On Wikipedia

I love Wikipedia and I use it often. Not everyday, but certainly several times a week. There I've said it. I'm a 'full-grown' academic PhD in hand and I think Wikipedia is a fantastically useful thing. Use it. Better still contribute to it, for this is the really amazing thing about it.

But, there's always a but,

CAUTION: IT IS ALWAYS A BAD IDEA TO CITE AN ENCYCLOPEDIA IN ACADEMIC RESEARCH PAPERS.

Follow the link above. That's what Wikipedia has to say about its academic utility. I agree with everything said there and also with this Chronicle of Higher Education article and comments . Fundamentally, Wikipedia, like any encyclopedia, is only a starting for your research. To which I would add that owing to the way in which Wikipedia entries are authored they range in quality from exceptionally erroneous, even maliciously slanderous in at least one case, to exceptionally good. You must exercise critical judgment about what you read on Wikipedia--actually this is a good general rule but it's especially the case here. As it happens, I am impressed with the quality of Wikipedia entries in the areas in which I specialize. The problem more often than not is lack of depth and subtlety rather than factual inaccuracy.

There's an article by Marshall Poe in the September 2006 edition of the the Atlantic Monthly (subscription only, great magazine, you should consider subscribing) which I quote:

Wikipedia has the potential to be the greatest effort in collaborative knowledge gathering the world has ever known, and it may well be the greatest effort in voluntary collaboration of any kind.

I'm fascinated by the whole idea of the collaborative approach to knowledge-building which Wikipedia represents. I think it's a very big thing. Justt be cautious and sensible about how you use it and never rely on it exclusively.