[WikiEN-l] Re: Medical Disclaimer

[Daniel Mayer]

On Wednesday 19 March 2003 09:26 am, wikien-l-request at wikipedia.org wrote:
> Jesse and all,
>
> This is just the question whether Wikipedia is meant to be a reliable
> reference source.
>
> If not, it should be clearly stated that _no_ information is meant to be
> taken seriously.
> If yes, we must be prepared to be responsible for what we write here.
> We cannot be sure that someone wouldn't take some misguided action reading
> some joke put in by a vandal (even accessible for a short time to
> readers).
> Wikipedia could be available in print and all reliable printed sources give
> such disclaimers. Not only to be on the safe side legally but to be
> responsible to their readers.
>
> Let's see to it that Wikipedia is not a health hazard.
>
> Regards,
> Kpjas.

I agree - Wikipedia is in constant development by volunteers and has many 
rough edges. Therefore a blanket disclaimer linked from the the same place as 
our copyright notice is, is needed for all articles. This would also be 
needed for a sifter version too - otherwise our editors or the Foundation can 
be held liable if somebody uses an article to their detriment (even if that 
detriment is getting an F on a test or blowing up your lab). 

Using Wikipedia is like installing pre-beta software on your computer. So we 
should communicate this fact to people and also mention that because we are a 
wiki /they/ are also responsible for the accuracy of articles they read (if 
they find a mistake then they should fix it right away and not become 
indigent about it). 

So this problem isn't unique to medical articles. 

-- Daniel Mayer (aka mav)

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