ResourceBlog Article: Wikipedia Notes: Credentials Required; To Delete or Not to Delete

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Tuesday, 6th March 2007

Wikipedia Notes: Credentials Required; To Delete or Not to Delete

Two items.

+ Wikipedia to Seek Proof of Credentials (via AP)

Following revelations that a high-ranking member of Wikipedia's bureaucracy used his cloak of anonymity to lie about being a professor of religion, the free Internet encyclopedia plans to ask contributors who claim such credentials to identify themselves.

As the article points out, the idea to require proof of credentials was suggested two years ago and after this scandal has regained steam. What happened two years ago to this initiative? We also posted back in October 2004 the following from Red Herring:

Wikipedia's [Founder] Mr. [Jimmy] Wales has said that next year he will begin using editors to review the web site's content for accuracy and allow users to rate contributions to the encyclopedia for their quality. 'It's complex because it's a social community, and feelings can be hurt,' said Mr. Wales, but he added that the change will be critical when Wikipedia content is put on more permanent media, such as CD-ROM disks."

Larry Sanger, another founder of Wikiepdia, left the community and is creating, Citizendium. More about the project here.

+ To delete Wikipedia entry or not to delete? (via News.com)
This article is about six weeks old but raises some interesting issues. Should the writer of the story have a Wikipedia entry? Why? Why not? You be the judge?

We will add that some people and companies are creating/getting entries into Wikipedia and then press releasing them saying they were "accepted" into Wikipedia. Interesting, Wikipedia as a marketing tool.

Finally, we often wonder what might happen if/when the next big thing comes along and Wikipedia volunteers move on to new and different efforts. Will this mass of content continued to be updated in a timely fashion? Perhaps, the answer is yes for people, places and stories in the news. But what about less popular entries (long tail content)? Will they also get the same treatment and review as more popular entries? Yes, of course, errors and outdated info are part of every reference resources but at least (in most cases) there are people who do review the content on a regular basis, it's their job. Perhaps (just wondering) if the info profession needs to reconsider some traditional ideas when reviewing reference resources in the Wiki age? Ideas like authority of the author or reputation of the publisher over a period of time.

One of Wikipedia's strong points is that corrections and changes can be made quickly and efficiently on the actual site and those sites that point to the Wikipedia site. However, what about those sites that take Wikipedia content and host it elsewhere and brand it as their own? Are they required to update it? In other words download changes, new versions? How often? Daily? Weekly? Monthly? Yearly? At all? How does a researcher who comes across this content know they are seeing the most current version possible?

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