Essay about The Debate Concerning Wikipedia: Is Wikipedia Quotable?

Wikipedia is a collaborative resource, which aims to be a compendium of all human knowledge. In a serious examination of Wikipedia as a credible and valid source of information we need to place our argument within a definable framework. As I will show information has many uses, for the purposes of this paper I will examine the use of Wikipedia for scholarly research, the kind, which I will be utilizing throughout the rest of my MBA program. I will be evaluating Wikipedia based on the parameters set forth by Brenda Spatt. The credentials, Impartiality, style/tone, and currency of Wikipedia will all be examined in this paper (Spatt 2011).

In the article, Purdy talks about how Wikipedia’s articles are constantly changing, which makes Wikipedia hard to cited. If one was to cited something from Wikipedia’s information could have changed since that

As Wikipedia has become more and more popular with students, some professors have become increasingly concerned about the online, reader-produced encyclopedia. While plenty of professors have complained about the lack of accuracy or completeness of entries, and some have discouraged or tried to bar students from using it.

The ultimate reason Marshal Poe does this is to illustrate his views on information sharing and depict the communities role in it. Poe mentions, “Wikipedia has the potential to be the greatest effort in collaborative gathering the world has ever known, and it may well be the greatest effort in voluntary collaboration of any kind.”, in the very beginning of his article to present his view on collaboration within the community. He describes wikipedia as “the most comprehensive repository of human knowledge in human history.” (Poe 349) This serves to contribute to the idea that information sharing lies within both the community and technology, which was also shown by Marshall Poe upon his discussion of the usage of the bottom-up system and cathedral model. Marshall Poe is ultimately stating that when power is given to the public, they will use it to their own advantage and promote true knowledge, as exemplified through his new and improved biography on Wikipedia. Information sharing is contributing to the progress of human

When students are doing research on the internet, Wikipedia is usually one of the first site to appear. For students, the site is usually tempting to click, but they are quickly reminded by their teachers that Wikipedia should not be used as a site of knowledge. They label the site as inaccurate, unreliable, and uncreditable. In Boyd’s article she writes that teachers consistently tell students to stay clear of Wikipedia at all cost. Students should not have to see the site as tempting. They should be allowed to use it and embrace the site. Wikipedia has so much educational potential and should not be ignored by teachers. Boyd also writes that some analyses have shown that Wikipedia’s content is just as creditable as, if not more reliable than, more traditional resources.

Eventhough, the internet can be helpful with education, it can also be unreliable. However, “The Hive” by Marchall Poe, was the openness of Wikipedia. Wikipedia is an online encyclopedia that anyone can use it. This might work for some people specially that ones who attend school or college. This is very helpful for them because in Wikipedia you can search or find anything you would like. Since anyone can write, or delete or use information off of Wikipedia, it makes it less controversial because anyone can put their input into the website. If don’t agree with something, that’s alright because you can add your own opinion. Poe describes how authors of certain wiki pages write with a bias to support their facts. Facts become opinions when feelings and emotions of bias get involved. “Instead of relying on experts to

The New World Encyclopedia is a free online encyclopedia primarily intended for students and teachers that are considered about quality or credibility. Due to this reason, this online encyclopedia prides itself on its “traditional editorial supervision by scholars” along with their traditional values. The New World Encyclopedia carries itself through scholarly content but also has the benefit of hyperlinks to greater efficiency of research and convince.

He also stated when he needed help he would ask a friend since there was no internet in that time. He talks about how students and researchers should use Wikipedia at it’s advantage on the formal knowledge. This way it can inform the researcher on basic information as background knowledge before they actually find credible sources about their topic; they

The Internet is an uncensored place, where knowledge flows freely, and uninterrupted. The site en.wikipedia.org, is an online wikipedia freely editable by anyone. Therefore, ideas and knowledge can be exchanged freely, if they are accurate, that is another question. Since it is editable by anyone, information can be false, but in most cases, the information found there is highly accurate and updated frequently. You can find knowledge on a range of topics, from WW2, to Philosophy, even to the Bolshevik Uprising. This is an example of what can happen when the free exchange of ideas and knowledge, is both not limited, and uncensored. “There must be something in books, something we can’t imagine, to make a woman stay in a burning house; there must be something there. You don’t stay for nothing.”(Bradbury, 1953) This quote from Montag relates to a world where knowledge isn’t limited. He ponders why a woman, would stay in a burning house, just for her books, just for the potential knowledge in them.

Discussions between users and editors also take place to ensure the quality and correct information is being published. Wikipedia does realize that work does get by them from time to time and admits that some of the work is complete nonsense. They do not want their work to be used for crucial information but rather to familiarize oneself with a new topic. New ways of governing the website are constantly being explored to improve the overall quality of the work being shared. Ultimately it is the users responsibility to double check information with other sources when needing to find out and use significant information. It has been a very helpful tool throughout the years to find information quickly and is generally a dependable way of finding out new

Wikipedia was the jumping off point for our topic. When it came to finding out who Jane Addams was we learned did about how she opens the hull house to help others and how it was helping many children. This site was also helping us get the basis of a research that we could use to find more credible sites and books. It also let us know about the hull house because we didn't even know that it existed so it gave us this whole new thing to research about

Wikipedia is a popular social media site that is used by people all over the world. The two articles, “The Decline of Wikipedia” by Tom Simonite and “The Rise and Decline of an Open Collaboration System: How Wikipedia’s reaction to popularity is causing its decline” by Aaron Halfacker, R. Stuart Geiger, Jonathan Morgan, and John Riedl, both argues about the decline of popularity in Wikipedia over the years of its creation. Both of these two articles include a recognition of the claims being made by the opposing party, facts and statistics to support their claims, and their own specific type of language to connect to their audience. Although both readings are very convincing, the article “The Rise and Decline of an Open Collaboration System:

In his concluding paragraphs, Stross compares Wikipedia to the Encyclopedia Britannica in which he shows the different, but important, strengths and weaknesses of each. He states that although Wikipedia can cover a wider range of topics in a shorter amount of time, the Encyclopedia Britannica has the upper hand on credibility. However, even though Randall Stross did spend a whole essay discrediting Wikipedia as an open source website, he ends his composition by stating that the current Wikipedia is just a newer version of a much better, more credible website in the

Badke (2008) begins his article reminding us that Wikipedia although controversial is still the online encyclopedia of choice by 36% of the United States population according to Pew Internet & American Life Project’s findings. (As quoted by Badke, para. 1)

The Wikipedia is a free, online encyclopedia that lets every individual with Internet connection write and edits its articles. Jimmy Wales and Larry Sanger launched their creation in 2001 giving an opportunity to all willing people to work together to develop a common resource of knowledge. Many people have different believes and ideas about Wikipedia, therefore, some tend to think of it as a credible and valid source of information, others strongly disagree. “Since all the books and articles have been chosen for publication, each one has presumably undergone some form of selection and review” (Spatt, 2011, “p.”339-340). Unfortunately, this statement is simply not enough to