Wikipedia is about as good a source of accurate information as Britannica, the venerable standard-bearer of facts about the world around us, according to a study published this week in the journal Nature. Over the last couple of weeks, Wikipedia, the free, open-access encyclopedia, has taken a great deal of flak in the press for problems related to the credibility of its authors and its general accountability.

- Daniel Terdiman, Wikipedia is as accurate as Britannica, 2005.

 

It has been argued passionately that Wikipedia is an unreliable source of information, however, a study published by Nature, the journal, now shows that to a large extent, Wikipedia information can be trusted. This is extremely significant because as the World Wide Web continues to grow at an alarming pace, more people are beginning to depend on this information as a legitimate resource. The digital culture is becoming much more present in every day life. Email is slowly taking over from the 'old fashioned' way of letter writing or faxing, much the same as the web is becoming just as dependable as books. The rest of the article goes on to compare Wikipedia to Encyclopedia Britannica.

It was found that Britannica, on average, contained 2.92 mistakes per article and Wikipedia contained 3.86. This is a significant comparison as it highlights that even the most trusted online encyclopedia contains an alarming amount of errors. It just goes to show, you cannot always trust what you read, no matter what the web site. As Wikipedia is operated by the general public, this can be seen as the source of many errors. Different people deconstruct different events in their own ways and because of this, information can slightly vary. As said on Wikipedia itself, “This site has been criticized for its susceptibility to vandalism and the addition of false or unverified information, uneven quality, systemic bias and inconsistencies, and for favouring consensus over credentials in its editorial process”. However, the vandalism that they speak of is generally short lived and sites are usually put back to normal within a short period of time.