Wikipedia Turns Mainstream, Leaving Information in Its Track

There are few editions of the Encyclopedia Britannica where you could find a list of the most famous drummers, "Weird Al" Yankovic's albums, or the biography of actor Ted Knight. With the rise of the Internet as a main source for research and reference, Wikipedia has become the most important resource for Internet researchers. Whether it is a need for pop culture ephemera or information on classical music, anyone with a computer and Internet access can feed their thirst for knowledge. The reason why people are so attracted to Wikipedia is that it promises a more democratic editing and research process than the stuffy encyclopedias that line shelves in college libraries. However, Wikipedia's meteoric rise in popularity has led its founder, Jimmy Wales, and its team of editors to refine publication policies to improve its legitimacy.

As someone who has only a casual acquaintance with Wikipedia (I am a bit of a popular culture freak), I was curious about the editorial standards that drive Wikipedia's published content. According to the five pillars of Wikipedia, there is a tension between strict encyclopedic standards and an almost anarchic flexibility about writing style. While material on Wikipedia cannot be used to reason out an original theory or promote a viewpoint, all content is freely edited by any member of Wikipedia's community. As well, the code of conduct which ensures that writers for the website maintain civil behavior is made difficult to enforce by the fifth malleable pillar of flexibility outside of the first four pillars. It is no wonder that Wikipedia's founder and editors are beginning to lay down the hammer to contributors who don't fit into their particular concept of an online encyclopedia.

Why are Jimmy Wales and Company taking Wikipedia so seriously? Isn't it a democratic process, where peers edit each other's contributions? Perhaps Wales is realizing that trying such a massive informational project on the Internet, home to up skirt shots of celebrities, was more than the Internet using public could handle. Recently, Wikipedia's number of contributions has begun to decline due to increased editorial standards and the fact that many major topics have already been covered. The egalitarian and democratic Internet encyclopedia has turned into an increasingly paranoid and authoritarian organization, looking to keep information that is arbitrarily deemed irrelevant off the website.

One website, called WikiDumper, is taking articles on Wikipedia that are deleted or on the verge of deletion and publishing them for public use. Upon perusing this website, I found the published information just as useful as safe material on Wikipedia. Many of the entries on WikiDumper are still on Wikipedia but are on the verge of deletion without reader support. While some of the material on WikiDumper was not relevant to my personal life, that is not the standard that should be used for one of the Internet's most reliable resources. Article on geek rock, a list of worms from popular culture, and a list of animal sounds seem like appropriate fodder for Wikipedia's pages.

However, because these articles do not meet the particular standards of an editor, they are subject to deletion in the near future. These deleted articles, like many others on Wikipedia, are not perfect and remain incomplete until peers add their two cents. With more work, articles on geek rock and animal sounds can turn into great resources for Internet users. While WikiDumper is doing its best to keep important information out of Internet oblivion, Wikipedia's growing power as an information resource has kept it above reproach by typically fickle Internet users. Wikipedia is not allowing the democratic editing process to work, relying on regular contributors with bland articles to flood their website. Unless people recognize that the course of Wikipedia's future is parallel to that of mainstream television news outlets, they will be succumbing to another mirage of people powered media.An