2010-03-25

School anti-wikipedia dogma

OK, my daughter (14) has had it drummed in to her by the school that "we aren't allowed to use wikipedia because it can be updated by any member of the public"...

You only have to mention wikipedia and she blurts that out!!!

The fact that any member of the public can register a convincing domain name and put up a convincing web site with total drivel in it, without peer review, making them less reliable than wikipedia, seems to be beside the point. They are allowed to use any other web site as reference apart from wikipedia.

The fact wikipedia articles normally have a long list of external references, which are the very web sites that they are allowed to look at, so they can check the sources (even though those themselves could be bogus) does not seem to matter either.

I may write to the school...

2 comments:

  1. The whole anti-wikipedia thing is quite amusing, sure wikipedia can be full of misleading nonesense, but they seem to have no understanding that even the 'official' account can be nothing more than fiction. Having some 'official' or government rubber stamp doesn't make something true, trustworthy or the 'right thing'.

    After all, History is written by the victors..

    ReplyDelete
  2. It all makes much more sense when you realise it's not about being right, it's about being able to shift the blame for being wrong.

    ReplyDelete

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