Wikipedia at 10th Anniversary: Tensions in the Crowd-sourcing Model

There have been several good articles in the press stimulated by the 10th Anniversary of Wikipedia going live on January 15, 2001 (for example, Wikipleadia in The Economist, http://www.economist.com/node/17911276.)  I, for one, am a heavy user of Wikipedia, for almost as long as it has been in existence.  So much so, that I’m unloading my personal library of reference books and encyclopedias that I haven’t touched for 5 or more years.  Most charitable organizations will not even take them in donation.

My use of Wikipedia ranges from serious research to entertainment.  The serious research usually starts with Wikipedia for  orientation, but does not end there.  My entertainment use is either an aide to solving crossword puzzles or digging for background on movies, authors, actors, writers, etc.  I recognize the limitations of the volunteer author / editor model (crowd sourcing) used by Wikipedia.  However, about 5 years ago, a study of accuracy indicated that Wikipedia attained about the same level of accuracy as professionally edited and authored reference works such as paper encyclopedias.  As an academic, I had been exposed to the dynamics of the encyclopedia business years ago.  Most articles were written not by top scholars, but by junior scholars (hoping to advance their careers) for very little money.  The editorial workload was also very high, so many of these articles got only limited review.  Wikipedia’s model replaces the junior scholar with the passionate amateur (some of whom are also scholars) and the overworked editors and reviewers with volunteers and a structured system of article standards.  Consequently, articles are constantly being rewritten and reviewed, addressing one of the fundamental problems with paper reference material... rapidly becoming dated.

In The Economist article, it is noted that the number of regular contributors to the English-language encyclopedia has dropped from about 54,000 in March 2007 to about 35,000 in September, 2010 and that Wikipedia has been increasingly accused of elitism in its editorial policies and practices.  One argument for the decline in contributors is that most of the subjects of interest to readers have already been written.  The counter argument is that, in order to deal with concerns about accuracy and vandalism, the editorial policies and practices have become increasingly restrictive and reactionary, thus frustrating the energy and good will of the volunteer labor force.  A group that gets gratification from seeing their work published and used by the greater Wikipedia community.

In any event, the Wikipedia phenomenon, which attracts 400 M visitors a month, is a remarkable and transformative story of the impact of Internet technology on people’s lives.  What’s your reaction to the tension between volunteer authors and editors and Wikipedia’s editorial policies and practices to ensure greater accuracy and immunity to vandalism?  How do you use Wikipedia?  How much do you trust what you find there?