WIKIPEDIA is an excellent source of information. Founded in 2001, it has exploded into dozens of languages and millions of articles on just about every topic imaginable. Critics of Wikipedia charge that it is an unreliable and poor source of information plagued by vandals, ideologues and an anti-elitist attitude to boot. While some criticisms of Wikipedia have genuine value, most are inspired by a misunderstanding of Wikipedia's ethos and policies. The resulting castigation is often misdirected and ignores the innumerable positive qualities that Wikipedia offers to the world.
The most typical warning about Wikipedia is that it should not be used as a reference. In an interview with The Guardian magazine in October 2004, librarian and internet consultant Philip Bradley said that "The main problem is the lack of authority. With printed publications, the publishers have to ensure that their data is reliable... But with something like this, all that goes out the window." Other concerns about reliability focus on the use of questionable sources, like blogs, or the fact that pages can be vandalized or changed and look completely different from one moment to the next, which begs the question: Do you trust what you are reading now or what you read five hours ago? Edit wars, a struggle between two or more editors to include or exclude certain information in an article, have also drawn criticism to the site.
In December 2005, Nature magazine conducted the now infamous study that revealed that Wikipedia and Encyclopedia Britannica, one of the most respected reference works of all time, are roughly equal in the factual mistakes they contain. There was much bad blood between Britannica and Nature in the next few months, Britannica charging Nature with methodological errors while Nature claiming that the study was fair and properly executed. Many people who believe in the spirit and purpose of Wikipedia cite this Nature study for its defense, but this has become a rather weak technique. Without resorting to the Nature study, one could show that Wikipedia critics are simply in the doldrums based on their bad conceptions of what Wikipedia is and what it does.
First of all, while in theory any person can edit Wikipedia, that does not mean everyone does. In a June 20 ZDNet article, Jimmy Wales, the founder of Wikipedia, states that "really the vast majority of work is done by this small core community." He is referring to what the article identifies as 1,000 dedicated editors that keep Wikipedia functioning. Checking the userpages -- non-article entries on Wikipedia that often contain biographical information -- of these dedicated editors reveals that many of them have college degrees. At various points in September, for example, the article on String Theory was edited by Joshua Davis, a post-doctoral researcher at UCLA.
Wikipedia's math and science articles are often edited and developed by users with undergraduate or graduate degrees. The insinuation that Wikipedia is somehow written by people who have no idea what they're talking about is simply false. It is true, however, that most Wikipedia editors are not experts. Although this could lend credence to negative stereotypes and perceptions, Wikipedia has strict policies regarding what should and should not go into articles. Editors are required to give reputable sources, preferably scholarly material, for contentious claims and are also required to write in a neutral point of view, which in one way or another is Wikipedia's cornerstone policy. A cadre of dedicated vandal hunters and administrators keep vandalism to a minimum as much as possible and root out ideologues or disruptive users through various deliberative and quasi-democratic processes.
Wikipedia does have problems, however, but they are things you would never know about until you see for yourself. Systemic bias is a big issue: The English Wikipedia, at 1.4 million articles the largest of all Wikipedia versions, is skewed towards Anglophone topics and cultures. A big push is being made to correct this, but Wikipedia's coverage in some obscure areas is already superb. The article on the Nafaanra language, a regional language in Ghana, has attained "Featured" status (one of the best articles on Wikipedia) where most traditional encyclopedias and other sources of information would not even have a word on it. Perhaps in the end that is Wikipedia's true strength: its sheer size, scope and universality. Wikipedia represents everything that ties humanity together amidst everything that separates it: There are 229 language editions containing over five million articles. This giant is now a timeless artifact that encapsulates all aspects of human knowledge.
Erald Kolasi is a Cavalier Daily Viewpoint writer.
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