slipstream808

Wikipedia is MUCH easier so what do you expect? I'm not saying it's necessarily good OR bad... just what do you expect?

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Urufu_Shinjiro

This is where I disagree, people can print whatever they want in books too. I'm a WWII history buff and I can't tell you the thousands of books out there with completely inaccurate information on them, yet I can reference any one of those and it's considered more valid than an internet article based on interviews with people who were actually bloody there. Yes, you need multiple references on a single point to show it as valid, I can show multiple sources on the net, each one of those with multiple sources and it be just as acurate as referencing multiple book sources. No one is saying you don't need verifiable sources of info, we are saying that books are not inherently more verifiable than internet resources.

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Gexx

If books had a CTRL + F key i'd probably read a lot more of the parts that interest me!

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stargate125645

The issue is that people aren't verifying their information. There wouldn't be a problem with Wikipedia if kids didn't take it as the ultimate word. Have you ever tried to click on a Wikipedia source? Quite often they are dead links. The fact of the matter is that published items require credibility and sources. The internet does not.

Point taken. Books with cited sources, then, as any good source would have. Books aren't automatically taken as fact if they don't support their own words with sources as well. The point still stands.

smoke12291

yeah, internet sites are always being updated.
when a book is written, that's it. it must be re-written to update.

BUT
i think it's safe, when researching something you don't know, to find the same information on multiple sources. just so you're sure it's accurate.

maybe that's why assignments in schools ALWAYS ask for more than just 2-3 sources

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hout17

I would have respect for wikipedia if it were not so easy to change it. I personally think wikipedia is crap as far as a source goes. I have no problem with people using ACCURATE online sources. I do think that you need to be referencing a journal or two with anything you do to validate that you are not an idiot in what you are presenting in said topic.

As far as I know most libraries have all of their stuff online and you can easily do a search through a library to find a legitimate source then go and pick it up.

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Urufu_Shinjiro

Agreed, wikipedia should not be considered a one stop accurate source, and any kid doing a report that sites wiki alone is an idiot. My problem is that most teachers consider ANY internet source invalid regardless and most book sources as valid regardless. Again, I'm not saying that teachers should take any old internet source at face value, but I don't think anyone should be required to source from books if they can show valid reaserch and verify thier internet sources.

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stargate125645

There are people that check the changes. Any changes made get reviewed so it's not as easy as you imply. If the sources listed at the bottom of Wikipedia or reputable then there should be no problem with using Wikipedia. I think the point of this article is that students take Wikipedia to be entirely factual without verifying the sources, as should be done anyway. This is a common problem with how people use internet sources.

I agree. See above.

jhotmann21

wikipedia is watched over by people very well...its definitely not going to cause kids to fail

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guyladouche

The failure is not in students citing wiki, etc., but rather in not providing them with good analytical and logic reasoning--instead of them citing some random webpage as a source, make them analyze the situation and ask themselves if it's likely credible info--which, from the classes I've TA'd for undergrads in the last few years, is what's missing. That being said, in the classes that I teach, we do not allow the students to use wikipedia as a reference because it's not a scientifically peer-reviewed source (the students are using it in upper-division chem lab reports). Department requirements are that citations must be from scientific peer-reviewed sources (an outdated practice as, just like other areas, even scientific journals with peer-review are full of BS and inaccuracies).

That being said, I saw a recent evaluation of wikipedia, and it turned out that its accuracy is in 99% agreement with the Encyclopedia Britannica for articles more than 5 years old. It's the newer, controversial topics are the ones that one must read and take with a grain of salt as there are fewer sources to cross-reference for accuracy.

The first place I go to learn about a topic I'm not familiar with is wikipedia (well, technically google, but then the first result on google is by-and-large a wiki link, LOL).

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