Wikipedia, the ultimate search engine (Source: Wikipedia.com)Wikipedia
In recent times, once a person is in need of information, they are more likely to turn to “Wikipedia”. Therefore, it has become a device which widely used by many online users. Wikipedia is a free online encyclopedia which attracts 683 million visitors annually, it provides information which covers almost everything that a user search for, and it is also a multilingual information search mechanisms which consists a total of 253 languages, as Wikipedia has become the largest online-based encyclopedia by article and word count (Elliot 2006). Furthermore, articles on Wikipedia are entirely written by volunteers as it has created an information sharing phenomenon (Elliot 2006). That is, anyone who has internet access is able to edit or update the existing article in Wikipedia, and then the article will eventually publish on the site. Hence, someone who have professional background in that certain subject area can write an article, then anyone can just edit it with their opinions regardless whether they are a qualified writer or not.
Britannica website (Source: Britannica.com)
Britannica
Britannica is an encyclopedia which have both online and printed version. Furthermore, its online encyclopedia consists more than 100,000 articles which by a staff of 19 full-time editors and over 4,000 expert contributors, in which it is consider as a source of valid information which set an example of reliable reference (Terdiman 2005). Hence, in order to use Britannica we have to pay unlike Wikipedia which is free in nature.
Wikipedia- To trust or not?
Is Wikipedia reliable? (Source:Google)
The main criticism of Wikipedia is its credibility, as its accuracy has become an issue due to its open policy which allows vandalism, uneven quality, inconsistency and unproven individual opinions occurs (Elliot 2006). That is, any random online users can alter or edit Wikipedia’s articles in which it leads to mistakes and erroneous statement occurs as it is based on their own knowledge, judgement and opinions. Therefore, there is site Furthermore, as a student we are not allowed to use Wikipedia as a source for references as it is consider not reliable for academic purposes. Nevertheless, a study by Nature shows that Wikipedia is as accurate as Britannica whereby the average mistake of the two is 2.92 mistakes per article for Britannica and 3.86 for Wikipedia (Terdiman 2005). Apart from that, Wikipedia’s site provides hypertexts, links and menu bar, in which users are able to click on any links or the menu bar to navigate to other articles or relevant sites. That is, it sets a non-linear pathway whereby readers are able to access to a variety of information, to choose different pathways depending on their interest and there is no beginning or ending as there is many reading path which is less strictly coded (Walsh 2006, p.30).
In my opinion, Wikipedia is a useful source to refer with, as it is a device which provides almost everything from A-Z. By using Wikipedia, we are able to obtain information which we desired, and also able to gain knowledge and understanding towards a certain topic. But, Wikipedia is lack of accountability, in which it can be easily edited by others, so I felt that it is a useful medium but not reliable to used especially for academic purposes.
Reference List
Elliot. J 2006, What is Wikipedia?, Associated Content, viewed 4th June 2008,
Terdiman, D 2005, Study:Wikipedia as accurate as Britannica, CnetNew.com, viewed 4th June 2008,
Walsh, M 2006, “Textual shift”: examining the reading process with print, visual and multimodal texts’, Australian Journal of Language and Literacy, vol. 29, no. 1, pp. 30.
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