Monday, March 12, 2007

Point underlined

Wikipedia is dealing with the fallout from the revelation that one on its most prolific contributors lied about his qualifications in an online profile.

Wikipedian "essjay" claimed a string of degrees he had never earned and only came clean when approached to join Wikia Inc., the money making arm of the online encyclopedia.

The anonymity provided by the Interweb is one of its great attractions, and underpins many great sites like Second Life for instance.

But when it comes to being taken seriously as a trustworthy source of knowledge, anonymity is seldom helpful, as Wikipedia has found to its cost.

via Slashdot

No comments: