Wikipedia-WiseYou use it—so use it wisely!

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Today’s Goals

Understand the premise and purpose of Wikipedia

Understand the strengths and limitations of Wikipedia

Learn how to evaluate Wikipedia articles

Practice

Wikipedia is & hasa multilingual, Web-based, free-content encyclopedia project.

written collaboratively by volunteers from all around the world. Anyone with internet access can make changes to Wikipedia articles.

65 million visitors monthly as of 2009.

75,000 active contributors working on more than 13,000,000 articles in more than 260 languages.

English Wikipedia right now

no advertising—all donations & grantshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:About

Strengths of WikipediaUp-to-the-minute, often excellent coverage on topical events (unlike traditional paper encyclopedias).

Wikipedia is self-correcting--errors to Wikipedia are usually corrected within seconds, rather than within months as it would be for a paper encyclopedia.

Current affairs articles, as well as older articles being edited, are updated hundred of times an hour.

Wikipedia's neutral point of view policy makes it an excellent place to gain a quick understanding of controversial topics.

Censorship, or imposing "official" points of view is extremely difficult to achieve and almost always fails after a time.

One of few sites on the web even attempting neutral, objective, encyclopedic coverage of popular culture.

and more Strengths…

There are many non-Western writers, so has many topics not covered fully in other English encyclopedias.

Anyone may ask questions of an article's authors.

You can find interesting articles on some obscure town or a bizarre hobby written by actual residents and practitioners. People with a passion for a field or topic are those who contribute.

Information in Wikipedia is hyperlinked, not linear (like a textbook).

It’s biggest strength…

It is a good place to start research on a topic you know little or nothing about. Once evaluated for authoritativeness (we’ll get to that!) it will give you:

Key names, dates

Key words, events

Links to primary sources

Links to verifiable sources

And then you can begin the research process.

Criticismso Wikipedia's radical openness also means

that any given article may be, at any given moment, in a bad state, such as in the middle of a large edit, or a controversial rewrite.

o Notable criticisms include that its open nature makes it not authoritative and unreliable (see Reliability of Wikipedia).

o Obvious or subtle vandalism.

o Susceptible to attempts by outsiders (or insiders) with an agenda to place a spin on articles.

o Edit “wars.”

Who contributes what?Anyone–you do not need specialized qualifications to contribute—yet many professionals do contribute. However some articles are locked

Articles cover existing knowledge, not original research.

Most of the articles can be edited by anyone.As long as they do so within Wikipedia's editing policies and to an appropriate standard.

Substandard or disputed information is subject to removal.

Need not worry about accidentally damaging Wikipedia when adding or improving information, as other editors are always around to advise or correct obvious errors.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:About

ReliabilityWikipedia, by its very nature, resists destructive edits.

Wikipedia has 1,674 Administrators who are editors with access to restricted technical features ("tools") which help with maintenance. For example, administrators can protect and delete pages, block other editors, and undo these actions as well. They check each others’ work constantly.

Assessing its reliability requires examining its ability to detect and rapidly remove false or misleading information.

Rating system in place (you’ll see).

There has been a gradual increase in using it in academia as a good starting point for research.

The reality?May contain false or debatable information.

Many articles have much more verifiable, up-to-date, authoritative information than text encyclopedias.

Many articles start their lives as partisan; and, after a long process of discussion, debate, and argument, they gradually take on a neutral point of view reached through consensus.

Others may, for a while, become caught up in a heavily unbalanced viewpoint which can take some time — months perhaps — to achieve better balanced coverage of their subject.

Facts should always be checked against many sources.

Encyclopedias (any) are generally not cited for research.

The ideal article

• is well written

• is balanced

• is neutral

• is encyclopedic

• has comprehensive, notable, verifiable knowledge

Evaluating the EntriesDiscussion TabWhat is it’s rating, if it has one? Are there discussions about the validity of the article? Are questions raised about the article? Does the article topic appear to be controversial or otherwise under debate? Not all articles are rated. See Hybrid Vehicles

History TabWas the article recently created? When was it last edited? (older articles have likely been seen by more people). Have many people contributed to the article, or is the work of only one or two editors? Is there evidence of ongoing edit wars? Is there evidence of heavy or continued vandalism? (constant changes and reversions with edit summaries like “revert” or “rvv vandalism”). If so, check that you have a good version of the page.

References, Notes, See alsoAre there any references and outside links? Are there citations to print sources as well as online sources? Are individual statements referenced with footnotes in the text?

QualityDoes the writing read well? Is the topic clearly explained? Are Wikipedia style conventions followed? (such as: is the article broken into sections; is there a clear introductory paragraph; are proper names and key concepts linked to other Wikipedia articles; is there any other formatting, such as images)

Featured Content—The Best

Featured articles

Featured lists

Featured pictures

Featured sounds

Featured portals

• Featured topics

Featured Articles

• “Featured articles are considered to be the best articles in Wikipedia, as determined by Wikipedia’s editors. Before being listed here, articles are reviewed at featured article candidates for accuracy, neutrality, completeness, and style according to our featured article criteria.”

• Søren Kierkegaard http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S%C3%B8ren_Kierkegaard

• Now we look at Discussion, History, References, Quality

Kierkegaard Top of Page

Featured Article

Kierkegaard Discussion Tab

Kierkegaard History TabOver 500 entries

Today’s

First entry

Kierkegaard References

Source for books, articles, verify, further research

Kierkegaard Notes !

These are invaluable for furthering research—journals, books, academic websites (68 for this article)

We will look at #6

Kierkegaard Note #6Good academic article

Kierkegaard “Bibliography” &

References

Kierkegaard’s works discussed on Wikipedia

Kierkegaard’s See Also, Full Texts

Broader & narrower terms

MORE

Kierkegaard Bottom of Page

Non-Wikipedia Online Resources

Related articles put Kierkegaard in a time, place, school of thought

“Good” Articles • Currently, of the 2,975,709 Wikipedia articles,

about 7,118 are categorized as good articles (about 1 in 419).

• “Good articles are articles which are considered to be of good quality but which are not yet, or are unlikely to reach, featured article quality. Good articles should meet the good article criteria and have passed through the good article nomination process successfully. In short, they should be well written, factually accurate and verifiable, broad in coverage, neutral in point of view, stable, and illustrated, where possible, by relevant images with suitable copyright licenses. Good articles need not be as comprehensive as featured articles, but they should not omit any major facets of the topic.”

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Good_Article

Wikipedia “Good”• Cinematic style of Abbas Kiarostami

– http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cinematic_style_of_Abbas_Kiarostam

• see Discussion (D)

• see History (H)

• see References (R)

• see Quality

Compare this with Akira Kurosawa article, rated C-class

Look at another “Good” entry:

Kohlberg's stages of moral development

See Isaac Newton

• Can be read aloud!

• Formerly a FA (Featured Article)– Why?

Evaluating

• unconsciousness– Notice warning signs at top of article– D, H, R, Q

• Fred Clarke– Notice advisory with name– D, H, R, Q

Now, your assignment• Look up as many of the following keywords as

you can

• Go to the Discussion tab—how is it rated?

• Return to the article, see Notes—are there good resources used to write the article (these are the endnotes or footnotes)?

• In the article, see References—can you find at least 5 articles or books that seem authoritative and might be useful for research?

• Would you use this article, or any of its Notes or References?

Select from this list!remember: Discussion, Notes,

References

Finally, copyright

Created by Kathy Fester, Shelton School & Evaluation Center, Dallas, TX. 972.774.1772. kfester@shelton.org. Last updated 10/1/09.

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 United States License. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/us/ or send a letter to Creative Commons, 171 Second Street, Suite 300, San Francisco, California, 94105, USA.