[Web4lib] Problems with Wikipedia

[Deborah Kaplan]

> On 1/4/07, Michael McCulley <drweb at san.rr.com> wrote:
> I happen to still be in the credible author = non-anonymous camp

A *good* Wikipedia article -- which is hardly to say most of them
-- provides extensive footnotes, links, cited sources, and no
unsourced opinions or original resource.  In that case, the
information is coming from non-anonymous authors, as described on
a Wikipedia page.

Teaching Wikipedia literacy is a subclass of web literacy.  Just
as  a teacher of information literacy gives students a whole slew
of shortcuts and tips ("look for the author's name on the
website"; "look for .gov or .edu") which are far from perfect but
provide a starting point, we could also provide tips on how to
check the likely authority of a Wikipedia page. Footnotes and
cited sources; good information on the discussion page; is it one
of the fields in which Wikipedia is strong.

-Deborah
-- 
Deborah Kaplan
Digital Initiatives Librarian
Brandeis University