Wikipedia vs. Britannica or Public vs Private

Is Wikipedia reliable? Is it worth going to? Would you prefer to go to a place like “Britannica Online” or Wikipedia to search for a topic? For our final blog assignment, the First Year Seminars were asked to pick a topic, and compare a Wikipedia article an Encyclopedia Britannica article. It was quite difficult to find two pages that were relevant to one another, since Wikipedia covers many more topics than Britannica. I chose skin cancer as my topic because while there is not a lot of controversy over skin cancer, there is room for misinformation. I compared these two articles on the basis of attribution, recency, references, links, consistency, bias/controversy, and my overall impressions of the quality of each page.
Attribution, or who is responsible for the information provided in a piece of writing, is very important in determining the quality of the information being received, and a useful tool when a reader would like to contact the author. While Britannica Online does not note the author on the page or any contact information, this web site does have a place to comment on an article. A reader can ask questions, comment on something, or point out any mistakes (spelling or otherwise) that need to be addressed. The Wikipedia article is a whole other story. The listed editors (located under the “history” tab) consisted of bots, Wikipedia editors and administrators, a few good citizens, and many anonymous users, with no user details. One Wikipedia worker was kind enough to list all of his editing history, the reason for his nickname, and what research he does on the side. Under his username, there is a tab labeled “discussion” in which many people have left comments and questions, as a way of contacting him. This is great for those who have questions, but its still leaves the worry about those users that have no user page and no way of being contacted.
Recency is vital to a topic, especially one that is time sensitive, like cancer. The Britannica article was last edited in the year 2007. I would personally like more information--was it edited early this year, or just recently? The date is very important, especially if new information has been found since then. In Wikipedia’s article, under the tab “history” the last edit is listed as November 29, 2007, with the hour and minute of the edit. This is helpful, because I know that if there were recent breakthroughs on skin cancer, and no new information had been added in a long time, that article wouldn’t be as relevant. Both these sites made it easy to find out when they were last updated, but Britannica Online wasn’t as specific as I would have liked it to be.
References are helpful when determining the reliability of a source. This specific Wikipedia article lists three references at the very bottom of the page. Two links are from the internet (thus, clickable) and one is a book, with its listed ISBN number. One link takes me to a British Pathology website (which looks homemade), and another link leads me to the National Cancer Institute (which is quite reliable and professional). Britannica Online does not give a bibliography, but it does have links to further readings, located in the grey “expand your research” rectangle on each page of the article. They seem very reliable, and have very good information for anyone who wishes to research further. They are all clickable and lead me to websites like CNN and Medicinenet, which are well known and accredited sites for information. Both of these sites have reasonable references, but in this area, I am more likely to count on Britannica for respectable references.
Updated links are very important to a webpage’s credibility. Sites that have “dead” or broken links are most likely not updated on a regular basis, and thus not necessarily up-to-date on all the information. Apart from the references, Britannica’s article consisted of 12 links that were all up-to-date and working. The Wikipedia article had approximately 38 links, one of which was being edited for content. Overall, both of these sites prove to be keeping up-to-date with their links.
Both the Wikipedia and Britannica articles had similar information. Wikipedia seemed to have more specifics, and overall more information in the article itself than that of Britannica. Wikipedia also listed skin cancer as having three categories, and Britannica considered skin cancer to have only two categories. Both of these are consistent with other websites (neither are wrong). Wikipedia seemed to have more specific facts, and Britannica seemed much more general in the information they provided.
When clicking “discussion” and “history” on Wikipedia, I can find evidence of much controversy over skin color and its relation to skin cancer. There is much discussion over recent vandalism on that page, and it seems the whole page was wiped clean not too long ago. Some people seem to get offended over certain mentioning of color and gender in relation to the likelihood of skin cancer. There is no comparable section on Britannica Online.
Finally, both articles are quality. Both articles are thorough, professionally worded, and overall seem to speak the truth. I however, preferred Wikipedia because it can tell me what topics are controversial, where people found their information, and allow me to come up with my own opinion. However, I would not use Wikipedia as a valid source for any paper because its information is easily compromised. I would be more likely to cite Britannica Online, or one of its references in a paper because that is a more professional and viewed reliable world-wide.