> Not to mention its updatedness for current information that would not have made its way to traditional reference sources yet.
Yeah, this is where a lot of the arguments against wiki fall down. Kevin Hall writes:
"... a true encyclopedia is an enormous undertaking ...Single entries may take months to write before they are even sent for review by people with legitimate expertise."
Okay, but it's not an encyclopedia though, it's wikipedia, and its a good reference tool in the sense that entries link to a broad range of useful and 'reliable' sources which can be directly accessed. So even if you question the entire content of wiki - every word - show me a vastly better free tool (online or off) for finding an overview of resources on a subject. There ain't many. Search engines don't fit the bill. Besides, a good portion of the current event information is embedded from participating sites - they must be evaluated on their own merits within the frame of wiki.
Another Register article comments 'Wikipedia is fast becoming the number-one online resource for web surfers ...in what must be a sad comment on the ability for traditional news media to keep its audiences well-informed.'
Look at what is on offer as general resources for viewing current news items - Google News, Yahoo, newsbots, etc. None of these are as simple and well laid out as wiki, none of these offer a broad face on a topic and cumulate information on one(!) web page as the events happen, but rather offer a mass of syndicated 'snap-shot' articles which are all almost identical in a query result list. These articles repeat information related in other previous articles over and over again too for the sake of context. This is inefficient - pure and simple. Those who hate wiki should propose a better general resource to the oh-so ignorant masses who choose to drill down to Internet links with the *visually clean and objective resource of wiki.
Sod truth, we'll get to that, make it pretty first. Time.com is an ugly mess full of ads and pop-ups. Economist.com costs money. Foxnews.com is, um, selective. Other sites offer only endless rewritten agency texts. Where is this other great general reference tool? Ahhh, there ain't one. Now we see why wiki is still useful - despite its many flaws.
Last edited by belligerentyouth; 10/28/05 12:17 PM.
