Certainly I can see that defamatory and simply wrong information is
extremely bad not simply for those misrepresented or defamed but also for
students who may be relying on such sources as wikipedia to underpin their
assignments.
Information literacy and quality judgements are key to any student working
in areas where there is no simple right or wrong. Facts are facts (and
those "facts" about Ken are open to being exposed as falsehoods and deserve
to be exposed as such) but in many areas there is a real need to provide
students with an understanding of how to make quality judgements in "softer"
areas. As Mark points out there are many ways to teach this. The library
profession can be very helpful here - they have an ongoing frustration with
the use of things such as Google which are, though excellent in many ways,
still at the stage where they are simply gophers ("go for it and fetch it"s)
rather than offering a filter of quality (such as some internet subject
gateways do). This may change in the future but at the moment the ranking
algorithms although including a lot of contributory factors (over 100 in
Google's case) seem to be weighted towards links and popularity which,
unless one is pretty information literate, seems to imply that knowledge and
truth are a function of community rather than an external source of
authority. Hmm.. age old problem like should a dictionary lay down meaning
or reflect current usage.
Many of the newer information resources find authority in community not in a
specified source. Indeed sometimes it can be difficult to even identify
what the authoritative "external" source is so perhaps after all Google's
algorithm is relevant and useful here. Do a search in Google for [ Iraq
"chemical weapons" ] and you will see that you need to go down to near the
bottom of page 2 before you get the first government document. This isn't
(I don't think!) censorship or favouritism by Google but simply Google
reflecting community. Who links to whom and how popular the sites are, I
suspect, nudging all the .org sites up the ranking.
So wikis, blogs and perhaps even the new "mashups" (some of which have a
similar ethos to the wiki) are indeed potentially wrong in specific
instances but I hope there's someone somewhere researching HOW wrong
compared with supposedly authoritative sources. I'd hate to bar a whole new
type of information resource from my students without sustained comparative
evidence to justify it. They may be potentially wrong but an educational
institution should teach its students how to make judgement calls on this
.... not bar a whole information resource.
Every source of information can be completely or partially wrong. Sometimes
community provides the best, and most authoritative reality there is,
sometimes it does not. Community does have the potential for built in
quality control ... it can referee itself. The fact that it "can" rather
than "always does" offers, as Mark notes, a really interesting educational
opportunity to force critical thinking.
Terry Kendrick
MBA Unit Organiser. Contemporary Management Issues,
University of East Anglia, UK
www.terrykendrick.co.uk
----- Original Message -----
From: "M.P.Fenton-OCreevy" <
M.P.Fenton-Ocreevy@open.ac.uk>
To: <
MG-ED-DV@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU>
Sent: Friday, December 09, 2005 5:08 PM
Subject: Re: Wikipedia warning -- Wikipedia is not a reliable information
source
> Ken,
>
> I agree with you that Wikipedia has errors and inaccuaracies. I agree it
> is lamentable if someone is defamed in any forum. However, I disagree with
> you about the value of Wikipedia as a reference source.
>
> First, Wikipedia does carry a great deal of good quality articles and
> information. I have made a point of reviewing articles in my own areas of
> expertise and have found much that is of a high standard. This has
> encouraged me to contribute articles and to get involved in editing
> others.
>
> Yes but . . . I suspect you may say --- how do we expect students to
> distinguish good quality information from poor quality information?
>
> In my view here lies a wonderful educational opportunity. Actually we
> would like our students to develop the critical facility to question and
> interogate the value and quality of all sources, even those provided by
> their professors. The trouble is that when we provide them with
> information sources whose quality we warrant, the temptation is to treat
> those sources uncritically. Information sources such as Wikipedia require
> them to excercise discretion in interpretation and it is easy to highlight
> the need - the article you cite would be one way. After all, the process
> by which Wikipedia is compiled is transparent to them. Incidentlly, an
> important source of variation in Wikipedia articles is the quality of
> referencing. This is one starting point for assessing quality; there are
> others.
>
> How about a project which is focussed on critiquing and improving the
> quality of a Wikipedia entry?
>
> Having honed their critical skills on Wikipedia, perhaps we could
> encourage them to apply these skills to their textbooks?
>
> best regards
>
> Mark
>
> Mark Fenton-O'Creevy
> Professor of Organisational Behaviour
> Open University
>
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Management Education and Development Discussion on behalf of Ken
> Friedman
> Sent: Sun 04/12/2005 16:37
> To:
MG-ED-DV@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU
> Cc:
> Subject: Wikipedia warning -- Wikipedia is not a reliable information
> source
>
>
>
> Dear Colleagues,
>
> This letter is a suggestion that you address the problem of bad
> information in student papers from an increasingly poor source:
> Wikipedia. Wikipedia is not getting better. It is getting worse. One
> reason for this is the apparent case that the status of Wikipedia as
> a much-used reference resource makes it the target of opportunity for
> hoax efforts that would never enter an edited reference text.
>
> There are now enough serious incidents of false and defamatory
> information in Wikipedia biographies to warrant prohibiting this as a
> reference source in universities and university-level professional
> schools. The same is true of inaccurate or false assertions in many
> articles.
>
> The problem with Wikipedia is not that the Wiki system MAY develop a
> solid and reliable reference work, but that in the current form, it
> DOES NOT. It is as easy to change an article for the worse as for the
> better.
>
> Nearly any university student today has access to a decent library
> and good on-line reference texts. In addition, anyone willing to
> search a bit will also fine outstanding SIGNED references sources by
> major scholars in many fields, as well as useful albeit older
> versions of respected references source no longer covered by
> copyright.
>
> The article posted to Humanist by Norman Hinton (below) and similar
> recent cases lead me to conclude that Wikipedia has no way to prevent
> problems like this from happening. This is made worse by the fact
> that Wikipedia is an automatic flow-through resource for other
> on-line sources.
>
> Wikipedia is unacceptable as a research tool.
>
> I have informed my students that they may no longer use Wikipedia as
> a reference or source on papers in my courses. I urge you to consider
> a similar statement.
>
> Use of Wikipedia by students and researchers is an important
> validation mechanism for Wikipedia.
>
> If enough of us prohibit Wikipedia as a reference source in our
> courses, programs, and schools, the message will eventually get
> through.
>
> When it does, Wikipedia will find an appropriate way to monitor
> contributions. If they do not, the reputation of Wikipedia will sink
> to that of another crank web site.
>
> Ken Friedman
> Professor of Leadership and Strategic Design
> Institute for Communication, Culture, and Language
> Norwegian School of Management
>
> Design Research Center
> Denmark's Design School
>
> email:
ken.friedman@bi.no
>
>
>
> --
>
> Letter to my students on 051203:
>
> Friends,
>
> Please DO NOT use Wikipedia as a reference source in your semester
> project. You have a free on-line subscription to Encyclopedia
> Britannica through the Norwegian School of Management library, and
> you have access to many other excellent reference tools.
>
> Wikipedia is not reliable. The story below is an example. There is
> now enough serious incidents of false and defamatory information in
> Wikipedia biographies to warrant prohibiting this as a reference
> source in universities and university-level professional schools. The
> same is true of inaccurate or false assertions in many articles.
>
> The problem with Wikipedia is not that the Wiki system MAY develop a
> solid and reliable reference work, but that in the current form, it
> DOES NOT. It is as easy to change an article for the worse as for the
> better.
>
> You have access through our library access to many good on-line
> reference texts. In addition, anyone willing to search a bit will
> also fine outstanding SIGNED references sources by major scholars in
> many fields, as well
> as useful albeit older versions of respected references source no
> longer covered by copyright.
>
> The article posted to Humanist by Norman Hinton and recent cases --
> including one concerning Jens Stoltenberg that I discussed in class
> -- leads me to conclude that Wikipedia has no way to prevent this
> from happening.
>
> If you use Wikipedia, you MUST check at least one or two RELIABLE
> sources for the same information. Once you use a reliable source, you
> can use it directly instead of relying on Wikipedia.
>
> Please do NOT use Wikipedia. Choosing reliable sources and checking
> information is one of the criteria for grading the semesteroppgave.
> This is not a sudden warning. It is a reminder. If you are STILL
> using Wikipedia, please remember that I specifically brought this up
> in three lectures, the first when I return the biographies, the
> second when I gave a talk on how to write a good paper, the third in
> the session on writing your semester project. If you are still using
> Wikipedia, this is a good time to find the same information from a
> better source. If you cannot find it in another source, that should
> cause you to question the information.
>
> Yours,
>
> Ken
>
>
>
> From:
> Humanist Discussion Group, Vol. 19, No. 474.
> Centre for Computing in the Humanities, King's College London
>
>
www.kcl.ac.uk/humanities/cch/humanist/
>
>
www.princeton.edu/humanist/
>
> --snip--
>
> Date: Sat, 03 Dec 2005 10:07:03 +0000
> From: Norman Hinton <
hinton@springnet1.com>
> Subject: [Fwd: No wonder some people are skeptical about Wikipedia!]
>
> Untrustworthy Wikipedia again:
>
> A false Wikipedia 'biography'
>
> By John Seigenthaler
>
> USA Today (at Yahoo News), Wed Nov 30, 6:50 AM ET
>
> "John Seigenthaler Sr. was the assistant to Attorney General Robert
> Kennedy in the early 1960's. For a brief time, he was thought to have
> been directly involved in the Kennedy assassinations of both John,
> and his brother, Bobby. Nothing was ever proven." - Wikipedia
>
> This is a highly personal story about Internet character
> assassination. It could be your story.
>
> I have no idea whose sick mind conceived the false, malicious
> "biography" that appeared under my name for 132 days on Wikipedia,
> the popular, online, free encyclopedia whose authors are unknown and
> virtually untraceable. There was more:
>
> "John Seigenthaler moved to the Soviet Union in 1971, and returned to
> the United States in 1984," Wikipedia said. "He started one of the
> country's largest public relations firms shortly thereafter."
>
> At age 78, I thought I was beyond surprise or hurt at anything
> negative said about me. I was wrong. One sentence in the biography
> was true. I was Robert Kennedy's administrative assistant in the
> early 1960s. I also was his pallbearer. It was mind-boggling when my
> son, John Seigenthaler, journalist with NBC News, phoned later to say
> he found the same scurrilous text on Reference.com and Answers.com.
>
> I had heard for weeks from teachers, journalists and historians about
> "the wonderful world of Wikipedia," where millions of people
> worldwide visit daily for quick reference "facts," composed and
> posted by people with no special expertise or knowledge - and
> sometimes by people with malice.
>
> At my request, executives of the three websites now have removed the
> false content about me. But they don't know, and can't find out, who
> wrote the toxic sentences.
>
> Anonymous author
>
> I phoned Jimmy Wales, Wikipedia's founder and asked, "Do you ... have
> any way to know who wrote that?"
>
> "No, we don't," he said. Representatives of the other two websites
> said their computers are programmed to copy data verbatim from
> Wikipedia, never checking whether it is false or factual.
>
> Naturally, I want to unmask my "biographer." And, I am interested in
> letting many people know that Wikipedia is a flawed and irresponsible
> research tool.
>
> But searching cyberspace for the identity of people who post spurious
> information can be frustrating. I found on Wikipedia the registered
> IP (Internet Protocol) number of my "biographer"- 65-81-97-208. I
> traced it to a customer of BellSouth Internet. That company
> advertises a phone number to report "Abuse Issues." An electronic
> voice said all complaints must be e-mailed. My two e-mails were
> answered by identical form letters, advising me that the company
> would conduct an investigation but might not tell me the results. It
> was signed "Abuse Team."
>
> Wales, Wikipedia's founder, told me that BellSouth would not be
> helpful. "We have trouble with people posting abusive things over and
> over and over," he said. "We block their IP numbers, and they sneak
> in another way. So we contact the service providers, and they are not
> very responsive."
>
> After three weeks, hearing nothing further about the Abuse Team
> investigation, I phoned BellSouth's Atlanta corporate headquarters,
> which led to conversations between my lawyer and BellSouth's counsel.
> My only remote chance of getting the name, I learned, was to file a
> "John or Jane Doe" lawsuit against my "biographer." Major
> communications Internet companies are bound by federal privacy laws
> that protect the identity of their customers, even those who defame
> online. Only if a lawsuit resulted in a court subpoena would
> BellSouth give up the name.
>
> Little legal recourse
>
> Federal law also protects online corporations - BellSouth, AOL, MCI
> Wikipedia, etc. - from libel lawsuits. Section 230 of the
> Communications Decency Act, passed in 1996, specifically states that
> "no provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be
> treated as the publisher or speaker." That legalese means that,
> unlike print and broadcast companies, online service providers cannot
> be sued for disseminating defamatory attacks on citizens posted by
> others.
>
> Recent low-profile court decisions document that Congress effectively
> has barred defamation in cyberspace. Wikipedia's website acknowledges
> that it is not responsible for inaccurate information, but Wales, in
> a recent C-Span interview with Brian Lamb, insisted that his website
> is accountable and that his community of thousands of volunteer
> editors (he said he has only one paid employee) corrects mistakes
> within minutes.
>
> My experience refutes that. My "biography" was posted May 26. On May
> 29, one of Wales' volunteers "edited" it only by correcting the
> misspelling of the word "early." For four months, Wikipedia depicted
> me as a suspected assassin before Wales erased it from his website's
> history Oct. 5. The falsehoods remained on Answers.com and
> Reference.com for three more weeks.
>
> In the C-Span interview, Wales said Wikipedia has "millions" of daily
> global visitors and is one of the world's busiest websites. His
> volunteer community runs the Wikipedia operation, he said. He funds
> his website through a non-profit foundation and estimated a 2006
> budget of "about a million dollars."
>
> And so we live in a universe of new media with phenomenal
> opportunities for worldwide communications and research - but
> populated by volunteer vandals with poison-pen intellects. Congress
> has enabled them and protects them.
>
> When I was a child, my mother lectured me on the evils of "gossip."
> She held a feather pillow and said, "If I tear this open, the
> feathers will fly to the four winds, and I could never get them back
> in the pillow. That's how it is when you spread mean things about
> people."
>
> For me, that pillow is a metaphor for Wikipedia.
>
> John Seigenthaler, a retired journalist, founded The Freedom Forum
> First Amendment Center at Vanderbilt University. He also is a former
> editorial page editor at USA TODAY.
>
> --snip--
>
>
>