One of the main concerns people express with Wikipedia is that of its reliability content. "How do users know if Wikipedia is as accurate as established sources such as Encyclopaedia Britannica?" states Jim Giles on the nature of Wikipedia. If anyone can edit such source then it should not be used as strong evidence for any argument. On the well known show the Colbert Report, host Stephan Colbert "praised Wikipedia for 'wikiality,' the reality that exists if you make something up and enough people agree with you - it becomes reality."(Newsvine) Stephan Colbert proceeded to insist that his audience change articles that elephants have tripled in population. This stunt was done and pulled off from the Colbert Report's viewers and lead to Wikipedia administrators blocking many people including Wikipedia where Stephan Colbert then stated, sarcastically, he is just "a defender of the truth." With stunts like these, it does make you wonder whether or not to trust Wikipedia, but how many people spend there days fabricating lies on Wikipedia? Why is other websites easily trusted? Can they not be easily fabricated? Little things that make you wonder whether or not Wikipedia should be trusted.
Thursday, March 4, 2010
Essay 2
Wikipedia is one of the many advances that has come with the age of technology. It has innovated many from there natural lives to typing in what they need to learn and there answers lay within Wikipedia's endless and abundant source of knowledge. However, there are many out there, especially in the academia world, who feel that Wikipedia should not be used as a source for essays, dissertations, and research studies. Many feel, with Wikipedia's free-for-all editing, that a lot of the sources cannot be credible to academic concepts. Since Wikipedia is not a primary nor secondary source of information, many have banned it from being an academic source. But, with all the flaws that people point out of Wikipedia, it is Wikipedia that has been able to maintain such a reliable source of knowledge by posting links to other sources or by having people who keep an eye on Wikipedia. I feel that if done properly, and accordingly, Wikipedia should be used as a device to help site sources, but not as a cited source.
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I think it's great that you brought in the Stephen Colbert example. You might even want to consider using that for your introductory paragraph; it seems like a good way to introduce the topic and the controversy.
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