Wikipedia on NYT
April 16, 2008
Check out the Wikipedia page on the New York Times web page.
It is pretty amazing.
Here are a few of my favorite finds:
Growing Wikipedia Refines its ‘Anyone Can Edit’ Policy by Katie Hafner
“Much discussion of Wikipedia has focused on its accuracy. Last year, an article in the journal Nature concluded that the incidence of errors in Wikipedia was only slightly higher than in Encyclopaedia Britannica. Officials at Britannica angrily disputed the findings.
“To be able to do an encyclopedia without having the ability to differentiate between experts and the general public is very, very difficult,” said Jorge Cauz, the president of Britannica, whose subscription-based online version receives a small fraction of the traffic that Wikipedia gets.“
All the News That’s Fit to Print Out by Jonathan Dee
“When news broke on May 8 about the arrest of a half-dozen young Muslim men for supposedly planning to attack Fort Dix, alongside the usual range of reactions — disbelief, paranoia, outrage, indifference, prurience — a newer one was added: the desire to consecrate the event’s significance by creating a Wikipedia page about it. The first one to the punch was a longtime Wikipedia contributor known as CltFn, who at about 7 that morning created what’s called a stub — little more than a placeholder, often just one sentence in length, which other contributors may then build upon — under the heading “Fort Dix Terror Plot.” A while later, another Wikipedia user named Gracenotes took an interest as well. Over the next several hours, in constant cyberconversation with an ever-growing pack of other self-appointed editors, Gracenotes — whose real name is Matthew Gruen — expanded and corrected this stub 59 times, ultimately shaping it into a respectable, balanced and even footnoted 50-line account of that day’s major development in the war on terror.“
The Encyclopedist’s Lair by Edward Lewine
“Collections: I collect books, and not only that, I do something unbelievably geeky with them, which is, I put little labels on the spines with Library of Congress numbers, and keep all the books in Library of Congress order. Oddly, I have never computerized the collection.“
Wikipedia mixes my fascinations with modern news reporting, online communities and fact finding.
Responses to the above articles are NYT articles you find in the above site are welcome.
April 17, 2008 at 3:22 pm
The comparison between Wikipedia and Encyclopedia Britannica was very interesting. When you think about it, Wikipedia is certainly updated much more frequently.
I enjoyed the second article because I have never thought about the process of beginning a Wikipedia post before. I now know that they often start with a “stub” to which other interested parties contribute.
Thanks for sharing these articles!
April 18, 2008 at 12:25 am
I was surprised to see a comparison between Wikepedia and the Encyclopedia Britannica. I understand that Wikipedia is updated more frequently, but can you really say that the Encyclopedia is just as accurate????
I would think that the Encyclopedia would be more reliable if based on nothing but reputation
April 18, 2008 at 9:03 pm
I am surprised that Wikipedia would be as reliable as an encyclopedia, especially in areas where there would be less interest. A look at my son’s middle school found great information until the last sentence which went something like there are many good students at __ but (insert name) is the best. Obviously the is entry was made as a joke and is probably not accurate. I wonder how many more rogue entries exist on Wikipedia and I doubt you would find this happening in an encyclopedia.
On the other hand, I found it fascinating to see how a Wikipedia entry begins. It made me wonder what new topic I could come up with to start a new entry.