Wikipedia

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=Wikipedia=

An example of a wiki. Wikipedia is a free online encyclopedia, which was rated by individuals specializing in specific fields as slightly more accurate than [|Brittanica encyclopedia]. [|Wikipedia] is interactive in nature, where users can improve and update articles. It comes with various media possibilities including text, links (hyperlinks) and attachments (documents, images, audio and video). Their purpose is to inform and share information on multiple pages where the language is mostly objective and formal. Everyone has access to this web browser. It is free content and open to anyone for editing. [|Wikipedia's] slogan is "The Free Encyclopedia that anyone can edit", and the project is described by its founder Jimmy Wales as "an effort to create and distribute a multilingual free encyclopedia of the highest possible quality to every single person on the planet in their own language." The top five languages Wikipedia functions in are English, German, French, Japanese, Polish. Wikipedia holds reliable information and up-to-date articles. Some users have the habit of vandalizing different pages of articles. They post irrelevant information and delete factual information. But these activities are easily tracked and quickly removed by users who edit the content to maintain the quality information. Hence, people continue to rely on the source. Some people maintain a watchlist for the articles they are most interested in and contributes to regularly. If someone posts new material on that particular article they are interested it, it notifies them. The user can then check if anyone posted useful or irrelevant content. And if they did, it is quickly removed. Great online tool for students to become involved in a learning process and allows students to have a voice stating their opinions while contributing course related content.

=Problems with Wikipedia=

One must always be cautious when consulting online resources such as Wikipedia. Due to it's nature, any information may be edited to be false, skewed, or biased in any topic on the website. For [|example], US political groups made changes in the personal entires of senators that removed campaign promises and made them look more appealing to the public. Additionally, Wikipedia itself states there have been problems concerning reliability, which include difficulty of fact checking, use of dubious sources, exposure to vandals, privacy concerns, quality concerns, fanatics and special interests, and censorship.

It is also important to keep in mind that any articles on Wikipedia, legitimate or not, that deal with subject matter past ordinary life that would normally be found in scholarly journals are research articles references from the originals. As writing is interpretive, a reader of wikipedia must always be aware that what they are reading may not reflect the true nature of the subject.