Wikipedia & Newsrooms

Wikipedia is still considered pretty radioactive among journalists. We know we can't trust its entries at any given moment since anyone can edit them [1]. We take no comfort in assurances [1] to contributors like "You can't break Wikipedia. Anything can be fixed or improved later" -- when "later" is five minutes after I hit the button.

You rarely see the phrase "according to Wikipedia" in a news story, and news stories about Wikipedia tend to stress the various and sundry innocent errors and malicious hacks that have besotted some if its entries.

And yet this free, always-available site with more than 2 million entries is, potentially, a tantalizing resource. Is there a way to tap into all that crowdsourced goodness without ending up the victim of some evil prankster or well-intentioned dummy?

Wikipedia is a top 10-rated Alexa [2] site. Nearly 112,000 other sites link to it. About 9% of all the Internet users in the world visit it. So it's a safe bet that even if Wikipedia citations don't make it into news stories its fans include some reporters who, while they might never, ever cite Wikipedia in a story under their signer, use it nevertheless to get the job done.

We know of at least one reporter who does: David Cay Johnston, a Pulitzer-winning reporter for the New York Times (wonder how accurate his Wikipedia entry [3] is?).

Carr tells Donna Smith at the American Journalism Review [4] that he recently looked up the Wikipedia entry for "thermodynamics" and found numerous references from reliable sources.

"I have a solid understanding of the concept, but once we get into fine points, I have nothing beyond my skepticism as a reporter to judge the accuracy, validity and reliability of what is there," he says. "However, this entry appears to be useful as a source guide. It has names of researchers whose books were published by eminent organizations, and you can take that as a quick way to find sources. So as a tip sheet, as a road map to reliable sources, Wikipedia seems valuable."

So, be not totally afraid. But by all means be careful; even Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales tells Smith that its best journalistic use is for background.

His conclusion, he says, "comes from people who have used the site for a long time and know, 'I have to be careful'... which is what good reporting is supposed to be about anyway."

Smith's article is a thorough review of the state of Wikipedia play, plusses and pitfalls. Read it here [4].