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What is Wikipedia?
Wikipedia is one of the largest and best-known wikis. A wiki is a website that allows many users to continuously contribute and edit the site using simple mark-up language. This site is also a wiki.
While our wiki is specifically geared towards Internet safety topics, Wikipedia is an extensive project that seeks to cover millions of subjects, ranging from the Boulder Dash rollercoaster to the Kowloon-Canton Railway Corporation. Created in 2001, it has exploded into one of the world's largest reference websites. It contains articles in over 260 languages and attracts nearly 65 million visitors a month. Wikipedia currently hosts an estimated 2,900,000 articles in English.
Concerns for Parents
- Because anyone can edit Wikipedia, the information found there is not always accurate. Some schools frown upon using it as a reference for reports or research papers. Be sure you know your child's school's standing on Wikipedia use.
- Another danger of Wikipedia's free-for-all nature is that inappropriate content can be posted.
- Many of the references can contain links to adult content.
How Can I Keep My Kids Safe?
- Weigh the need versus the risks. Wikipedia is closely monitored by thousands of editors each day, so it's hard for obscene content to stay posted for long. Still, Wikipedia scandals include posting of child pornography and obscene textual insertions in articles with topics benign as Cecilius Calvert or Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH.
- Some articles contain mature content. Although relatively bland compared to what is available elsewhere online, some articles cover adult topics and contain sexually themed images.
If your child's school discourages Wikipedia use, you may want to consider blocking Wikipedia and helping your child access more "official" reference sites instead.
Where Can I Learn More?
This page gives some good guidelines for parents of kids who use Wikipedia.
This article does a nice job of encapsulating the clash between Wikipedia and academic writing.
