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Six years ago, I pondered whether Wikipedia was in fact dangerous. So much information, so many people using it as a source, and so much potential for misuse. When I wrote the story, the site was being roiled by a fresh controversy. One man had, as a joke, written a fake biography of journalist John Seigenthaler. The entry included nonsense about him and the John F Kennedy assassination. The post author lost his job and Wikipedia ended up with a black eye. Up until then, it seems as if no one realized how easy it was for anyone to enter virtually anything in the information Wiki.
Since then, I've continued to use Wikipedia for research, but always with some skepticism. I trust virtually nothing unless I can find a second, verifying source. Wikipedia has also improved since then, tightening its content posting guidelines and noting at the top of posts when information within needs verification or citations. Look today at the Seigenthaler Wikipedia entry and you'll find 27 references, three publication annotations and five links. Even so, the post says it needs more in-line citations for verification.
I heard a report recently that noted that you can find errors in physical encyclopedias too. I know there have been mistakes in, say, dictionaries, but I don't think I'd ever be able to notice one in "The Encyclopedia Britannica." Even so, the point that's being made is that no reference is 100% perfect.
That's fine. I get that. However, I think Wikipedia is probably light years away from 100% accuracy.
In the intervening years since I first wrote about Wikipedia, I was added to the site as an official entry. When this happened, I was kind of honored. On the other hand, the page was almost devoid of information about me. So I went in and edited it, adding details about my background and current activity. This was easy and the results of my efforts appeared on the live site immediately.
Later, someone else went into my Wikipedia page and added new detail about my life and background. I'd served in the French Foreign Legion. My hands are deadly weapons. I was a chef. I dated super models. The fresh content went on and on and was pretty funny--and also 100% false. I have no idea how long the false information was on Wikipedia. You have to be a registered user to create an entry watch list; I have not logging into Wikipedia in years (you do not have to log-in to edit entries, though, a fact I proved this morning when I again edited my entry). Within each post, you can view an extensive post history. Through it, you can see the life of a post. Mine appears to have been steadily tweaked (and sometimes grossly edited) since 2005. Based on my research, it looks like the Foreign Legion nonsense was added in 2009 by someone named "MrGuitar73". A click on that Wikipedia link leads to a user page not found page. Sometime that year, I fixed my post only to have it changed back again. Someone else fixed it, and it has been clean ever since.
Inaccuracy is one thing, but point of view is another. Search for Microsoft on Wikipedia and you'll find a voluminous entry, which starts with an unusual diatribe. It calls Microsoft an "American multinational corporation" which sounds oddly sinister (Apple is described the exact same way), talks about its dominant position in the OS and offices suite markets and then spends a paragraph talking about Microsoft's alleged monopolistic practices and troubles with U.S and European governments. The author is clearly trying to make a point about Microsoft. Is that the role of an encyclopedia?
Another knowledgeable reference source, The Merriam-Webster Dictionary defines encyclopedia thusly:
"a work that contains information on all branches of knowledge or treats comprehensively a particular branch of knowledge usually in articles arranged alphabetically often by subject"
Pretty dry stuff. While comprehensiveness is key, there's nothing in there about opinion.
Apple's Wikipedia entry starts almost the exact same way as Microsoft's but then follows a cleaner path, describing the company's work, foundation and growth. No front loading of controversy and hints and monopolistic practices.
When you read a physical encyclopedia, it sounds like it was all written by the same person; one voice, one perspective (which is to say, no perspective) and lots of dry information. Every page on Wikipedia is different and depending on who wrote the entry (and who edited it) it can read like an oral interpretation of the yellow pages, or like a Dashiell Hammett novel, full of intrigue and excitement.
My gut says this is a bad thing. Wikipedia at 10 is really no more trustworthy than it was at two, five, or eight years old. However, the reality is that this is how the world prefers its information now: interpreted through the prism of belief and self interest. We get our news from web sites, blogs and television networks that, whether stated or not, have a point of view. It's not "The Truth." It's "His Truth. Her Truth. Your Truth." Why should we expect our new primary source to be any different?
Wikipedia is unlike traditional encyclopedias in another way: It's non-profit. Go to the Encyclopedia Britannica site and you can search for free on any topic, but you'll only get a brief synopsis of the lengthy entry. You have to become a member and pay to read it all. The free Wikipedia is user funded, and they're constantly hosting surprisingly effective fund driving campaigns.
So this self-created, self-funded public interest information site isn't going away any time soon. Nor is the fact that you simply can't trust it.
So long as you recognize that Wikipedia is much the same as talking to a very well-informed person who also happens to be an almost perfectly integrated citizen (in the "1984" sense), then you're okay.
You're going to get the hard-core official culture version of absolutely everything. If it matters in a spiritual, hyper-dimensional sense, then whatever Wikipedia has to say about it is going to be misleading.
It's handy to know precisely what the lunatics are thinking.
Imagine if psychologists had that kind of map of their patient's minds?