assignment. Don’t we want all of our students to be critical of other information that may be found in a book or journal article? Plus, as Wales correctly asserts, Wikipedia should be a “stepping stone” not a be all and end all source of information. I know that I have used it as such. And, don’t we use an encyclopedia as a stepping stone to further research a lot? So, why can’t this be used similarly?
One of the great things about Wikipedia being on the web when you compare it to a traditional encyclopedia is that if you find a reference to something, you can check that reference right there. Also, if you find a word or phrase that piques your interest, you can easily click a hyperlink to find out more. Of course, the skills necessary to critique that information must be employed at all times, just like that which is found on the internet in general. So, to totally ban it, I think, would be a disservice. Maybe instead of debating the merits of Wikipedia we (myself included) should be doing more to instill critical thinking skills into all students. It’s easy to rail on them for not having those skills, but what are we doing to foster them?
For more information read this article by Roy Rozenweig titled “Can History Be Open Source? Wikipedia and the Future of the Past.” Nature did a study that’s worth reading when it compared Wikipedia to the Encyclopedia Britannica. The article Limits of Self-Organization: Peer Production and the “Laws of Quality” by Paul Duguid is yet another take on this topic that’s worth reading. Also, this article from Inside Higher Ed is worth reading regarding Middleberry College’s history department and their discussion on whether to ban Wikipedia’s use in papers. For a humorous take on Wikipedia, watch Stephen Colbert’s take on it.
So, what do you think about Wikipedia? Should Wikipedia be banned? Should it be allowed to be used as a “stepping stone.” What needs to be done in the Web 2.0 world to teach students the better use of information resources?
18 Comments
January 11, 2008 at 3:18 am
A lecturer friend of mine became known as the “teacher who hates Wikipedia” by students and other staff because, tired by students submitting Wikipedia cited works, he warned the class about the fallibility of the text. When he found out that he had this nickname, he discussed the site with them. It became apparent that not only were students oblivious to the nature of Wikipedia information, so were the other teachers. Who had given it far more credence than it deserved.
Wikipedia puts additional pressure on teachers to inform students about the dangers of the medium. But refuses to accept responsibility for its content, nor the impact it has. Since Wikipedia has, in essence, become a commercial company in the advent of Wikia,Inc, this is particularly galling. It is not our job to clean up the messes of a private, for-profit organisation.
We at Wikipedia Review have a number of articles detailing the massive problems caused by Wikipedia. And a lively forum visited by lecturers, teachers, public figures, Wikipedians themselves and subjects that have been slandered in Wikipedia articles, with no other recourse.
Many of the positive assumptions about Wikipedia, drawn from cursory use, can be shown to be out-weighed by major problems. And a lot of the hype is phoney.
For instance, the Britannica comparison you site was bogus, creating a distorted “meme” about the quality of articles from early on.
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2006/03/23/britannica_wikipedia_nature_study/
Thankfully, the media is catching on to “the darkside” of Wikipedia, and the bubble has been well and truely burst.
Here is a brief summary of some of the problems:
http://wikipediareview.com/blog/20080104/criticisms-of-wikipedia/
January 11, 2008 at 9:28 am
The scary thing about working on Wikipedia is realising just how unreliable other so-called ‘reliable’ sources are when you try to use them as solid references and then look into how they were actually made … with Wikipedia, the main thing is that you can see into the sausage factory.
I’d like to see educators use Wikipedia as an example of how to meaningfully interact with unreliable but useful sources of varying quality. Some Wikipedia articles are the best thing available on the subject, and some are … not.
January 11, 2008 at 9:56 am
Great point David. It is very interesting to think that just because something comes from a “reliable” source we automatically give it a pass because it’s from Encyclopedia Britannica. But, that which comes from Wikipedia we’re immediately more skeptical. We should be skeptical of both.
January 11, 2008 at 3:55 pm
Michael – your points are well taken. However, I take issue with the first link you provide from “The Register.” This piece is obviously biased in its assessment of the Nature/Britannica row. In it’s first paragraph it says: “The Encyclopedia Britannica has published a devastating response to Nature’s December comparison of Wikipedia and Britannica, and accuses the journal of misrepresenting its own evidence.” The word devastating immediately caught my attention and thus, characterized the entire piece right off the bat.
Regarding the Britannica response to the Nature piece, I should have also included the various rebuttals from each company to the questions of the initial Nature report. The piece you linked to on The Register provided a link to the Britannica response but did not provide a link to Nature’s response to Britannica’s response. The Nature article also provided links (aka Updates) on the the original article’s page to those responses allowing all to see and judge for themselves.
Nowhere in my post above did I say that the Nature article was right on. I just said that it was worth reading. I would hope that anyone who chose to read the article would have taken notice to the updates available and would have checked them out.
Further, you write, “Wikipedia puts additional pressure on teachers to inform students about the dangers of the medium. But refuses to accept responsibility for its content, nor the impact it has.” You are correct that it does put that pressure on teachers. But, as I tried to point out (and raised the question) shouldn’t teachers be doing more to teach students to be critical thinkers about all mediums of information.
It’s also worth considering that even though Wikipedia while it doesn’t take responsibility for it’s content, it is at least up front about this. These two links are worth exploring. The quotes below the links are the headlines to each of the pages. (Read the whole article on each page to get the full picture.)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:General_disclaimer
“WIKIPEDIA MAKES NO GUARANTEE OF VALIDITY”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Academic_use
“IT IS GENERALLY CONSIDERED A BAD IDEA TO CITE AN ENCYCLOPEDIA IN ACADEMIC RESEARCH PAPERS”
As the academic use page points out – encyclopedias are starting points, not ending points for research. It also says that all resources have to be evaluated. These are all important things to consider as I wrote about above.
I’ve read through the second article you link to off of your own site and will probably get to the content of it in a later post. However, as a starter you are correct in asserting in #3 that Wikipedia does contain a lot of pop culture information in great depth. Is that the fault of Wikipedia or is that a reflection of the society in which we live?
Like I said, I will come back to this at a later time. For now, I have to get back to work.
January 11, 2008 at 7:14 pm
We should have a healthy skepticism of everything we read, but in the case of Wikipedia — whose record on responsible publishing is simply atrocious — it should go way beyond that.
David Gerard (above) is the UK representative of the Wikimedia Foundation, an organization that has a stake in future Wikia success. Ironically, he too was the subject of a Register article :
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/12/06/wikipedia_and_overstock/page5.html
To our knowledge, Gerard has no background in education. Yet he sees fit to request that the profession, already underpaid and besieged by huge pressures, adapt to suit his organization. Requests the other way, that Wikipedia take responsibility for its content and apply much needed regulations, are met with derision by the Wikipedia hierarchy.
This is why NASWUT teachers Union in the UK (Gerard’s own domain) warned against the use of the site at schools. Later, they themselves were the victims of scurrilous claims added to their Wikipedia article. A fairly common occurence for anyone who crosses Wikipedia’s path.
http://education.guardian.co.uk/schools/story/0,,2054497,00.html
Please do not be naive about what goes on at Wikipedia and the problems it is causing. And certainly don’t be naive to believe the fact, obvious to anyone who has resarched the site extensively, that Wikipedia has any serious value in an educational context.
January 11, 2008 at 7:23 pm
Regarding these Wikipedia disclaimers, which have been on the site for years, they are not working. They are not getting the very important message across.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:General_disclaimer
“WIKIPEDIA MAKES NO GUARANTEE OF VALIDITY”
Until Wikipedia places a statement in large letters as to its methods and reliability on every article, educators and students will continue to be hoodwinked by what amounts to a process of “anti-education”, which ultimately goes to serve the finances of a small group of people.
January 11, 2008 at 7:46 pm
Content on Wikipedia varies in accuracy and reliability from one article to the next.
If you’re looking for the buzz about some topic in popular culture, it’s a great source.
If you’re looking for scholarly treatments of serious academic subjects, Wikipedia is a crapshoot.
January 12, 2008 at 12:35 pm
As a university student I agree with professors, that wikipedia is a terrible source for information.
Maybe using it as a tool or reference in highschool would be tolerable, but in a academic setting that focuses on reliability and is a setting for creating new knowledge I would trust wikipedia.
They key is reliability in information or sources, and that is why university or college settings will only allow for academic journals or books because these sources are reliable. Even though the information on wikipedia is checked by a moderator, there is always that possibility for information to be wrong or misleading.
January 12, 2008 at 6:55 pm
true how very true…ya’ know…you must reason…why on earth would a university teacher or anybody with an education who teaches for a living or even maybe say try an internet service of personal tutor in a world where company’s of information technology give away their wares’ especially considering the high cost of information…have you priced them…network access anyone?…
January 12, 2008 at 7:02 pm
ya’ know…at least a school diploma or a college education give credence to the type of information (aside from media trends) that a person wholesaley dispenses at a cocktail party…
January 12, 2008 at 8:18 pm
I think one of the things being lost in the discussion here is that if things are documented correctly, Wikipedia can be (but isn’t necessarily) a useful source of citation information. Whenever I use a printed encyclopedia, I use it as a starting point. It is especially useful when that encyclopedia gives source citations at the end of an article. I would personally never recommend a student using Wikipedia as a primary or secondary source for a research paper.
I’m not trying to shill Wikipedia. I am merely raising the question that Jimmy Wales did. Of course he is going to say what he said – he’s behind Wikipedia. But, he has also said that students shouldn’t use it for serious academic research: http://chronicle.com/wiredcampus/article/1328/
For those of you who disagree and say that only information in a printed book, journal, or encyclopedia should be used because of its fixity and having gone through an editorial process, how would you respond to Holocaust denial literature? Do you give more credence to something simply because it is in bound form?
I know it is very easy to edit a Wikipedia page. I try to show students this when I have the opportunity to discuss Wikipedia with them. I also tell them that serious academic researchers would not cite Wikipedia but go to primary sources and secondary sources. I also know that Wikipedia has had its share of problems and controversies – all of which have been pointed out on this blog before. See the John Siegenthaler article in USA Today http://www.usatoday.com/news/opinion/editorials/2005-11-29-wikipedia-edit_x.htm
or Virgil Griffith’s Wiki Scanner which shows who has edited Wikipedia entry’s for their own benefit. http://wikiscanner.virgil.gr/
Heck, one of the Royal family of Holland even got into trouble for editing an entry. http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/08/30/wikipedia-editing-proves-a-royal-embarrassment/index.html?hp
Part of the problem that people have with Wikipedia is that ease. It’s so much easier to Google something quickly (and inevitably a Wikipedia result comes up near the top) than to go to a library or talk to a librarian about finding the information you need. So yes, the burden is upon the user to sift through it to verify its validity. And, yes, more than likely the place they’re going to verify it is in some sort of printed resource. But, as I keep trying to say, part of the reason that “information literacy” has become such a big push in academia and education in general is because we are in the “information age.” We are being inundated with text messages, digital ads on TV sporting events, ads on the web, the internet, books, movies, etc. Being able to make sense of (i.e., evaluate) them takes skills that need to be taught to all students. These are lifelong skills that need to be employed on many different levels. As the ACRL Information Literacy Competency Standards suggest, http://www.ala.org/ala/acrl/acrlstandards/informationliteracycompetency.cfm an information literate person does the following:
* Determine the extent of information needed
* Access the needed information effectively and efficiently
* Evaluate information and its sources critically
* Incorporate selected information into one’s knowledge base
* Use information effectively to accomplish a specific purpose
* Understand the economic, legal, and social issues surrounding the use of information, and access and use information ethically and legally
Thus, I am going to say this again, we need to be doing more about teaching students these skills. If students learn, understand, and use these skills, websites like Wikipedia will not cause so much consternation to college and university faculty.
January 12, 2008 at 8:58 pm
I currently teach first year composition at a large university as a teaching assistant. For the most part I am in complete control of what I teach my class.
When it comes to wikipedia, I tell my students that wikipedia is not a reference, but it is a tool. Much of the information presented on wikipedia is linked to citations near the bottom of the wiki page. I tell my students that this is an excellent starting place. They can check the sources on the wiki and possibly find useful and “quotable” information.
Also, I encourage my students to wiki their subject and check out the “external links” section, which can sometimes be useful.
On top of all that, wikipedia is a really awesome way to explain to students the value of evaluating their sources with a critical eye. Since the website contains a lot of crap, I can usually do an in-class demonstration about what might and might not be useful from a wiki.
The fact of wikipedia: it is worthless as a source but valuable as a starting point for research.
~Matt Fouts
January 12, 2008 at 9:46 pm
“The fact of wikipedia: it is worthless as a source but valuable as a starting point for research.” — Matt Fouts
I don’t think anyone can dispute that. Wikipedia is an excellent source on anything, but because it is so egalitarian, it is also seriously fallible.
The first place I go to get quick information is Wikipedia. On reliability, it ranks right up there with friends and casual acquaintances. Wikipedia’s probably more reliable, but not much.
Therefore, before I commit anything I read on Wikipedia to print, though, I double-check it elsewhere.
Of course, as a current educator, I introduce Wikipedia to my students as an excellent tool for finding out the basics. As I do so, I repeat that my policy is that any paper that cites Wikipedia or any wiki earns a zero.
That covers all the bases straight-up plagiarism doesn’t, and that’s a high-school-level policy. If a professor has some less rigorous policy, they had ought to be ashamed.
http://awaitingtenure.wordpress.com
January 12, 2008 at 10:03 pm
I love wikipedia. I actually think it’s very good “ball-park” knowledge in many cases.
Would I use it to determine the political leanings of presidential candidates? Hell no.
But would I use it to find a basic biography of Bob Dylan? Or the history of Mac computers? Or a rundown of my favorite sports team’s past accomplishments? Or find who the head of Google, inc. is? Yes to all of the above and much more.
It annoys me whenever educators (and others) totally discredit the usefulness, and/or the potential usefulness, of Wikipedia.
So yes, I agree with your post, kind sir. And I see you’re a librarian. I’m actually strongly considering it as a possible career choice right now. We’ll see how that goes.
January 13, 2008 at 8:05 am
I love wikipedia and I say that students and anyone else with a curious mind should use it. Like any other source of information it has errors. One should not use wikipedia as a sole source of information but rather as one source of many. Most articles in wikipedia have numerous links to other sources of related information. All in all I think it is a great resource.
January 13, 2008 at 8:14 am
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January 13, 2008 at 10:35 am
we should! It’s easy info and you can ususally tell when false information is edited in there
January 14, 2008 at 8:08 pm
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