[WikiEN-l] Wikipedia's provable anti-expertise bias

[Jimmy Wales]

Tony Sidaway wrote:
> If the Wikipedia article is any good it should cite sources, and if
> you're at a university you have access to those sources and should
> check them and cite those where appropriate.
> 
> Suppose two of my students turn in  essays on the Milgram experiment,
> one citing Wikipedia as the source and obviously relying on the
> Wikipedia article on that experiment, the other citing Milgram's paper
> and Blass' fairly recent critiques, and demonstrating a knowledge of
> the material. Well odds are that both went to Wikipedia first, but the
> second one actually did his homework.

That's exactly what I always say.  We strive to be (and sometimes, but
not yet nearly as much as we'd like) Britannica or better quality.  But
even at that level of quality, frankly, it's just not appropriate to
cite any encyclopedia at the university level.  That's not the role of
an encyclopedia in the process.

The proper role is what Tony describes here -- you use the encyclopedia
to get started, to get an overview, and *then* you do your homework, and
hopefully a lot more effectively than you would if you took a random
stab at the library catalogue.

--Jimbo