Who Do You Trust, The Wiki Or The Reporter?
from the questions,-questions... dept
On Wednesday I posted a story linking to an article suggesting Wikipedia was somehow untrustworthy. While I can understand why, at first, the concept of Wikipedia seemed a little scary to those who hadn't seen it in action, I figured the reporter in question might want to know a few more details about it, and perhaps correct some of his misperceptions. My main problem was that he seemed to write off Wikipedia based solely on how it was created and maintained, and not at all on the actual content. Along with my post, I sent an email to the writer, Al Fasoldt, giving him some additional information about Wikipedia, and wondering why, after telling us how you can't trust any random info online, he trusted the email from a random librarian claiming Wikipedia was somehow untrustworthy. The ongoing discussion with Mr. Fasoldt has been quite a lesson in watching how a journalist (a) continues to make unsubstantiated allegations (b) seems to prefer insulting me and putting words in my mouth to actually responding to my points or questions and (c) sticks steadfastly to his belief that only "experts" can be trusted with information -- and, in his case, only experts that he chooses. Yet, somehow, we're supposed to find him more trustworthy than a self-correcting community. Figuring he might appreciate the views of others in his profession (you know, "experts"), I sent him links to Dan Gillmor's article on Wikipedia and Steve Yelvington's recent realization of the power of Wikipedia. However, rather than actually look at that information, Mr. Fasoldt accused me of wanting "students to trust a source that's not trustworthy." After some back and forth of this nature, where Mr. Fasoldt responded to my request that he do a little more research by saying: "I'm glad you're not the publisher of a newspaper" (apparently, his publisher lets him do no research at all) and then telling me that anyone who wrote for Wikipedia obviously knew nothing (his phrase was: "100 times zero is still zero"), I suggested an experiment. I pointed to the Wikipedia page on Syracuse, NY where he apparently lives, and suggested he change something on the page, to make it provably, factually incorrect -- and see how long it lasted. Rather than take me up on the experiment, or suggest an alternative, he complained simply that the whole idea of Wikipedia was "outrageous," "repugnant" and finally (in another email) "dangerous," and therefore he refused to take part in my experiment. He told me that asking him to take part of an experiment that would show how Wikipedia corrected errors "wouldn't change the danger" of Wikipedia -- and mentioned how important it was that teachers everywhere knew what a dangerous tool this was. After this email exchange, he came to Techdirt himself, and commented that, based on what he read here, he was disappointed in our educational system -- and proceeded to misquote a poem. Apparently, he was unwilling to trust information displayed in Wikipedia, but finds random comments on a blog as a representative sample of our education system. Thankfully, someone else corrected his misquote, pointing out that a group editing system might have helped out in such a situation. It's true that you shouldn't trust anything you read online, by itself. However, most of us know how to look at information, find other, supporting information to back it up or disprove it before writing it off, and not to judge a wiki by its disclaimer. However, by refusing to back up his claims, by mis-stating or ignoring nearly everything I said to him and by resorting to misdirection in his arguments, personally, I find Mr. Fasoldt to be untrustworthy -- but I suggest you make your own judgment call on that one.
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Wiki Or The Reporter?
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Re: Wiki Or The Reporter?
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Wikipedia = garbage by nerds, for nerds
Save your time, access a library online.
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Re: Wikipedia = garbage by nerds, for nerds
What a bunch of hacks these dorks have become. They hear one little rumor, and blow it all out of proportion.
By the way, wasn't the world supposed to end on Thursday??
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Re: Wikipedia = garbage by nerds, for nerds
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Re: Wikipedia = garbage by nerds, for nerds
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Re: Wiki Or The Reporter?
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Face value
Wikipedia as a form will grow and good information as well as false information will likely come out of it. But any information is going to require the users do double checking. I seem to remember learning that in High School english. There were entire courses on learning to use a library and part of that course was learning how to double check your facts.
Hmmmmm, maybe someone needs a refresher course on basic research.
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Good entertainment.
Now, of course, professional reporters, if they are actually capable of doing a proper job, will never go without work. After all, I still like to read even the opinions of some of the authors in my daily newspaper, just as I like to read the articles online.
Let's just celebrate that eventually bad journalists will eventually be out of work and will realize that they, too, are to blame for all the misinformation in the world.
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Rabblepedia
A common misconception is that bacteria divide through mitosis. I've seen science sites make this mistake. Mitosis can only occur in eukaryotes that have a nucleus. Bacteria reproduce through binary fission instead.
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Re: Rabblepedia
This is the point of Wiki.
Oh, you're talking about other sites that don't accept corrections?
Good thing they're a trusted resource and don't need to be corrected then...
(Speaking of trusted sources, anyone ever track the
factual errors in school text books? Man, if that
doesn't teach kids to be critical of "authority's"
I don't know what will.)
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Re: Rabblepedia
The information sources should be reliable - that's the point.
Good luck to you taking your chances with the amateurs and drunks. I'm pretty happy with the Real Thing.
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Re: Rabblepedia
There are also errors in those reference books that you've chosen. At least with Wikipedia you have the option to expose the errors and correct them. With the reference books: "Too bad, they've already gone to press, therefore they must be correct".
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Isn't all info trivial without application?
That being said, the Wiki Wiki Web is not in a state of perfection yet, although the concept does serve to inspire. But if it is simply a conversation about whether to trust or rely on the information contained - well, that's a topic that has a really broad reach, far beyond Wiki.
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Re: Rabblepedia
That would be like most of Dorpus's posts here.
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Re: Rabblepedia
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Re: Isn't all info trivial without application?
I don't claim to speak for all journalists. Likewise, Mr. Fasoldt should not be used to represent a much larger population of reporters and writers. I personally use Wikipedia on a regular basis to double-check facts in my work. There are likely many others who do the same.
With the exception of entertainment (which most "journalism" has become)
I disagree with this also. I dont' read about presidential recall votes in Venezuela, ethnic cleansing in Sudan or White House policy in the U.S. because it's entertaining, I do it because I want to learn more about the world. For those that don't trust journalists, there are a gazillion newspapers available on the Web from all around the world that provide different points of view on almost any story.
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sources
This also applies to Wikipedia of course, and newspapers (which sometimes has a active political view), schoolbooks (some still teach evangelism as how the world is created and some (most?) say thats incorrect), and even encyclopedias (try reading an encyclopedia from mid 19th century?).
Especially encyclopedias since they generally try to show a broad collection of knowlegde. And knowlegde and truth always change over time (science is a good example, where how things work are explained, and theories still evolve, meaning truths still change).
My point beeing; Always consider the source of your information, and the fact that wikipedia constantly updates is as I see it both its strength and weakness.
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Re: Rabblepedia
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Unplug that computer when you're done
"If you use Windows, don't run your computer without up-to-date protection against viruses, and don't leave your computer plugged in when you're not using it. Spammers can turn on any hijacked Windows PC remotely, using a function built into the PC's BIOS (its basic operating instructions). Don't let them take over your Windows PC."
I'm assuming he's referring to Wake-On-Lan, but how many people have their home PCs configured to enable WOL?
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Too bad I'm not faster off the draw...
Good job calling him on it Mike.
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Ignorance talking about ignorance
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No Subject Given
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Re: Ignorance talking about ignorance
Now, the question over whether I would trust Wikipedia over the Britannica is different. Wikipedia is often smarter on subjects in the Britannica because they are written by experts on the subjects involved. Wikipedia also gets updated far more frequently. On the other hand, Wikipedia does have its faults on controversial topics where partisans battle over what the truth is. So both kinds of publications have their strengths.
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on Al Fasolt
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Re: Unplug that computer when you're done
I'm assuming he's referring to Wake-On-Lan, but how many people have their home PCs configured to enable WOL?
-----------------
Actually, I think he's referring to the netbios, and there are so many things wrong with his statement I won't even get into it....
This place is quite a tinderbox... settle down people!
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Re: Unplug that computer when you're done
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Re: Rabblepedia
Okay... so the source should be reliable, without anyone taking responsibility for making it reliable. Including you. How does a source become reliable, then?
Not to mention you'd be doing everyone a favor by contributing knowledge of your own, but you'd rather keep it to yourself to prove a point? How does that help?
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Re: Rabblepedia
pd: We shouldn't have to.
Why not? Are you saying that people should uncritically accept information as it's presented to them? It seems to me that people ought to regard it as their responsibility to change what's mistaken.
Wikipedia is designed to allow correction by anyone, and subsequent review by a large subset of everyone.
Think of it this way: You can choose to rely on a Wikipedia article that's the aggregation of contribution and review from, say, seven or eight people (three grad students in the discipline, a couple of dilettante specialists, a professor or two, and a few people who notice ambiguous usages or contested views). Or you can choose to rely on a Brittanica article that was written by a grad student, scanned, cursorily revised and then signed by his advisor, and copy-edited, all ten years ago -- and not touched since.
And that's not even beginning to address the issues that should be arising in your mind with regard to the corporate control of information, where, for example, religious organizations can petition the state of Texas as a means of forcing their agenda into school textbooks and library purchasing lists.
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Re: Rabblepedia
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Re: Rabblepedia
But students need to learn to think critically about information from all sources, rather than just fall back on appeals to authority (it must be true, because an expert or bit newspaper or the Britannica said it was).
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No Subject Given
Oh, and Wikimedia is a great concept.
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Re: Face value
While acknowledging that "the singular of 'data' is not 'anecdote'", I still wish to put for an example:
In two reputable, printed-on-paper books, each being an "encyclopedia of musical instruments", I have found the original Hammond Organ described as an "electronic instrument", explaining that it generates tones with vacuum-tube oscillators as the Teremin and the Ondes Martenot do. This information is incorrect.
Curious as to the reliability of the Wikipedia, I was pleased to discover just now that the Wikipedia gets it right: the Hammond Organs in question were electromechanical devices, producing their base waveforms by means of physically rotating disks with teeth on them. The Hammond electric organs are no more "electronic instruments" than an electric guitar is. (Each contains electronics for shaping the sound once it's generated -- the Hammond has more than a guitar does -- but each relies on mechanical motion as the ultimate source of the waveform.)
So no, we can't take library books at face value. Knowing which source to trust in a given disagreement is a matter of epistemology, of course, but the nature of Wikis didn't create that problem.
Personally, the idea that wankers can post guesswork in a Wiki and the idea that someone with a political agenda or a really persistent misunderstanding can go in and de-correct correct information do bother me, but they're cancelled out by the notion that a proper expert can come along and make it right, or that someone can walk in and say, "I've personally taken apart a $foo and can describe its internals." So for me it's a wash: the Wikipedia is yet another useful source which might be wrong, just like most good reference works. There are a great many sources I trust less.
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Re: Face value
There is a (deliberately designed) imbalance on Wikipedia, between the relative ease of making a change vs. undoing it. It is much easier to undo, with a single click, and more work to edit and change an entry. The result is that there is a disincentive to try to deliberately launch a campaign of disinformation. It is simply not worth the effort, and thus rarely happens--and when it does, quickly and easily corrected, by virtue of a large community of concerned contributors.
The real difficulty folks have with Wikipedia is that it simply does not fit into the capitalist model of free-market fundamentalists. Wikipedia is an example of a "value-drive", as opposed to a "profit-driven" enterprise. Thus, free-market fundamentalists try to pretend that it doesn't exist, or, when that fails, that it doesn't work.
There are many models of similar constructs that generate tremendous value even though they do not fit into the classic capitalist/charity complementary model. More and more, people are discovering new ways to fill niche needs that the free market simply doesn't address.
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clarification on value
Wikipedia and similar value-driven enterprises prove that the capitalist model, of exploiting the cumulative effects of individual competing self-interests, is not the only effective model for creating sustainable value in a free society.
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Re: Rabblepedia
An example of their bias is found in a 1997 Encyclop�dia Britannica entry on Drug Abuse :
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Re: Rabblepedia
Wikipedia is fraught with adjectives where they don't belong, adjectives and adverbs that flower and qualify and otherwise opinionate what ought to be information only.
Such that, reading many issues on Wikipedia, without any foreknowledge of that or those issues -- such is the point of searching for information, particularly for those with limited life and/or educational experience, although we all remain unfamiliar with many things over age, regardless of our educational and living experiences -- Wikipedia through this method of prosaic language applied to information, opinionates the information.
You can write a definition of something, a concept, an event, a person, a being, a process, whatever, and include descriptions by way of adjectives and adverbs that convey the writer's individual opinions about that about which he/she writes, and thereby actually CHANGE and modify a definition.
Which is what, in my experience accessing Wikipedia, exists there: ongoing opinions masquereding as "facts" and information that is subjectivized through the application of descriptive language.
So, I understand the fellow's complaint and entire area of question. A reliable source or person would not be so emotive about the inquiry -- as the thread here is, in effect, as an emotional reaction to this person's valid point of inquiry -- and would attempt to coordinate a process of exchange by which this person's inquiry could be intergrated into the site information itself, WITHOUT applying negative opinions about the person making the inquiry and the inquiry itself.
Which is, to the man, an excellent example of why Wikipedia is flawed, just as the inquirer points out.
A flaw does not mean doom. It does if you respond by attacking and denigrating someone who points out a flaw. It doesn't if you coordinate and accommodate the flaw, use it for a point to improve (which is what I mean by "integrate the flaw and accommodate it" into the site).
The very thread here, however, the posing point "Mike" makes, exemplifies just why Wikipedia is not a reliable source of information, other than a study in sociology, perhaps, or one about the personality of "Mike."
P.S.: I'll be voting for Bush, also, but anyone's voting determination isn't the point of the issue here, but that's another point about Wikipedia that is noticably flawed: the abundance of opinionated SOCIO-POLITICAL insertions into "information" -- more of what I've already described here, earlier.
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Welcome to the logic of skeptics
This journalist uses the same tactics that skeptics use to ridicule and dismiss UFO evidence. They:
This behaviour is well documented; look up "stupid skeptic tricks" and "the logical trickery of the UFO skeptic" for detailed analysis of this sort of behaviour. Its extremely annoying is it not?