Friday, November 19, 2010

Midterm Blog

     Wikipedia is an online encyclopedia that offers information to every ones fingertips. People must be aware however, that Wikipedia is an encyclopedia created by people like you and me. Sure there are respectable people offering accurate information from a field, but some information is malicious and incorrect. Wikipedia should not be used as a scholarly source, for the fact that anyone can create or edit a wiki article. Instead the website should  be used as a background check for certain topics. Once someone has a general idea on a topic thanks to Wikipedia they should use a more scholarly source to make sure all the facts are correct. It is truly amazing that a non famous person can contribute to society's knowledge, but not everyone has the same intention of creating a bigger circle of knowledge.
     The technology we have today allows us in a sense to change or alter truth. There have been numerous accounts of Wikipedia users declaring the death of a person and editing that persons Wikipedia article.  Someone who doesn't follow up on the life of this person regularly might stumble upon this information and take it as reliable and site it. The ease of altering reality whether for fun or malicious reasons, creates a bad image for our generation. We have so much technology that we should harness its power to better society rather than fool around with it. This project has reassured my reasoning that Wikipedia can not be taken as one hundred percent accurate. At times the website does tend to leave out information for whatever reason, so anyone using the website for facts should always double check the references.

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