Should we allow students to use wikipedia for their academic work?

Wikipedia not only is a reliable source of information, it also is a source of knowledge that stimulates students to learn more. As Linklater (2003) states in “Reference Books? Give me Wikipedia,” by using Wikipedia students “learn that they have a gateway to knowledge unprecedented in the history of man, and that this opens up access to sources of information that they might never have glimpsed as they struggled with poorly equipped libraries unhelpful staff and unimaginative lecturers, then they will realise that, far from blunting curiosity, it (wikipedia) sharpens it.”

Wikipedia is a reliable source of information because of the active commitment of its editors to maintain quality of the content available on the site. The 4.2 million entries that can be freely accessed on wikipedia were not, contrary to a common misconception arising from the seemingly ‘open access’ to wikipdia, entries are not written or edited by its millions of users. In fact, most of the entries are edited by a small group of active and committed editors (Swartz, 2006) who scrutinize and monitor the content with their watchful eyes. In "Who Writes Wikipedia?" Swartz (2006) quotes Wale who had found that “the most active 2%, which is 1400 people, have done 73.4% of all the edits." In “The Wizard of Wiki” Larry Smith interviews Richard Farmbrough, one of the active editors of wikipedia for whom eliminating errors from wikipedia is an ongoing passion. Similarly, Priedhorsky et al., (2007) in "Creating, Destroying, and Restoring Value in  Wikipedia" showed that “1/10^th of 1% of editors contributed nearly half of the value” of wikipedia. This finding is consistent with other research which found that a small number of users post a large proportion of messages on other online social sites: discussion lists and blogs (Marks, 2003; Whitteker, 1998). It is also worth noting that any antisocial behaviour such as vandalism of wikipedia entries or posting of misleading or erroneous entries is immediately repaired. Pridhordky et al., (2007) found that “42% of damage is repaired almost immediately, i.e., before it can confuse, offend, or mislead anyone.” This is done by human editors, automated scripts, and with wikipedia bots (see Wikipedia: Bot Policy). These research findings substantiate the fact that wikipedia is, in fact, a reliable source of information as its content validity and credibility are carefully scrutinized by a small group of active and committed expert editors.

Having said that, it is also worth pointing out that the widespread accessibility of wikipedia and the possibility it carries to allow anybody regardless of his/her status and academic qualifications to become one of the active and committed editors/experts expands the traditional form of “peer-reviewing” done by a closely-knit circle of experts nominated by other experts to do the job. This new opportunity for knowledge sharing and knowledge scrutinizing afforded by wikipedia constitutes a major shift in allowing many who otherwise would not have access to “peer-reviewing” to become the watchful editors of online knowledge.

Comments

[Abhishek Ravi]

Students are desparate for help with their academic work and removing access to wiki will bring even more hardships to their lives. Wikipedia has become a basic necassity for todays students. Abhishek www.dibugs.com

[Abhishek Ravi]

Students are desparate for help with their academic work and removing access to wiki will bring even more hardships to their lives. Wikipedia has become a basic necassity for todays students. Abhishek www.dibugs.com

[Thesis writing]

yes Abhishek you are right...

[danial]

good blog

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