[Web4lib] Authority + Wikipedia

[Thomale, J]

> But isn't this also the premise of the Citation Indexes? 
> Things that are cited more often must be more authoritative? 
> Not that their popularity makes them more 
> authoritative, but that being authoritative makes them popular.

I think the assumption behind citation indexes is that the people doing
the linking are themselves authoritative sources, so the citation index
is therefore valid (which of course leads one to Mike's question, "what
makes something authoritative?"). On the web, anybody can link to any
source of information they wish and therefore boost its perceived
authority.

And because of this, the concept of authority is being turned upside
down. Yes, it should be that "being authoritative makes [sources]
popular," but that is being turned around in the wider online
environment.

> Getting away from the online world: which is more findable, the 
> radio report of the AP news article on the scientific study 
> summarized in JAMA, or the expensive medical journal article 
> that JAMA is summarizing? The problem that less authoritative 
> information is more findable is not new or online. 

You're right, of course--this isn't an "online only" issue. Nobody has
time to seek out 100% authoritative sources to get their news for the
day. Then we'd all be reporters. No, we have to make do with what's
convenient for those situations. Barring those who wear tinfoil hats, we
"trust" that the news media has some amount of authority to tell us
about what's going on in the world. As Jeremy said in a later message,
trust is a vital part of the whole authority issue.

The web and the online world do exacerbate this problem in that they
make publication so incredibly easy. The web is an infinitely larger and
more complex information organism than the press by itself. These
problems and issues aren't new, they're just magnified *very much* in
the current networked environment.

> The idea of making 
> information in general more findable, and trying different ways to 
> create more authoritative information sources, that's what's new. 

Yes--I fully agree with you.

Jason Thomale
Metadata Librarian
Texas Tech University Libraries