Comments on: microsoft imitates wiki

By: pete

pete — Thu, 21 Apr 2005 13:36:22 +0000

In many people’s minds, finding information online lends the item legitimacy. One could post a well written and plausible piece on a wiki, which if it is fairly obscure (like the origin of a word for example), could go unnoticed by “experts”. If left in place long enough, it could be cited, mis-cited, included in other works, and maybe spread to more traditional repositories of knowledge. People seeing it in several sources might then shrug their shoulders and take it to be “truth”. Of course, the same thing happens on TV all the time. No one vets the news, we see what the cameraman and the producers want us to see. However, I think that wikis blur the line between fact and opinion even more than “traditional” websites or news programs.

By: Liam

Liam — Thu, 21 Apr 2005 03:28:39 +0000

I think wikipedia is generally intended as more of a background for information, rather than a trusted source. That being said, I would have more faith some technical wikipedia articles than the equivalent traditional encylcopedia, particularly for relatively new subjects.

By: Jean-Sebastien

Jean-Sebastien — Thu, 21 Apr 2005 03:18:30 +0000

Wikipedia is quite interesting, I was amazed, you can just go on and edit the text, don’t
even need to login, register or anything. It’a quite an amazing collective work, but I don’t
know… would prof. Sieber accept it as an official reference?

By: jennifer

jennifer — Thu, 21 Apr 2005 03:07:38 +0000

Is there not a concern for the validity of these types of references? What are the criteria for contributing to wikipedia and now microsoftâ€s version? Do you have to be an acclaimed expert? Intelligent amateur? Or just a regular joe and good story teller?