The founder of Wikipedia is claiming that it’s being miscast as a poor tool for education, and that “young students should be able to reference the online encyclopaedia in their work.”
Mr Wales said the site, which is edited by users, should be seen as a “stepping stone” to other sources.
As long as an article included accurate citations, he said he had “no problem” with it being used as a reference for younger students, although academics would “probably be better off doing their own research”.
I he might be missing the fact that many teachers worry about their students blindly turning to a big-name online provider without learning to first weigh the reputation of the source. With the recent stories questioning how Wikipedia grants rights to create and edit articles. And this is the point on which everything turns: who gets to be the editor?
When you think about the role of the editor in other media, it frequently emerges as what gives something its flavor. It’s the editor selecting songs and DJs that draws you in to a particular radio station, not its corporate parent. It’s the editor dictating how a news story should be framed that makes TV (or any other) news something you enjoy watching, or something you despise.
On Wikipedia, the editor is everyone. Wales and others might argue that this is a powerful way to arrive at “the truth,” but I believe it’s just as likely to cause content to loose much of its focus–that being the voice that an editor usually brings to a story. Learning to spot the impact that an editor’s voice has on information is an important part of developing information literacy, and with Wikipedia’s democratic editing, that lesson might be lost.
It is true that on Wikipedia, at any given time the editor is potentially everyone. In practice though, I think that over time, the real editors of any particular article are those that have the time and motivation to return to the article repeatedly. Reader’s need to know that articles evolve over time, that the current state of the article might note be the most accurate, and that the motivations that keep editors coming back to articles could be altruistic and genuine, or less so.
Hey Doug,
Sorry to take so long to reply. For some reason, WordPress didn’t alert me to your comment.
Your point is well taken, because I think you’re right–in practice it’s probably the most interested people that are putting in the time on pet articles. Perhaps the angle I’m coming from is that community editing sometimes doesn’t make the best product (I’ll confess, I’ve soured on the process because of a few difficult experiences). It makes me wonder if anyone has subjectively looked at the typical “voice” of a Wikipeda article, if there is one. In the end, a compelling voice makes something more readable, or even in some cases, more organized.
…kind of a digression from what’s really important (accuracy), I’ll admit. :-[