Speaking of Wikipedia

[Jazzmatazz49]

I'm taking an online class for my master's degree from a nearby university. We post most of our research online for others to read and then make a response. I've noticed that several people have used wikipedia as a source. Is it a legitimate source for a research paper? I never thought it was a reliable source since I thought anyone could change the information there.

[KristiB]

I would say it's not as reliable as a lot of other sources for the reason you suggested.

[Gumbeaux]

Articles in Wikipedia are submitted by "experts" in the particular field that they are writing about. There are so many entries that it is almost impossible for Wikipedia to independently substantiate or verify what is submitted.

Wikipedia got caught "with their pants down" a short time ago and suffered embarrassment from credibility issues over a false biography (http://www.usatoday.com/news/opinion/editorials/2005-11-29-wikipedia-edit_x.htm).

I would "guesstimate" that Wiki' is mostly accurate but personally I would never use their material in any kind of scholarly or professional publication. It looks "amateurish" to me to quote an unnamed author.



.

[Aubergine]

there is a lenthgy and fascinating article about the origins and current status of Wikipedia in the recent July 31st issue of The New Yorker by Stacy Schiff. i dunno if it can be accessed online, or whether i, as a subscriber, can do that--never been to their site. also do not own scanner.

i did learn that they are rigorous in their scrutiny, persons get routinely banned for posting false info, and/or "reposting" (i.e., editing a post repeatedly), and that worthwhile links have cross-references. they have a group of very serious and well-educated mods that review all info submitted.

to me, the bottom line is two-fold. Jimmy Wales, the 39-y-o founder, emphatically says that, "If it isn't on Google, it doesn't exist." also, according to this article (and i DO trust the NY'er's reporting and vetting), Wiki is likely more reliable than the Ency. Brittanica, etc., b/c its entries are sometimes updated many times per minute.

bottom line is two-fold: will your prof accept the Wiki info; more important, if it's an upper-level course, you should use that as a starting point to guide you to more scholarly articles which, if you're serious about your education, you should be reading anyway.

ETA: wow. learn something new everyday.:) here's the link to the NY'er article:

http://www.newyorker.com/fact/content/articles/060731fa_fact

[seeteekay]

How I have used Wikipedia for papers (I am in graduate school) is to help me get ideas about subjects and to see if the background info is interesting. But that is not the only site I use and it is more of a side note to just checking things out to see what is written and then finding more "so called" legitimate sources. I posted the wikipedia "don't ask don't tell" policy info on this forum because I did do a paper and know that all the stuff in there was legitimate because I did the full research on the US policies and scholarly articles. It was just the easiest thing to post to get the understanding of the policy out there.

[Jazzmatazz49]

Thanks for your thoughts. The article referenced by Aubergine was interesting, and did nothing to make me think it should be a source in an academic paper. I agree with seeteekay, that it is a good place to get ideas and see what's out there. I'll stick to professional journals for my citations in papers, but now I think I'll be checking out Wikipedia more often as an encyclopedia. I probably wouldn't use encyclopedias of any kind for papers.

[Aubergine]

wowsers! i'm in awe that virtually the entire articile is online. glad it helped!

[honeygirl1971]

I would not accept Wikipedia as a source for an academic paper from my (college- and grad-level) students for the reasons already mentioned. I think it's useful for sort of general knowledge stuff, for BB posts, etc, but not for an academic paper. Encyclopedias in general are not great sources for academic papers, and certainly not one that does not have verified, peer-reviewed articles.