More and more college professors are refusing to accept Wikipedia, the on-line encyclopedia, as a reference source for a research paper. According to several news reports, professors question the accuracy of material appearing on this free site which pops up with most “Googled” terms. The scary part to me is trusting any site which invites surfers to add to or to correct “data” already listed.
Recently, when I accessed www.thepress-sentinel.com through Google, I noticed that our local newspaper has an entry on Wikipedia. I had to read it, only to discover that some of the facts are incorrect. While The Jesup Sentinel and The Wayne County Press did merge in 1977 as reported, only The Sentinel could claim a history more than a century old. Newcomer The Press didn’t begin until 1961. Likewise, Wikipedia lists Eric Denty as editor-in-chief; actually he’s the publisher and president. There is a difference. It is through such seemingly harmless discrepancies that much disinformation is disseminated around the whole world.
A. J. Jacobs, over the course of a year, read all 33,000 pages, 65,000 articles from 9,500 contributors, in the Encyclopaedia Britannica and lived to write about it in a humorous account, The Know-It-All: One Man’s Humble Quest to Become the Smartest Man in the World. He, too, has real disdain for Internet research. He says, “I could try to read Google from A to Z. But the Internet’s about as reliable as publications sold next to Trident and Duracell at the supermarket checkout line. No I prefer my old-school books.”
Jacobs’ own fascinating book reads like a combination mini-encyclopedia intwined with memoir and opinion. The book is arranged in alphabetical order with each chapter listing certain words with a brief definition from the Britannica. Most that he includes has prompted him to recall his own memories or led him to opine on the meaning of a word.
He goes on to report, “The Britannica is not a book you can skim. This is a book you have to hunch over and pay full attention to, like needlepoint or splinter removal. It hurts my poor little head...The Britannica is packed with weird ways that great lives intersect...It’s something I’ve learned over and over again: luck plays a huge part in history. We like to think that it’s the product of our will and rational decisions and planning. But I’ve noticed it’s just as often - more often- about seemingly tiny whims of fate.”
Even before reading Jacobs’ funny, and at times, poignant book, I trusted the facts within the Encyclopaedia Britannica. Fortunately, by the time I learned to “Google,” I already was pretty selective about my resources. I knew the dangers that lay out there.
With so many candidates, both Republican and Democrat, lining up early to campaign for the office of President of the United States, we could easily field a football team or two. However with numerous campaigns underway, the Internet videos and bloggers are already spewing as much disinformation as fact.
While newspapers regularly print corrections for errors in print, broadcast journalism rarely does and the Internet never does, allowing outright lies to float around in the nether world forever, probably adding more junk to the universe than all space programs combined. Unfortunately, the ability to admit to one’s mistake is fast becoming a lost art, not only among the media, but also in human relations. How often do we encounter those who cling to a lie in an attempt to save face?
Internet users, specifically, must be more skeptical than ever. If not, we’re going to be in real trouble. And whenever we repeat mistruths as fact, we compound the problem. Folks, such irresponsibility damages more souls than old fashioned, over-the-back-fence, malicious gossip ever has.
Not only must we know our sources, this is the age when we must compare the nuances of news stories across the spectrum. It behooves all of us to read and listen to more than one news outlet. If we really want to believe the worst about a candidate we don’t like, we no longer have to fabricate reasons of our own: we can always find an untruth from an Internet source to spread. Did you hear...? And while such urban myths may fade away briefly, they never really die. Rather, they resurface at a later date to infect a new body of believers.
Be patriotic. Celebrate Independence Day. Enjoy the holiday in all its red, white and blue trimmings. Pay tribute to those who have given their all for the United States of America. Because of the drought and great fire danger, refrain from shooting any fireworks. Know your sources before you buy into a bit of gossip. And, above all, avoid perpetuating out and out lies.
2007
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