I use Wikipedia a lot. Wikipedia, if you don't know, is a free on-line encyclopedia that anyone, and I mean anyone, can edit. You don't even have to be a registered user to make a correction, just click "edit" and away you go! There is even a place to have a discussion on differences you may have with the article. There are currently active "Wikipedias" in 107 languages, and the English version has over 873,000 articles.
I think the Wikipedia is a great way to get a general understanding about a subject. I link to it all the time in my blogs, and just in general think it's a great — and pretty darn amazing — thing. I did often wonder how it could be used as a resource in a paper as there really is no way of knowing if the content was accurate, and often as I read along I wondered just how accurate the information I was getting was.
Well, it turns out the science journal Nature has just completed the first peer review of Wikipedia, comparing its accuracy in coverage of science topics with the online version of Encyclopedia Britannica. And, in what I think is a remarkable testament to Wikipedia's contributors and to the whole Wikipedia concept, the peer review found that errors are almost as common in the Encyclopedia Britannica as they are in the Wikipedia.
In the study, entries were chosen from the websites of the two encyclopedias from a range of scientific disciplines and were then sent out to a relevant expert for peer review. A total of 50 reviews were sent out — of which upon their return 42 were usable. The reviewers were not told from which encyclopedia the entry came from.
Eight serious errors were found in the pairs of articles that were reviewed — four from each encyclopedia. 162 factual inaccuracies were found in the Wikipedia, and 123 were found in Britannica — an average of four inaccuracies per article for Wikipedia and three per article for Britannica.
The article points out that while the Wikipedia may have more errors on average than the Britannica, the advantage of the Wikipedia is that it can be quickly corrected and updated.
So, I am now even more confident in Wikipedia. I'll still double check what I learn there against other sources, but I personally don't find four entries much more alarming than three.
What do you think?
I have been reading some of the discussion threads behind some of the articles I have referenced in past blogs, and find them to be very interesting. Wikipedia holds "votes for deletion" of some articles, and is now looking at locking certain articles that have been found to be accurate and stable for editing until a better version of the article can be submitted.
As a registered member, I can post science stories of my own like the ones on the Buzz Blog.
In wikipedia news, it looks like the wikipedia is entirely blocked in the country of China. This has happened before and is an unfortunate blow to researchers. The free flow of ideas is essential for high quality science research and it is sad, although not surprising, to see China censoring an entire source of knowledge.
This article claims that, on at least some politically-charged entries, Wikipedia has "locked" articles that contain bias. So, while Wikipedia probably remains a good place to start looking for info, especially on more cut-and-dried factual topics, it shouldn't be your only source of info. Trust, but verify.
Science Buzz is supported by the National Science Foundation.
Email
Delicious
Digg
Facebook
Google
Yahoo
Add a new comment