Wikipedia gets a lot of criticism based on the fact that it’s open-source and just about anyone can edit it. That’s definitely something that is worth considering whenever using it, but I’ve found it is surprisingly good, considering this. Inaccurate content exists, but it’s fairly rare. A few articles are poorly written, but generally it’s pretty decent. Most articles have citations, which is probably the best way of assuring you can track down the validity of the information.

That having been said, I would never cite it as a source for any sort of scholarly research or any academic paper or serious news article. But there’s one thing that I love about Wikipedia, aside from the fact that it’s free: It has *EVERYTHING* in it. When you want concise information on a topic, there’s no other place I can think of to find it right away. The only alternative might be to start searching the web. You could also turn to a traditional encyclopedia, but aside from being updated as frequently they might not have quite as many topic. Here’s just a few:

The Holy Roman Empire
Ren and Stimpy
GNU Project
“Paul is Dead”
Project Jennifer

The biggest issue with Wikipedia is generally baring in mind that it is user-written, so if you are serious about the information being 100% accurate, you had best track down the sources or get some kind of independent confirmation. And above all else, be skeptical, especially with articles on topics that are controversial or prone to strange theories or where someone might have an interest in misleading. But where else can you get info on Ren and Stimpy and The Holy Roman Empire?

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This entry was posted on Wednesday, November 21st, 2007 at 9:43 am and is filed under Education, Links, Misc. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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