Given the importance of the issue of Economic Development, I was convinced that its Wikipedia entry would be extremely reliable. To my surprise, Wikipedia failed the topic of Economic Development. I am not writing this blog post to criticize Wikipedia, as I myself support Wikipedia. But rather, I am writing this blog post to educate users of some of the flaws of the Wikipedia process and how this causes issues with reliability.
There are several different resources that I used to assess the reliability of the topic of Economic Development on Wikipedia. The first resource that I used was the “Talk” tab directly on the article. This “Talk” tab lists comments from users of Wikipedia with respect to what parts of the article needed to be addressed, rephrased, cited, or corrected. Furthermore, I accessed the Encyclopedia Britannica article on Economic Development, and compared this article to the Wikipedia one. Lastly, I used some of the comments that my peers made on their blogs to further develop my arguments.
According to Jensen (2012), Wikipedia “has become the world’s dominant educational resource, with over 4 million articles in English”. The abundance of information found on Wikipedia is truly remarkable. However, one should address whether abundance of information translates to useful or appropriate information? In regards to Wikipedia’s entry on Economic Development, abundance of information was rarely the case. The article was definitely underdeveloped with many important sections and sources missing. Wikipedia rated this article as “Start” Class. A “Start” Class article has the following characteristics: “it is an article that is developing, but which is quite incomplete and, most notably, lacks adequate reliable sources, it provides some meaningful content, but most readers will need more, providing references to reliable sources should come first, and the article also needs substantial improvement in content and organization” (Wikipedia, 2013). The article on Economic Development matched every aspect of the “Start” Class classification. I applaud Wikipedia for developing such a rating system so that users have knowledge on how an article ranks. However, in my many years of using Wikipedia, I was never aware of the talk tab or even the rating system. To be more transparent and reliable, Wikipedia should post the article’s rank on the main page. This is extremely important as 26.4% of all assessed articles are ranked as “Start” Class (Wikipedia, 2013). It is great that Wikipedia has a ranking process in place, but if users are not aware of this process, then what exactly is the point of it?
According to Royal and Kapila’s article “What’s on Wikipedia, and What’s Not . . . ?: Assessing Completeness of Information”, Wikipedia’s accuracy is close to that of Encyclopedia Britannica. I wanted to test this view by reviewing the corresponding article on Encyclopedia Britannica. An individual posted Encyclopedia Britannica’s link to Economic Development on the “Talk” tab encouraging the writers to draw from this source. After reading both the Wikipedia and Encyclopedia Britannica articles, I can, with confidence, conclude that Encyclopedia Britannica’s article is more concise, accurate, and developed than the Wikipedia one. It is also more transparent as I could find exactly who the contributors were and what their qualifications are. I could also find who all of the editors at Encyclopedia Britannica are, but I could not find who the specific editor for this article was. The article on Wikipedia has no mention at all on who the author is and what their qualifications are. Furthermore, the Wikipedia and Encyclopedia Britannica articles had differing views.
It appears that the reason for these differing views is the biases of the authors and the sources. According to Jensen, Wikipedia has a NPOV rule where “all articles must reflect a Neutral point of View, and POV, or bias, is a misdemeanor that is regularly removed” (2012). On Wikipedia’s article about Economic Development, several users commented that there appeared to be a strong U.S. bias, and a strong bias to use a particular agency as a source. These comments were posted as far back as 2009, with no modifications occurring since then.
I already established that the article on Economic Development failed the minimal expectations that I had for Wikipedia, however, many of my concerns plus more were brought up by people in the “Talk” tab. The problem is that since these concerns were brought up, no one has taken the time to correct or adjust the article. It makes me wonder what is the point for peer-review in Wikipedia? This is the part of Wikipedia’s process that needs the most work. Jensen points out that “the Wikipedia community uses kangaroo courts” and “the severest penalty is a ban for a period of time or permanent” (2012). Perhaps Wikipedia needs to adjust this part of the process to encourage writers to quickly update the information based on the suggestions. My peer kkuhlblog mentions that “the approach for self-governing is unique and puts the onus on you and I to challenge accuracy”. I agree with his point, however, we can challenge accuracy all we want, but unless there is some person of authority to oversee that change happens, our views or suggestions are pointless.
Everyone uses Wikipedia for different reasons. My peer yujiaying816 wrote that Wikipedia is mostly used as extracurricular reading. Although I agree that this may be the case, I see the potential for Wikipedia to become more than just extracurricular reading. I think that with some adjustments to the Wikipedia process reliability and accuracy can be greatly improved. Lifeofscanner wrote that people can easily edit information. Van Dijk and Nieborg, authors of Wikinomics and its discontents: a critical analysis of Web 2.0 business manifestos, also explained that all users have the equal ability to add to the Internet world (2009). I have seen that this is exactly the case, yet most of us choose not to edit the article. Most of us, even though we have the knowledge or expertise to add something more insightful to an article, choose for whatever reason not to. We can sit and criticize Wikipedia’s process as much as we like, but by not contributing to the issue (either by direct contribution or by seeking Wikipedia to change its process), we are becoming the issue. We need to help Wikipedia fill the missing puzzle pieces in their logo.
References:
Jensen, R. (2012). Military History on the Electronic Frontier: Wikipedia Fights the
War of 1812. Journal of Military History. 76, 1. pp 1165-1182.
Royal, C. & Kapila, D. (2009). What’s on Wikipedia, and What’s Not . . . ?:
Assessing
Completeness of Information. Social Science Computer Review. 27,
1. pp 138-
148.
Van Dijk, J. & Nieborg, D. (2009). Wikinomics and its discontents: a critical analysis
of Web 2.0 business manifestos. New Media & Society. 11, 5. pp 855-874.
Wikipedia. (2013). Wikipedia:Version 1.0 Editorial.Team/Assessment. May 31st
2013. Retrieved from:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Version_1.0_Editorial_Team/Assess
ment#Quality_scale
Photo Retrieved From: http://www.flickr.com/photos/nojhan/3204073130/
Economic Development in Developing and Third-World Countries 