I read Jimmy Wales column today in Huffington Post about Wikipedia reducing some controls whilst strengthening othersm asking, “Will the new, more gentle tool, be more widely used than protection was? I certainly hope so. We are always looking for ways to help responsible people join the Wikipedia movement and contribute constructively, while gently asking those who want to cause trouble to please go somewhere else.
“Faced with the choice of preventing you from editing at all, versus allowing you to edit even though you might have bad intentions, we have erred consistently for the latter — openness. The new tool, by making it a lot easier to keep bad stuff from appearing to the general public, is going to allow for a much more responsible Wikipedia that is, at the same time, a much more open Wikipedia.”
As a huge fan of Wikipedia, and someone who ecourages her teenager to augment research using Wikipedia, I think Wales is right in downplaying the changes and believing this is positive evolution. Wikipedia is a fantastic source, a challenging and gigantic job for its admin, and I have no plans to start thiking that what I’m reading there needs to be corroborated by another independent news source. Good on them.