Wikipedia - GLCM/Gryphon Squadrons

[TDRSS]

Yeah, i know how most folks feel about Wikipedia; either they love it, or they hate

But, I have been putting up reference articles on various cold war topics - I'm branching out into squadron lineage, honors and heraldry for the various missile squadrons. I just finished with the 66/67/68th SMS from Ellsworth.

As soon as I get info from the Air Force Historical Research Agency on the GLCM squadrons, I will be posting it.

I just wanted to send out a notice, in case other GLCM crew members or interested parties want to add to the squadron pages. I put up a standard template for the squadrons, include the information (WITH references for all of those school or college-age kids writing papers) and let it change as other folks see fit.

Please include stuff if you feel like it.

[olexrina]

What is so bad about Wikipedia, that teachers should prohibit students from using it for projects or reports? I am helping my nephew with his 5th grade science project. The assignment sheet he was given has "NO WIKIPEDIA" printed boldly across the bottom of the page. I mentioned this to a coworker and learned that his girl, (7th grader in a different school), has the same issue. I understand that a small percentage of information posted on wiki may be incorrect, but checking it against other sources should prevent any mistakes in a grade school project.
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[dpan]

What is so bad about Wikipedia, that teachers should prohibit students from using it for projects or reports? I am helping my nephew with his 5th grade science project. The assignment sheet he was given has "NO WIKIPEDIA" printed boldly across the bottom of the page. I mentioned this to a coworker and learned that his girl, (7th grader in a different school), has the same issue. I understand that a small percentage of information posted on wiki may be incorrect, but checking it against other sources should prevent any mistakes in a grade school project.

The issue is that many students are relying on Wikipedia as the first, and often the only, source for their research. This intellectuall laziness leads to a diminishment of the ability of students to conduct in-depth independent research, searching out their own sources of information. They can use Wikipedia to look up sources and then go to those sites for more detailed information on a subject. But to just cut and past from the Wikipedia article is not really doing research.

[Crewdog]

The issue is that many students are relying on Wikipedia as the first, and often the only, source for their research. This intellectuall laziness leads to a diminishment of the ability of students to conduct in-depth independent research, searching out their own sources of information. They can use Wikipedia to look up sources and then go to those sites for more detailed information on a subject. But to just cut and past from the Wikipedia article is not really doing research.

I tend to agree with dpan. Wikipedia is a convenient lookup source if you need a quick answer, but by its nature it is somewhat superficial to “real” research. As olexrina notes, I have found that most of the information is reliable, but there are some cases where it is not so good. I guess for me, the best analogy I can make is when I was in 7th grade, my teachers told us not to copy from the Encyclopedia Britannica.

[TDRSS]

That's about the same reaction some intel pukes have about "Intellipedia" - the wiki for the Intel Community. No references, and everyone's an expert.

I'm irritated on how many pages swipe from Wikipedia and claim the info to be "theirs" - before I had info on ERCS, there were only two pages with unique information (FAS.org and NMUSAF fact sheet)

However, most of the missile related information I put on the wiki pages has a definite reference list at the bottom (SAC Regulations, AF Historical Research Agency FOIA requests, etc), so if an intrepid adventurer wanted to trace through the mountain of paperwork, they can find their way. And it gives the kids an easy bit of footnoting when they're doing reports about ERCS, Minuteman III or other geeky topics.

Cheers,

[Crewdog]

I don’t think anyone doubts your research, sources, or the quality of the material you have posted, but you make our point when you say “I'm irritated on how many pages swipe from Wikipedia and claim the info to be "theirs…” Pure and simple that is plagiarism, and that’s where I am coming from. My degrees are in history and the professors had very definite views and consequences on that subject.

With that said a big issues with Wiki’s, from the educational perspective, becomes is it a primary source, a secondary source, did someone already plagiarize it, or is it just some goober blowing smoke and the information is completely unreliable? Without doing some research legwork and at the very least verifying the sources cited, a student using Wiki’s could really screw the pooch by including poor or incorrect information in their homework.

Wiki’s can be a starting point for some good research if they pull the threads; it can also be easy “F” work if they simply cut and paste...that's the only point anyone is tring to make.

[dpan]

That's about the same reaction some intel pukes have about "Intellipedia" - the wiki for the Intel Community. No references, and everyone's an expert.

I think the IC has a higher level of respect for Intellipedia content than what's on Wikipedia. At leaset on Intellipedia there is no anonimity, no edit wars, and everything (except for the LOLcat stuff) is professional. Some of the experiments they did in response to realtime crisis or NIE collaboration was pretty interesting.

[TDRSS]

I would agree on the Intellipedia assessment for the most part. But it was difficult to find references aside from the wiki pages - a intel assessment, phone number, name of intel analyst who wrote the assessment (*something substantial, please!?!*). It does work wonders for real time or near real time assessments though.

As for the comments on plagiarism - yeah, I can agree with that too. I like to use it as a primary look up tool, then find substantive sources to "dig deeper". All throughout my graduate program I didn't know Wikipedia existed (I used mostly print references in my papers - I dislike using Internet sources as primary references, even today.

Well, I guess I've got food for thought about folks not liking the Wikipedia stuff. Hmm...

.....,