Did you mean to say that your buddy Steve Johnson implies that anonymity tends to make one m o r e prone, and not less prone to post careless entries or outright pranks? I'm not sure that I agree, but I do believe that is what you meant to say about Steve's point of view. However, if that anonymity, like a non de plume, works in the opposite direction, works to free the imagination, maybe it's a trade-off: something lost, but something gained.

Anonymity doesn't matter. It's reliability that counts and the problem with wikipedia or any other informative media outlet is that one mistruth can completely ruin credibility. It's sad, but with so many perspectives, it is hard to say what is and isn't truth anymore. You just have to take what you can get and hope that it's pretty close to being accurate.

The fact is is this. You ( An Internet user )would never believe what was written on a piece of paper you found on the floor but will believe anything that is written on the iternet. Strange isn't it...

One thing I've not yet seen commented on regarding this study: how many of the errors are overlapping? I'd bet Britannica has probably set what "fact" is for a good chunk of the errors on Wikipedia. It would be interesting know if where one was wrong the other was wrong or right.

And I'm sorry, but given the fuss surrounding Britannica as an authoritative source, 3 errors per article is way too high. Shame on them.

I fail to understand how someone would want to ruin the reputation and image of a database of information like Wikipedia. The idea is revolutionary, and it is one that will work as long as people take it seriously. The "prankster" (here read "fool") that wrote the bogus article should find some other soap box for his pranks and realize that the audience is not only those with enough common sense to see his remarks are idiodic, but also children who may be writing a paper or trying to do a report which involves looking up and relying on information in this forum. Let's all grow up and use this resource properly....
It also comes to mind how we "automatically" assume (!!!) that Brittanica is the authoritative source... It may also be possible that in some areas, Wikipedia may be more accurate than Brittanica....

People use the internet in many cases as a smoke screen: masking both themselves and their agendas. The Wikipedia allows this perfectly.

Therein lies the difficulty with it. Without some way of identifying the authors of posts and edits, it is nearly impossible to see through the smoke.

At least with other media that has some editorial controls in place there is some way of checking the facts. And even if there is not any built in way of checking the facts presented within the media itself, there are other sources for fact checking.

Bottom line, when reading anything online or off, it is good practice to practice critical listening. View anything you read with a critical eye and ask yourself, who is publishing this? and why may they be doing so?

However, with wikipedia, someone has most likly read this report and fixed those particular errors, thats why it is far more useful

In my opinion, "Wikipedia admin and mods are abusing their power over article edits to try to make adolescents believe that child and or adolescent sex with adult strangers is ok. Even though these strangers have no children of their own- they want you or your child to feel safe with them and to be allowed to consent to intimacy and sex with them if you want to. They want parents and children to believe that they mean children no harm and would never ever ever hurt a child even though they are very much sexually attracted to children and they believe that the children will agree with them.
Perhaps I should amend or edit my opinion to say that Wikipedia isn't abusing their power, isn't favoring one POV over another and truly wants children to draw their own conclusions as to whether Wikipedia is neutral and has not distorted or removed any pertinent facts? I am pretty sure Jimbo would agree: that parents are not neutral- that parents are abusing their power by limiting our childrens' and other peoples childrens' rights based upon arbitrary age restrictions? Perhaps Jimbo feels that it is a child's right to be exposed to any and all media that claims neutrality and that claims to have no agenda, to limit their right to know things and experience things if they want to regardlessa of the source, to limit their right to decide if they can have sex with anyone thay want to have sex with at any age, or to make it illegal take or buy certain prescription drugs or to drink alcohol or to drive cars and have a drivers license- the children should be allowed to make and draw conclusions on all of these topics at any age that they think that they are ready or want to do so, afterall they do not have the right to vote, they are unrepresented in congress,in government, on school boards,as physicians in emergency rooms, as "legal"porn stars; with so many of their rights violated by their parents and other people who aren't even parents, we should at least make it legal for them to buy and enjoy porn if and when they want to? No Jimbo, I disagree with that view so I won't edit my opinion to say so."
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Jimbo Wales who partly owns Wikipedia also partly owns Bomis, a well known pornography enterprise.

I learned about this issue from an opinion piece on an anti-predator watchdog group website Perverted-Justice.com.

http://www.perverted-justice.com/opinions/?article=11

Please take note that Wikipedia is not censored for the protection of minors, and that is just one reason why parents and teachers should consider blocking the website. This news link http://news.baou.com/main.php?action=recent&rid=20679 contains the original published article. (see also www.wikipedophilia.com )

I must warn you that this next link contains sexually explicit photographs from the BOMIS.org site as evidence of the veracity of the statements made against WikiPedia.http://news.baou.com/main.php?action=recent&rid=20683

In my opinion, "Wikipedia admin and mods are abusing their power over article edits to try to make adolescents believe that child and or adolescent sex with adult strangers is ok. Even though these strangers have no children of their own- they want you or your child to feel safe with them and to be allowed to consent to intimacy and sex with them if you want to. They want parents and children to believe that they mean children no harm and would never ever ever hurt a child even though they are very much sexually attracted to children and they believe that the children will agree with them.
Perhaps I should amend or edit my opinion to say that Wikipedia isn't abusing their power, isn't favoring one POV over another and truly wants children to draw their own conclusions as to whether Wikipedia is neutral and has not distorted or removed any pertinent facts? I am pretty sure Jimbo would agree: that parents are not neutral- that parents are abusing their power by limiting our childrens' and other peoples childrens' rights based upon arbitrary age restrictions? Perhaps Jimbo feels that it is a child's right to be exposed to any and all media that claims neutrality and that claims to have no agenda? Perhaps parents shouldn't limit their right to know things and experience things if they want to regardless of their age, to limit their right to decide if they can have sex with anyone thay want to have sex with at any age, or to make it illegal take or buy certain prescription drugs or to drink alcohol or to drive cars and have a drivers license- the children should be allowed to make and draw conclusions on all of these topics at any age that they think that they are ready or want to do so, afterall they do not have the right to vote, they are unrepresented in congress,in government, on school boards,as physicians in emergency rooms, as "legal"porn stars; with so many of their rights violated by their parents and other people who aren't even parents, we should at least make it legal for them to buy and enjoy porn if and when they want to? No Jimbo, I disagree with that view so I won't edit my opinion to say so."
-----------------------------------
Jimbo Wales who partly owns Wikipedia also partly owns Bomis, a well known pornography enterprise.

I learned about this issue from an opinion piece on an anti-predator watchdog group website Perverted-Justice.com.

http://www.perverted-justice.com/opinions/?article=11

Please take note that Wikipedia is not censored for the protection of minors, and that is just one reason why parents and teachers should consider blocking the website. This news link http://news.baou.com/main.php?action=recent&rid=20679 contains the original published article. (see also www.wikipedophilia.com )

I must warn you that this next link contains sexually explicit photographs from the BOMIS.org site as evidence of the veracity of the statements made against WikiPedia.http://news.baou.com/main.php?action=recent&rid=20683

Well disclosing the identity of the contributors may help to improve te accuracy. Probably Wikipedia may look like comments pages of Amazon.com. This policy may also encourage the contributors becasue their efforts will be more visible.

But I would like to point out some problems.

When someone suggests to change a posting the person who has written it would defend much more rigidly. a basic persuasion concept in: people wants to be consistent. Therefore, disscussions to update an item in wikipedia can be fierce personal legacy wars and makes it harder to update itself which is the greatest advantage of Wikipedia.

Wikipedia is an experiment in unleashing the power of human mind that is willing to work at its level best without any selfish gain or inertest. I feel it is the debate and discussion among people and the curiosity of the human mind at play that is much more important than the accuracy of entries. And to that extend Wikipeia is doing a laudable job. Even if you compare the accuracy of Wikipedia with that of Britannica, I am amazed to find that an encyclopedia with several decades of repute and that is born out of contributions from "known people" with so many editions of opportunity to correct themselves is not scoring better than Wikipedia

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