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The World of Wikis

Do wiki communities spread fact or fiction?


April 29
        Have you ever wondered which dog won the World’s Ugliest Dog Contest last year or what the longest word in the English language is? Look no further than Wikipedia to find answers to these questions  and many more.
       Wikipedia is one of a number of sites called wikis, websites that allow anyone to write,add to or change a site’s text. But , are wikis reliable sources of information? The jury is till out on that as not everyone is enamored of the sites.

Conversation A
Adam: I’m so glad to finally be finished with my research paper. I ended up finding a lot of great information on Wikipedia.

Beth: Wikipedia? Are you serious? Wikis have no credibility. Articles on those sites are full of inaccurate information.

Adam: I disagree. In fact, I am convinced that wikis are reliable. They work because a community of writers oversees all of the content.

Beth: Maybe, but just how qualified are these people? What if they really don’t know much about a topic but write about it anyway?

Adam: That’s possible, but the writing community has
enough people involve that mistake are caught quickly and revisions are made.