On 4/21/06, Tony Sidaway <f.crdfa(a)gmail.com>
wrote:
Interesting. In this case, apparently, a Special Master, appointed by
the court under the Vaccine Act, introduced items from the internet,
including one which originated as a Wikipedia article. On the
evidence in those unverified documents, she dismissed a case for
damages because evidence could not be presented to demonstrate that
the nature of the child's seizures following vaccination was as
described in the internet documents. There was no evidentiary hearing
and so neither party had the opportunity to challenge that internet
evidence introduced by the Special Master.
The federal court, naturally, was not impressed.
Wow. That's disturbing. There are times when the influence of Wikipedia
makes me distinctly uncomfortable...if I make a mistake in what I write, if
I screw something up, I have changed "knowledge". Yet again, I wish that
the world understood that Wikipedia is a beta.
Particularly if you consider that most of our vaccine articles are at
best undergoing the wikipedia equiverlent of a mexican standoff.
--
geni