How to Use Wikipedia Intelligently
Not all articles are created equal. Most articles aren’t completely true, are biased, and even considering them as sources will give you dubious marks at best. To protect your integrity, as well as your pride, perform the following each time you are scanning a Wikipedia article for some source material.
The next time you are on Wikipedia, take a look at the top right of an article of your choice. If you see a little lock, that means that nobody can edit it anymore. In other words, the article is comprehensive and/or it is protected from vandalism. If an article does not have a lock, be very wary of it. You can use it, but much more work to verify the source material will be required on your part.
As you read through an article, click on every single citation number next to any information you think you might need. If a source looks good, write it down so you can find it later. By using Wikipedia in this fashion, you can get both the executive summary and an expansive list of sources for many topics.
A final thought…try to only use Wikipedia for small assignments or lower-division courses. Once you begin longer, upper-division coursework, you’ll need to do something else.
Just to clarify something here: the “lock” graphic is an indication that the article is protected for some reason. It may be semi-protected, which blocks anonymous non-registered and new users from editing it, or fully protected, in which case administrators are the only people who can edit. Protection is a vandalism or dispute resolution tool, used when an article has been hit heavily by vandalism or is in the middle of an edit war among a number of users; it isn’t an endorsement of that particular version of the article.
If you look at pages such as Russia, Turkey, or George W. Bush, there is a lock. These articles may be prone to vandalism, but are also replete with well-documented information.
By limiting the individuals who have the right to alter an article for any reason, vandalism or otherwise, endorsement of the existing version is implicit.
Hey there!
Great points on using Wikipedia! Another wiki-based site you might like to check out is CollegeWikis.com. We’d love to see you in the community.
http://www.nytimes.com/external/venturebeat/2008/10/07/07venturebeat-collegewikis-bags-2m-to-make-old-fashioned-e-98770.html?pagewanted=print
Crystal Williams
CollegeWikis Community Coordinator
Thanks for the information! I use wikipedia a lot when doing research. I’ll keep an eye out, though I usually check the additional resources anyway.