Saturday, March 21, 2009

Is Wikipedia Reliable?

Wikipedia is one of the most popular websites ever and is certainly the most used web source for information, but there's always been a concern about its reliability because anyone can edit it at any time.

One of the big problems with anyone being able to edit any entry at any time is that sometimes companies will edit their own entries or post info about their products that may or may not be true.
Also, some people just go on Wikipedia to mess with things or delete things.

But there are steps being made in order to secure Wikipedia's entries.This guy named Virgil Griffith made this program that tracks anyone who posts anything to Wikipedia, so that noone can change anything anonymously anymore.

I use Wikipedia all the time, and I haven't ever come across any false information, but I've heard stories of people who have, so I've cut back and only use it for my personal curiosities and never for any class work or anything like that. Most teachers now wont let you use it as a source. I trust it but I can see how some people wouldn't. I dont know if it's reliabile, but it sure is convenient and popular.

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