Today, with all of the advances in technology, our society always looks for ways to make life more efficient for people. However, this common ambition of people seemingly does not apply to the scholarly/educational world. It seems that there has been a reoccurring dispute amongst classrooms over the use of Wikipedia as a reference in research papers. Regardless of what most scholars think, the time has come that society accepts this new type of software as a credible resource of information in our educational journey. Wikipedia should be accepted as a valid reference in the scholarly world because of its overall popularity and growth, accuracy, and potential to become the new face of research worldwide.
Jimmy Wales and Larry Sanger created Wikipedia in 2001 in order to give people the ability to either obtain or put out quick, understandable information about any sort of topic, ranging from J.R.R. Tolkien’s fictional Middle Earth to the current conflict in Iraq. According to Capocci’s study on Wikipedia growth, Wikipedia’s total amount of articles has more than sextupled (around seven-million total) and the amount of views per day has more than quintupled in the past five years, making it one of the fastest growing and most commonly visited websites on the internet (par. 1). In agreement with Meier, the point that Wikipedia allows anyone to use its information for absolutely no charge or requirement of registration led to it becoming the 6th most visited website in 2009 (1). Also, the research in the Zotero Report on research citations showed how the amount of internal citations for Wikipedia at the least doubles almost every year since 2002 (Spiro 1). In line with this, citations for Wikipedia now outnumber many accepted ...
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...1-22. Print.
Sanger, Larry M. "The Fate of Expertise After Wikipedia." Episteme. 2009. Web. 27 Mar. 2010. .
Spiro, Lisa. "Is Wikipedia Becoming a Respectable Academic Source?" Digital Scholarship in the Humanities. Web. 31 Mar. 2010. is-wikipedia-becoming-a-respectable-academic-source/>. "Wikipedia Changes Editing Policy - PCWorld." Reviews and News on Tech Products, Software and Downloads - PCWorld. Web. 30 Mar. 2010. wikipedia_changes_editing_policy.html>. "Wikipedia Survives Research Test." BBC NEWS | News Front Page. Web. 31 Mar. 2010. .
Wikipedia: The Free Encyclopedia. Wikimedia Foundation, Inc, 2001. Web. 29 Mar. 2010.
Sean Kamperman the author of “The Wikipedia Game: Boring, Pointless, or Neither” believes that wikipedia can be helpful with educational learning purposes. Wikipedia is known for plagiarism and fake information. People make Wikipedia have a bad reputation in schools especially in english classes. Wikipedia can be a source of entertainment and self improvement for some people. Some people might just research stuff on Wikipedia to find interesting articles. In “Wikihunt” many Wikipedia users have “discovered” a game of their own, this involves creativity so it brings out the creative qualities of people. Wikipedia is a educational game and it's also free it's convenient for people. The game “Wikihunt” involves two people in separate computers
The Wikipedia Collective. (2010, February 22). Mark Morris. Retrieved February 28, 2010, from Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Morris
With one easy click on the search button, Google grants entry to a reservoir of information for our use. Carr acknowledges that the internet “has been a godsend to [him] as a writer” because of the ease of finding information rapidly (Carr 732). Before, he would spend days searching through lengthy articles for the same material. Thus, web-browsing proves that not only is the internet useful for finding relevant information, but it is a time-saving tool. In today’s gener...
Like Gladwell, Nicholas Carr believes the internet has negative effects. In his article, “Is Google Making Us Stupid”, Carr attempts to show as the internet becomes our primary source of information, it diminishes the ability to read books and extensive research. Carr goes on to give a very well researched account of how text on the internet is designed make browsing fast and profitable. He describes how the design for skimming affects our thinking skills and attention spans. He wraps up his argument by describing what we are losing in the shift toward using the internet as our main information source. Carr suggests the learning process that occurs in extensive research and through reading is lost. While the learning process can be beneficial to scholars and intellectuals, not everyone has the capability to follow through with it. The internet offers an education that anyone can have access to and understand. Also if Carr believes the learning process is better, this option is always available for people who want to learn according to this scholarly principal. However, for the rest of the population the quick and easy access has allowed the average population to become more educated, and to expose themselves to aspects of academia that previously is reserved for
I think the main idea from the article “How Google, Wikipedia Have Changed Our Lives – For Better and Worse” who was written by Jennifer Woodard is how this generation of people rely entirely too much on the internet to find their answers for school and everyday life. When people used to research for information they were looking for they could spend hours in the library, reading countless books to find their answers and even find more then what they were looking for. Now when researching people are so used to finding out what they want to know it only takes seconds to type in in your phone and find on Google your answer. Learning before there was computers or google, you had to listen to the whole lecture to get an understanding of everything
As Wikipedia has become more and more popular with students, some professors have become increasingly concerned about the online, reader-produced encyclopedia. While plenty of professors have complained about the lack of accuracy or completeness of entries, and some have discouraged or tried to bar students from using it.
Wikipedia: The Free Encyclopedia, 25 Nov. 2013. Web. The Web. The Web.
Carr, Nicholas. “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” The New Humanities Reader. 4th Boston: Wadsworth, 2012. 67-74. Print
Carr, like many people, fear the possibility that Google and the Internet will affect knowledge itself when he reveals that “Maybe I’m just a worrywart” (326). But the Internet as every instrument, it requires to learn how to use it. A process that very likely will last decades and maybe longer, considering how insanely complex the instrument seems. Google and current’s technologies all have “drawing power”. The kind of power that continues to offer readers the ultimate diversity of mass communication. Technology’s needs grow with almost the same pace, human culture and civilization do. We can all agree that a vast number of people prefer to search something in Google rather than reading a book, but the essence remains the same, people
Halsall, Paul. "Internet History Sourcebooks Project." Internet History Sourcebooks Project. Fordham University, n.d. Web. 11 May 2014.
Wikipedia, a crowdsourced online encyclopedia, is extremely beneficial to people who want facts, not opinions, on a wide range of topics. Occasionally, a volunteer editor will insert his or her opinion while creating or editing a page, as was the case with Leonardo DiCaprio's Wikipedia page when someone edited the page and wrote "FINALLY HAS A GODD***ED OSCAR" repeatedly, spoiling the actor's Wikipedia page. While Leonardo DiCaprio did finally win an Oscar for his work, the edit clearly shows bias, violating Wikipedia's regulations. Public figures, including politicians, authors and entrepreneurs, should have a Wikipedia page so that when people are looking for factual information, it is easy to find. A person needn't be as famous as Leonardo
However, suddenly he was stricken by the remembrance that he had failed to update his e-commerce blog today. In his blog he talked about the ins and outs of e-commerce, primarily through personal experience with customer-to-customer transactions on sites like craigslist and eBay. Johnny quickly veered off to the nearest internet café and opened up his laptop. Once Windows finally booted up, he double clicked on the shortcut to google chrome’s internet browser that was located on his taskbar. After searching the webpage he used to write his blog on googles search engine, he signed in and began writing today’s blog. At the end of his post he always provided a hyperlink to both craigslist and eBay so he’s readers could easily view the sites he spoke of. This time though, Johnny began to daydream about the path one’s computer must go through in order to move from his blog post all the way to eBay’s domain name www.eBay.com. It’s really cool stuff. Now that Johnny was done with his blog it was finally time to head home so he could start adding content to his favorite wiki webpage, Wikipedia. He often enjoyed updating other users’ poorly cited information. Hopefully it doesn’t get him into too much
Now that we are living in an ever changing world, technology is viewed as the most resourceful tool in keeping up with the pace. Without the use of technology, communication would be limited to using mail for delivery and encyclopedias for research. Although technology has improved the way we communicate and find information for research, the information is not always valid. Unfortunately, for those of us who use the internet for shopping, research, or reading articles of personal interest the information is not treated the same as a your magazine or book. While such literature is reviewed by an editorial staff, internet literature or information can be published by anyone. In order to reap the full benefit of having the use of technology for any purpose, there are five basic criteria’s one must keep in mind as an evaluating tool for deciding whether or not the particular website is a reliable source for information.
Search engines, specifically Google, have probably contributed more to the distribution of knowledge than any other invention since the creation of the printing press. Google was created by Larry Page and Serge...
With the advancement of technology and the exponential increase of Internet use, professionals-academic and business-are relying on electronic resources for information, research, and data. The Internet gives an individual access to a sea of information, data, and knowledge; plus, this vast amount of information is available in a matter of seconds, rather than hours or days. The ease of access, availability, up-to-the-second timeliness, and vastness of online resources is causing many professionals, however, to forgo the use of print sources. Online resources are useful to conduct scholarly research and 'may be convenient, but they have shortcomings that make print sources necessary for submitting high-quality assignments' (Dilevko & Gottieb, 2002, ¶ 1).