Yes, I haven't updated in two months and after I post this, I probably won't post again for two months because I'm ever-so-wonderful at maintaining a blog. What can I say? Even amongst friends I usually can't be bothered with long-winded explanations and justifications of my opinions, so why should I care enough to tell the ever apathetic Internet? But this entry is spur-of-the-moment and prompted by a bit of indignation after a conversation with one of my professors.
He told me that Wikipedia is crap [sic].
Well, I can agree well enough that it's pretty inappropriate and lazy to cite for research papers, or even just papers in general. But crap all around? I would have to disagree, sir. Wikipedia is our generation's mine field of information. Many people use it as their only news source, ahead of newspapers, blogs, and televised media. It's usefulness cannot be denied. Now it's accuracy?
Certainly there will be inconsistencies and bias now and again, but I firmly believe in the power of psychotic Wikipedians to correct things that are amazingly wrong and blatantly slanted. Most of the time, anyway. That's why articles are locked. Of course, lesser known and less important articles will be vandalized for the hell of it and maybe sniplets of falsities will be taken as truth by the unsuspecting browser, but the most important things are, for the most part, kept straight.
Wikipedia should probably never be your only source of information. But isn't that why all articles include at least one citation to another source so you can follow up on it? Isn't it useful for at least that? I'm getting tired of discussing this already... My opinion is obviously biased anyway, just like my professor's is. I grew up on the Internet and have great respect for it while simultaneously knowing all of its incredibly faults. I love that information is at the tip of my fingers and amazingly easy to access while knowing that the people giving me this information may not always be credible. It's a risk that comes with the rewards, I guess. But sometimes I think people like to point out all the errors and forget the amazingness of the people that are honestly working hard to make Wikipedia the best that it can be.
I dunno. In my own defense, I was only using Wiki to verify what I already knew. Who the hell's going to vandalize an article on Sadako Sasaki and the Thousand Paper Cranes anyway?
And now back to your regularly scheduled silence.
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