User:Jessyyx

Week 6- Discussion: Thinking about Wikipedia

What do you think of Wikipedia's definition of "neutrality"?

I think that Wikipedia's definition of "neutrality" is fair for the type of content it publishes. Since this website is based on this concept of building upon existent sources, it is appropriate for their definition of neutrality to exclude any type of bias/point of view in any of the writing whatsoever. Unlike other definitions of the words which include having no strong opinions about a subject and being open minded, this one excludes opinion in every sense of the word. This means that in whatever article you decide to add to or whatever article you decide to create, all of the information has to come from reliable, credible sources that offer direct information with no type of alternative point of view to it. In my opinion, this is the best definition of neutrality for this website especially for the type of content that it delivers and publishes.

What are the impacts and limits of Wikipedia as a source of information?

Using Wikipedia as a source of information as a lot of positive impacts and a lot of limitations. One of the most influential impacts it has is the constant reinforcement of its sources. Whether you are doing a research paper or adding onto a project for school or work, going into Wikipedia to find information on your area of choice opens up the portal to dozens of citations and external references that are reliable and can be used to further on your research. Another aspect of using it as a source of information is as a gateway or introduction to whatever it is that you are putting focus on. By adding this as a source, it shows where you initially began your search in order to expand for more. At the same time, there are limits for using this a source. One of those limitations is lack of credibility/sources. Despite the fact that Wikipedia follows a strict neutrality rule on no bias, there are thousands of articles that are missing the correct amount of information. If you use Wikipedia as your main source of information without putting effort into other research, you may make the mistake of not having enough depth in your analysis and therefore the source is not substantial enough for the work you are trying to do.

On Wikipedia, all material must be attributable to reliable, published sources. What kinds of sources does this exclude? Can you think of any problems that might create?

This excludes sources that do not come from in depth research analysis such as social media posts, blog posts, press releases, or small business websites. Using these type of sources that are not considered to be "reliable" or "published" may bring upon a lot of issues when conducting research on a specific topic. One of the biggest problems would be getting the wrong type of information because it is not based on the right sources or because it has no sources whatsoever. This means using a source that is solely based on personal opinion, like an article about the Presidents journey so far yet only speaking about what he has done wrong rather than focusing on the entirety of his work in general. If you use a source like this then it is not reliable because not only is it not neutral but it has no depth or research into the topic.

If Wikipedia was written 100 years ago, how might its content (and contributors) be different? What about 100 years from now?

If it was written 100 years ago, which would be in 1917, the first thing that would be different is the source of Wikipedia itself. Since the internet had not been created yet, the amount of contributors would be incredibly minimal compared to the amount of contributors there are today. The internet allows people to input information from all parts of the world and hence, millions are now a part of the platform. But, if it were 1917, this would probably be limited to the American people as an "add on" newspaper or something similar of the sort. Also, the content would also be a lot more limited than it is today because people would not have the same accessibility. 100 years from now it would be 2117 and if society continues on the same technological path it has today then we will be a lot more advanced. This means that those contributors would probably see the platform we have now in the same way I am analyzing how it could have been in 1917. There would probably be a more evolved "internet" and hence allows contributors to have easier access than we have now.