2008 Woodie Awards
Wikipedia
Do's and Do Not's for the Modern Day Library of Alexandria
By Bruce Bugbee
3/28/07 - Science & Technology
Wikipedia is the online community encyclopedia that is quickly becoming the go-to destination for information ranging from chemical reactions to characters from Lost. Wikipedia was launched in 2001 by founder Jimmy Wales and is powered by a community of volunteers that do everything from article writing, editing for grammar and punctuation, to providing citations. It soon evolved from a narrow-focused experiment into a worldwide phenomenon, translated into 250 different languages. Now that Wikipedia has become such an integral part of modern culture, there four things that every college student needs to observe in order to get the most out of this modern day Library of Alexandria.
Don't Use Wikipedia in Research Papers
With Wikipedia's meteoric rise in popularity over the past couple years, an debate has been created over the validity of using Wikipedia in academic papers. While recent studies have claimed that Wikipedia is as accurate as most other encyclopedias on average, many professors still frown upon using Wikipedia in papers. There have even been reports of professors dropping students a letter grade for each Wikipedia reference they use in their papers. Luckily one of Wikipedia's strengths is its citation practice which makes it easy to find the original source that the information came from.
Don't Ignore Wikipedia
While a lot controversy surrounds the validity of Wikipedia as an academic source, the community of volunteers that runs Wikipedia has done an excellent job in making sure that the information on the site is factual and correct. With this level of accuracy and the ease of the Wikipedia interface, tracking down even the most obscure information only takes a few clicks. While Wikipedia shouldn't be your only stop for information, it should be one of the first you make.
Don't Get Caught Editing Your Own Page
If you ever find yourself in the public eye for any reason, chances are you will have a Wikipedia page. Even though Wikipedia invites everyone to contribute, they highly discourage people from editing articles that have an inherent conflict of interest, so that makes editing anything about yourself a big no-no. Recently, members of both the Senate and House of Representatives have had their IP addresses blocked by Wikipedia, since they were having their aides edit information about themselves and post inflammatory information about their rivals. Even Wikipedia's founder, Jimmy Wales, was caught editing his own page and was promptly spurned by the online community that he helped create.
Don't Use Wikipedia in Research Papers
With Wikipedia's meteoric rise in popularity over the past couple years, an debate has been created over the validity of using Wikipedia in academic papers. While recent studies have claimed that Wikipedia is as accurate as most other encyclopedias on average, many professors still frown upon using Wikipedia in papers. There have even been reports of professors dropping students a letter grade for each Wikipedia reference they use in their papers. Luckily one of Wikipedia's strengths is its citation practice which makes it easy to find the original source that the information came from.
Don't Ignore Wikipedia
While a lot controversy surrounds the validity of Wikipedia as an academic source, the community of volunteers that runs Wikipedia has done an excellent job in making sure that the information on the site is factual and correct. With this level of accuracy and the ease of the Wikipedia interface, tracking down even the most obscure information only takes a few clicks. While Wikipedia shouldn't be your only stop for information, it should be one of the first you make.
Don't Get Caught Editing Your Own Page
If you ever find yourself in the public eye for any reason, chances are you will have a Wikipedia page. Even though Wikipedia invites everyone to contribute, they highly discourage people from editing articles that have an inherent conflict of interest, so that makes editing anything about yourself a big no-no. Recently, members of both the Senate and House of Representatives have had their IP addresses blocked by Wikipedia, since they were having their aides edit information about themselves and post inflammatory information about their rivals. Even Wikipedia's founder, Jimmy Wales, was caught editing his own page and was promptly spurned by the online community that he helped create.
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nitin
posted 4/13/07 @ 10:58 AM MST
ya u r right i am agree with u that the wikipedia research papers r so bogus .we should not stud that papers to retains our study well
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