The highly respected Jon Udell suggests that Wikipedia “greatest innovation is arguably the framework it provides to mediate the social construction of knowledge, advocate for neutrality, accommodate dispute, and offer a path to its negotiated resolution.” True, Wikipedia has developed a highly organized system for editing the content. However, the success of any such social system depends upon the individual members of the society that are contributing to the project. Hence, again, my renewed emphasis that librarians and academics should participate more fully in the Wikipedia project. Yet, I suspect that many academics will tire of participating in Wikipedia’s if they continually have to argue their disputes with the proverbial maniacal, random guy who has never studied in-depth the scholar’s area of expertise but still chooses to argue a point. While much knowledge is subject to bias and interpretation, scholars have been trained to explore those issues extensively.

So, why Wikipedia has established a great framework for editing and handling disputes, it’s validity still depends upon the effective participation of society….a much harder concept.

Dave Winer raises the topic about the accuracy of topics in Wikipedia. He uses the history of podcasting entry to point out that information about his own early involvement in developing what would become known as podcasting had been “carefully rewritten” and eliminated from Wikipedia. (Note: when I checked the entry this morning, mention of Winer had been evidently re-edited back into the Wikipedia article).

For those of you not familiar with the very public feud between Winer and Adam Curry, please wait for the upcoming made-for-TV movie of the week.

Seriously, though, Winer raises a very important topic about the validity and integrity of topical entries in Wikipedia. The premise behind Wikipedia is that it’s “the encyclopedia that anyone can edit”. Collaborative authorship is great and tools like the Wikipedia have great potential. However, how can an unsuspecting reader know whether the information contained in Wikipedia is correct?

As a librarian I’m very concerned about ensuring that quality content can be found on the Web. For years librarians have been advocating the concept of information literacy which is aimed at ensuring that students understand how to evaluate information resources, particularly online resources. Of course, information literacy is simply a part of what higher education has always tried to do: develop the capacity within a student to think analytically and critically about any topic/situation that the student might encounter.

In the realm of scholarly communications, peer-review and editorial review by a set of established scholars have been the criteria for identifying a work as intellectually legitimate.

Wikipedia, like blogs and so much of the Internet, depends upon self-governing peer-review to point out flaws in arguments and reasoning. In some matters, particularly high profile topics, this self regulating approach works quite well. However, in other topics, particularly among lower profile issues, the safety valve of net-based peer review may be missing. On the Internet anyone can establish him or herself as the expert and it’s up to others on the net to validate that person’s authority.

Despite the extensive nature of the net and the range of topics that can be found through any Web search, I’m not yet convinced that the self-governing approach to information validity can be achieved. Of course, there will be those who will argue that all information and knowledge is biased towards certain perspectives. I don’t want to get into those philosophical issues at this time. The important issue, for me, is how to those who do not think so analytically about information understand whether something he reads on the net is true?

There have been some calls for librarians and the scholarly community to get more systematically involved in supporting the intellectual efforts of Wikipedia. I think that is a very good approach. Many librarians tend to react negatively towards freely available, non peer-reviewed information on the net out of fears stemming from information literacy. However, we must accept that resources such as Wikipedia are here to stay and that people will use Wikipedia for their research.

Librarians must help to ensure that information in Wikipedia (and elsewhere on the net) is of a high quality. Also, librarians must incorporate the use of Wikipedia into their instructional programs just as they do for other encylopedic works. Indeed, it might be more important to inform students of specific aspects of Wikipedia rather than many other subscription-based reference works. For its the former, not the latter, that students will continue most likely continue to use throughout their lifetimes.

Seth Godin outlines some reasons why small is the new big …. basically, it’s about how small companies are more agile and provide better services than large ones because small companies can think big but remain focus on the issues that are really important.

This got me thinking about libraries, from small liberal arts college libraries to mid-sized academic libraries to large research libraries. I’ve worked in both types and have found that the small the library, the better the library services. Large research libraries will always have better collections, that’s simply because of the size. However, large research libraries often have an inertia that is difficult to overcome. Research libraries often have librarians and staff who are very cautious about change. This often results in a lot of internal conflict and organizational politics, which can drain an organization of energy.

Branch libraries within research libraries strive to mimic the small nature of smaller institutional libraries. However, branch libraries are often in direct conflict with a central library administration. Effectively managing a distributed library system is one of the biggest challenge for the director of a research library.

Research libraries too often get distracted with their focus on collection size and ARL rankings. Seth Godin ends his entry on small vs big with a few thoughts that could be relevant to libraries: “Small is the new big only when the person running the small thinks big.”

While a small or medium sized academic library will never have the collection size of an ARL library, small and medium sized libraries can provide better services than their larger research siblings. Also, small and medium sized libraries can provide just as good, if not better, technology services than a research library.