Reading Report #2

Megan Beverly
LIB 103
9/17/09

Reading Report #2
“Can Wikipedia Ever Make the Grade?”
10/27/06
By: Read, Brock Chronicle of Higher Education, 00095982, 10/27/2006, Vol. 53, Issue 10
Database: MasterFILE Premier

Over the past couple of years, Wikipedia has become the hottest source of information on the internet. Alexander M.C. Halavais was an assistant professor of communication, and he decided to test the validity of Wikipedia. So, he posed as someone else and decided to input some wrong information into Wikipedia. But, within three hours all of the incorrect information that he inserted was removed from Wikipedia. He then said that he was impressed by Wikipedia’s ability to sort out the false information that he had added.
Many scholars still feel iffy about using Wikipedia, and often people who use it receive bad or failing grades due to using it as a source. One of the reasons for this is because people argue that you do not know if the person who wrote the information is one with expertise or not. So, now many people who have expertise are being asked to contribute to Wikipedia, because it is obviously not going anywhere. But, there are still rare cases of abuse or non correct information being left for extended periods of time on Wikipedia, missed by the people who patrol the website. Wikipedia and the regular encyclopedia Britannica have been compared and usually have about the same amount of errors in the articles.
I understand why many scholars have a problem with people using Wikipedia, because anyone can post there and it will stay as long as the information is true. A lot of time these people have no background in the area, and it does raise that idea of people not needing people who have expertise in the subject. It takes out how we are used to learning about things, no longer do we need a scholar or teacher anymore, because we are learning from anyone who posts in Wikipedia. I think that using Wikipedia should be as valid as using a regular encyclopedia, but should never take the place of articles or books in ones own research. When it comes down to it, Wikipedia should be valid if you can just use an encyclopedia but not if you need to do in depth research.