Thursday, April 02, 2009

Downright Orwellian ...

... "Atlas Shrugged": Why has Wikipedia Removed Key Elements?

3 comments:

  1. Here you have showcased another example of problems at Wikipedia. Students in my courses routine rely upon Wikipedia for much of their basic information. They tend to believe it is the 21st century's version of the Encyclopedia Britannica, but they fail to understand the pitfalls of the do-it-yourself editorial policies involved in Wikipedia's product. Seemingly authoritative, Wikipedia is often compromised by incomplete, erroneous, and capricious (or sometimes malicious) content. It is a shame because there is a lot of potential for reliable content that is being undermined; however, I have grave concerns about Wikipedia's approach to quality control.

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  2. If an encyclopedia online cannot self-regulate, then can we expect other online ventures to do any better? The answer to the objection that online "news" sources have no gatekeeper to make sure they are honest has been that thousands of busy little worker bees will rush in to correct errors --that is, self-regulate. This seems to me misplaced trust at least as great as that placed in the promise of financial industries to self-regulate.

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  3. Well actually, Roger, those who have brought this up hope that a correction will take place. There is no fail safe system for avoiding error and deception. You place your faith in government regulation of the financial sector. Well Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and the Federal Reserve and various Congressional committees and God knows what else are already deeply involved in that sector and have been for a long time.
    Bad things happen. Incompetence is a perennial problem. As for Wikipedia, anyone with a smattering of education ought to know how to check and cross-check sources of information, as well as how to compare and contrast sets of data. This is elementary criteriology. To ask for an absolutely reliable source of information is simply to hope for any easy way of finding the answers to complex questions. The real value of the internet is the access it grants to primary sources, which we should avail ourselves of as much as we can. Were we to do so we wouldn't believe a fraction of what we are told by the media.

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