The founder of
Wikipedia has admitted that some of its entries are "a
horrific embarrassment," says an article by
Guardian Unlimited entitled "
Can you
trust Wikipedia?" The article goes on to
assemble a panel of experts, including a former editor-in-chief of the
Encyclopedia Britannica, literary authors, journalists, and magazine
editors, to judge some of the wiki entries for themselves.
What emerges is a somewhat lukewarm impression of Wikipedia's entries from the panel
of experts. The scores by the judges range from 0 out of 10 to 8 out of 10 for the
various wiki entries, with critiques varying from "inaccurate and
unclear" to "reasonably comprehensive."
It would have been even more
interesting if Guardian Unlimited had gone a step further with its
judges, giving scores and critiques to the same entries in a traditional
encyclopedia, and then comparing the scores.
I agree that comparison with entries in a traditional encyclopedia...
