Wikipedia (the “free online encyclopedia that anyone can edit”) is having a huge impact on how a great many people gather information about the world. So, it is important for epistemologists and information scientists to ask whether people are likely to acquire knowledge as a result of having access to this information source. In other words, is Wikipedia having good epistemic consequences? After surveying the various concerns that have been raised about the reliability of Wikipedia, this article argues that the epistemic consequences of people using Wikipedia as a source of information are likely to be quite good. According to several empirical studies, the reliability of Wikipedia compares favorably to the reliability of traditional encyclopedias. Furthermore, the reliability of Wikipedia compares even more favorably to the reliability of those information sources that people would be likely to use if Wikipedia did not exist (viz., Web sites that are as freely and easily accessible as Wikipedia). In addition, Wikipedia has a number of other epistemic virtues (e.g., power, speed, and fecundity) that arguably outweigh any deficiency in terms of reliability. Even so, epistemologists and information scientists should certainly be trying to identify changes (or alternatives) to Wikipedia that will bring about even better epistemic consequences. This article suggests that to improve Wikipedia, we need to clarify what our epistemic values are and to better understand why Wikipedia works as well as it does.

http://ce.uoregon.edu/aim/ElecInfoW09/EpistemologyWikipedia.pdf

Toward an Epistemology ofWikipedia

Wikipedia (the “free online encyclopedia that anyone can edit”) is having a huge impact on how a great many people gather information about the world. So, it is important for epistemologists and information scientists to ask whether people are likely to acquire knowledge as a result of having access to this information source. In other words, is Wikipedia having good epistemic consequences? After surveying the various concerns that have been raised about the reliability of Wikipedia, this article argues that the epistemic consequences of people using Wikipedia as a source of information are likely to be quite good. According to several empirical studies, the reliability of Wikipedia compares favorably to the reliability of traditional encyclopedias. Furthermore, the reliability of Wikipedia compares even more favorably to the reliability of those information sources that people would be likely to use if Wikipedia did not exist (viz., Web sites that are as freely and easily accessible as Wikipedia). In addition, Wikipedia has a number of other epistemic virtues (e.g., power, speed, and fecundity) that arguably outweigh any deficiency in terms of reliability. Even so, epistemologists and information scientists should certainly be trying to identify changes (or alternatives) to Wikipedia that will bring about even better epistemic consequences. This article suggests that to improve Wikipedia, we need to clarify what our epistemic values are and to better understand why Wikipedia works as well as it does.

Somebody who reads Wikipedia is “rather in the position of a visitor to a public restroom,” says Mr. McHenry, Britannica's former editor. “It may be obviously dirty, so that he knows to exercise great care, or it may seem fairly clean, so that he may be lulled into a false sense of security. What he certainly does not know is who has used the facilities before him.” One wonders whether people like Mr. McHenry would prefer there to be no public lavatories at all.

The Economist (Vol. 379, April 22, 2006, pp. 14–15) © 2008 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

http://www.clubedejornalistas.pt/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/FallisWikipedia.pdf

Toward an epistemology of Wikipedia

The cultural heritage preservation community now functions largely within the environment of digital technologies. This article begins by juxtaposing definitions of the terms “digitization for preservation” and “digital preservation” within a sociotechnical environment for which Google serves as a relevant metaphor. It then reviews two reports published twelve years apart under the auspices of the Council on Library and Information Resources. Preserving Digital Information presented an insightful and visionary framework for digital preservation in 1996. Preservation in the Age of Large-Scale Digitization explores the implications for preservation practice of the digitization of books and, by implication, our cultural heritage in general. These juxtapositions frame four dilemmas for preservation relating to the impact of environmental storage, new challenges to preservation quality, threats to audiovisual heritage, and an emerging expertise gap. The article concludes with recommendations and observations on making difficult choices. It’s the end of the world as we know it. (R.E.M.)

/pdf/preservation-in-the-age-of-google-digitization-digital-41cw1ohbsw.pdf

Preservation in the Age of Google: Digitization, Digital Preservation, and Dilemmas.

This bibliography presents selected articles, books, electronic documents, and other sources that are useful in understanding scholarly electronic publishing efforts on the Internet and other networks.

Scholarly electronic publishing bibliography

Scholarly Electronic Publishing Weblog

As libraries prepare to convert an increasing proportion of their services to online form, it is essential that they pause to review and define the core qualities of those services; only in that way can the systematic and conscious transfer of such services to an online environment be assured. This definition of core services is especially important for academic libraries, which face special economic and political challenges. Some of the most fundamental aspects of library operations entail the existence of a border, across which objects of information are transferred and maintained. Such a parameter, demarcating a single, distributed digital library (the "control zone"), needs to be created and managed by the academic library community at the earliest opportunity. One basic objective of such a single digital research library should be to serve as an alternative publishing mechanism for specialized scholarly communication. In order to achieve that combination of the collection and the publication function...

Library Functions, Scholarly Communication, and the Foundation of the Digital Library: Laying Claim to the Control Zone

Scholarship conducted in an increasingly online environment requires the services of a trusted third party in order to ensure that scholarly communication remains reliably accessible and applicable over the longer term. The library, by virtue of its most fundamental values and attributes, is probably better suited at this time than other information intermediaries to assume such a role. In order to understand the nature and responsibility of the trusted third party, or fair witness, it is essential to consider the key concept of transversality (especially as it is defined by the German philosopher Wolfgang Welsch) as it relates to information services. Assuming the role of trusted third party will also require that the academic library be prepared to undertake some fundamental changes in currently prevalent directions and values that will affect its relationship to other information intermediaries and, potentially, also to its parent institution.

https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1086/431332

Ross Atkinson

Papers

Library Functions, Scholarly Communication, and the Foundation of the Digital Library: Laying Claim to the Control Zone

Transversality and the role of the library as fair witness