Professors Give Up, Finally Embrace Wikipedia. Wikipedia Remains Unsure About Profs.

If you can't beat 'em, join 'em:

Wikipedia, the user-written encyclopedia, has a shortage of public-policy articles, so it is getting help from nine universities to solve the problem. The Public Policy Initiative of the Wikimedia Foundation, the nonprofit group that operates the online reference work, is running a pilot program during the 2010-11 academic year, asking public-policy professors to require active student participation on the site as a part of their courses….

Ironically, professors have long frowned on Wikipedia as an unreliable information source for their students, but now several are signing up their students to contribute. Brian Carver, an assistant professor at the University of California at Berkeley's School of Information, says he is involved because the site can add new information to the public domain. For instance, he encouraged a student to write an article about a portion of the Electronic Communications Privacy Act dealing with disclosures required by third-party service providers in Internet privacy cases, because he saw that the section of the act had been cited in Wikipedia but did not have a full entry devoted to it.

Many professors still don't think Wikipedia meets quality standards. But the feeling is mutual:

More on the joys and sorrows of Wikipedia here.

Comments

[Paul]

As long as the professors help their students understand what WikiPaedia is: A badly written set of articles replete with statements that read "some people say" or "others believe". To wiki's credit, there are a lot of superscript [who?]s after those statements, but no one ever seems to fill in the 'who?'.

Other than that, Wiki is a nice starting point, but hell if it's an ending point.

[Zeb]

Even a proer, reviewed and edited encyclopedia should only be a starting point and should never be used as a reference in academic writing.

[fresno dan]

"Ironically, professors have long frowned on Wikipedia as an unreliable information source for their students..."
Which professors? Science (or was it Nature) evaluated Wikipedia and found it pretty reliable. Of course, that is because it sticks to things that really happened, objective formulas used in math or physics, Raquel Welch's breast size, the names of all the villains in the TV series Batman (quick, who played "egghead?" Did you know that or did you look it up in Wiki???), etcetera.
The inclusion of social "science" (or more accurately called "bullsh*t" will only diminish Wiki's accuracy. On the other hand, it will expose most of what is social "science" as "not reality based" - which is a good thing.

[Paul]

I find the hard science articles ok, too.

But I think I find them OK for a couple of reasons:

1. I don't really know the properties and half-life of Bismuth 209, so I'm easily impressed.

2. The real science-ey articles seem to be better written. I suspect that's because the only people interested in writing about Bismuth 209 are people that actually know about Bismuth 209. Whereas an article about Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Episode 4 draws in every geek/crackpot on the planet to throw his towel into the ring.

[Tulpa]

Ironically, it was mainly crackpot edits to the physics articles that led to the No Original Research policy. Which seems to be violated out of necessity in most of the articles on TV shows and movies; it's probably hard to find scholarly articles on whether Kramer is the most moral main character on Seinfeld, for instance.

[Paul]

Really? I didn't know that. So what was going on, flat-earthers and intelligent designers getting their shots in?

[Tulpa]

According to Jimbo Wales' interview with Reason, they had to institute it after all the perpetual motion machine/engines that run on water/death ray inventors started using the wiki as a free, unrefereed publication for their "research".

I imagine the TimeCubeGuy had something to do with it, too.

[Paul]

Which I always find ironic. The very idea of Wiki suggested that this would 'self correct' by the 'many eyes' theory.

[mofo]

Rules like no orgional research are tools to help the self correction happen. Believe me, if ive actualy had arguments with editors who say that there is no rule saying "the content must have something to do with the subject"
Rules help deflect those dumbfucks, you can say "nope, here is the rule that says you cant do that"

[Paul]

Oh, yeah, and "global warming deniers" etc.?

[Tulpa]

It was Nature that did that study, specifically comparing it to Brittanica. However, they were only checking for errors, not overall quality of the articles. While Wikipedia contains roughly the same number of errors as Brittanica, the latter has much more well-written articles that go into much more depth.

[fresno dan]

The book "the long tail" goes into some detail about Wikipedia, and I think the author makes some good points that Wiki and Britannia do two different things. Wiki has an astounding number of articles that are updated frequently. Although Wiki may not be as precise or accurate as Britannica, it is more timely and more comprehensive.
Finally, it is free.
and finally, finally, as a microbiologist, I can't think of anything about basic microbiology facts that is glaringly wrong ...or even wrong at all.

[joshua corning]

the latter has much more well-written articles that go into much more depth.

$10 says the Roman section was not deleted in britanica because it mentioned the Roman warming period.

[Spoonman.]

I knew of an economics professor at Cornell who gave out assignments like "make a new Wikipedia article from a concept from this section".

[Timon19]

When I first read the headline, I thought that professors were beginning to accept Wikipedia as a primary source. Reading further on, this is a far cry from that.

You would not believe how frequently high school HONORS students cite Wikipedia exclusively in exercises meant to practice looking up stuff and citing it properly.

[Paul]

I thought the title of the blog post a little off from the meat-n-potatoes myself.

I actually think professors making their students write wiki articles is a fantastic way to teach your students proper research. If done properly, the students will be forced to really think about why they know something is "true".

[mofo]

I agree wholeheartedly, and it will add to the body of human knowledge. A win-win, in my opinion

[truthiness detecter]

Great. The academic left is about to finally co-opt Wikipedia for their own evil purposes.

[joshua corning]

I hate to break it to you...they have been there for a good 5 years already.

This story is simply about professors getting tired of doing the typing and now having grad students do their propaganda work for them.

[sarcasm detector]

... oh never mind ...

[Pat]

This made me smile out loud. =)

[joshua corning]

The Climate change sections of Wikipedia were ruled by a tyrant by the name of William M. Connolley who has been suspended from wikipedia.

I have been using Wiki more and more but i have not stopped taking what i read there with a grain of salt.

[mofo]

I think the fact that wikipedia eventually dealt with Connolley actually speaks very well for them. How many official organizations tolerate, and even encourage the sort of tendentious, dishonest behavior that Connelley was known for just because the person in question is a believer in AGW? The fact that wiki eventually said "enough, i dont care if you are right or wrong, you cant behave that way" shows that they are more honest then a lot of official scientific bodies.

[jtuf]

Wiki is fine for technical knowledge, but it is horrible for politics and history.

[joshua corning]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I._F._Stone

This is a fun article...i copy/pasted a stone quote from a Moynahan story that showed Stone's support for Stalin well after WW2 and after i did it all the quotes on the page were deleted.

Someone is protecting Stone from being exposed as a Stalin apologist...i suspect it is Brad DeLong.

[joshua corning]

From the wiki article:

In addition, it is often assumed, without evidence, that Stone was pro-Soviet Union and pro-Stalin during the 1930s or beyond when in fact Stone's writings were fairly critical of the Soviet Union and Stalin during that time

Funny stuff. Also a complete lie.

[Paul]

In addition, it is often assumed [by who?], without evidence[really?], that Stone was pro-Soviet Union and pro-Stalin during the 1930s[citaton needed] or beyond when in fact[so you say] Stone's writings were fairly critical of the Soviet Union and Stalin during that time[citation needed]

Factual or not, that's poorly written.

[joshua corning]

[citation needed]

There is a citation....the funny thing is it cites a blog which is against Wikipedia citation rules.

[mofo]

Looks like someone already blew that one away, beat me to it.

I agree that it was poor writing, thats usually a sign that someone is pushing a pov and cant figure out how to do it without dishing up word salad.

[mofo]

Im curious about this, can you provide a diff so i can look into it further?

[kinnath]

When I know nothing about a topic, I usually start with Wikipedia. After reading the wiki on a new topic, I usually know enough to pick good search terms to go find real data.

[hack]

"pick good search terms to go find real data"

I know the results google feeds me are unassailable.

[Pat]

I'm at university now at the senior undergrad level, and two professors this semester have clarified that Wikipedia is actually an excellent place to start research in a topic ? but not to cite it or use it exclusively. That's a relief. I've "started" at Wikipedia so many times now I should change my major to Wiki-ology.

[nfl jerseys]

found