Now, obviously, Wikipedia is no primary source of information if you want to do research on any subject; but it makes for a decent place to begin. Whatever be the quality of their sources, people who contribute do also contribute their sources to those entries found there.
Sure... there's something to be said about unqualified people posting there. Not to mention trolls and even high school teachers (yes... I knew one that bragged about trashing wikipedia to get kids not to use it....), posting nonsense to sabotage the good efforts of others. Either way, it doesn't matter, because if you look further, it works. Any mistakes can be corrected.
Though there's something else lurking behind the distrust of crowdsourced information, a distrust of those not in a position of authority. This is kinda way off topic, but its something I've noticed that came from a criticism of my earlier work using wikipedia as a starting point.
Sure... there's something to be said about unqualified people posting there. Not to mention trolls and even high school teachers (yes... I knew one that bragged about trashing wikipedia to get kids not to use it....), posting nonsense to sabotage the good efforts of others. Either way, it doesn't matter, because if you look further, it works. Any mistakes can be corrected.
Though there's something else lurking behind the distrust of crowdsourced information, a distrust of those not in a position of authority. This is kinda way off topic, but its something I've noticed that came from a criticism of my earlier work using wikipedia as a starting point.
