Wikipedia is about as accurate as Britannica.
"Wikipedia is about as good a source of accurate information as Britannica, the venerable standard-bearer of facts about the world around us, according to a study published this week in the journal Nature. . . In the end, the journal found just eight serious errors, such as general misunderstandings of vital concepts, in the articles. Of those, four came from each site. They did, however, discover a series of factual errors, omissions or misleading statements. All told, Wikipedia had 162 such problems, while Britannica had 123.That averages out to 2.92 mistakes per article for Britannica and 3.86 for Wikipedia."
The great Open Source Revolution continues. . . :-)
Posted by Discoshaman at décembre 16, 2005 12:03 AM | TrackBack
So, just when we're finally getting people to realize that going to an encyclopedia is not "research," the 'Net manages to almost-duplicate the peak stage of a 300-year development cycle?
Score me underwhelmed. Wikipedia is a triumph to the human capacity for unnecessarily attempting the fundamentally useless, and studying it like that--wow, it's like gilding the lilly, or perhaps more like tarnishing mud.
Maybe this is 'cuz I just herded a class of 30 Japanese students through three weeks of debate research in their second language....
Cheers,
PGE
Eh. . . I think we're approaching this from two different vantage points. If our frame of reference is academic research, then yeah, encyclopedias aren't worth much.
However, information doesn't have to be peer-reviewed or published in an academic journal to be useful or valuable. Encyclopedias helped pique my interest in a lot of topics growing up, topics I went on to study in more depth later. And sometimes you just need to know something and don't want to read a tome to find it. . .
What I found interesting about this is that once again we have a bunch of dudes in pajamas nearly matching the professional knowledge class. It IS significant when a group of amateurs can challenge an iconic institution like Britannica. It's something of a milestone in the democratization of information. . . :)
Posted by: Discoshaman at décembre 16, 2005 08:36 PMFair 'nuff. But anyone out of junior high who quotes an encyclopedia . . . or a judge who quotes Wikipedia . . . well, they deserve what they get.
But c'mon, think Auguste Comte here--the Encyclopedist project is the epitome of French Englightenment, the notion that all human knowledge is of the sort which can be de-historicized, thematized, and arranged alphabetically. . . . it's OK for kids, but when they stop believing in Santa, the gloves come off.
Oh, and one of my prized possessions is the set of Encyclopaedia Britannica I won for 2nd prize in a regional Spelling Bee (the year before I went to nationals, where I placed 53rd. :-) ).
So I'll go soak my head or something.
Cheers,
PGE