Wikipedia valid or not?

Is Wikipedia a valid resorce or not?
I think that Wikipedia is a valid resourse, well kind of. In certian cases I have found that Wikipedia does not have valid facts. However it's usualy right 9 out of 10 times. Even though any old smuck can post something, many people clean up the articals that have been vandalised.
Post appropriatly,
Nerdowl

[rzm61]

If it's just for reference amongst friends an all, it's pretty much valid.

If it's an academic paper you're writing and using it as a source, chances are it's not good enough.


Edit:
Oh yeah, check out the search feature sometime...

[tagnostic]

it is an uncitable rescource
which is a contradiction
therefore useless

[fosley]

However. . . the COPS tv show webpage links to the Wikipedia entry when you click "Show History" on the site. So it's good enough for them. :)

Wikipedia is an awesome resource, but it's best to cite (and read) wikipedia's sources, rather than wikipedia itself. It depends also on whether you're talking college papers or random arguments.

Also, I would think Wikipedia would be a fine source for something that's not under particular dispute and doesn't radically effect your argument. For instance, if I were demonstrating how to do orbital mechanics, and used radius, mass and distance values from Wikipedia, it wouldn't affect my demonstration if the values were off a little, and therefore shouldn't hurt a paper to use.

It's certainly more authoritative than "reference = my friend who likes history a lot" that I used in a history report once. :)

I think Wikipedia could really use a "Valid" stamp of some sort. Would make it a lot better.

Until that happens, I wouldn't use it for any assignments.

[sudikics]

I use it as a starting point: I read the articles to get a general gist of the subject, and then probe the sources (there's usally a plethora) at the bottom of the page.

It is pretty much valid because in order to post info on there, you have to cite your source.

[Chritter]

I agree with sciki over there. It's good to get a general gist of an idea for the subject at hand, to help you understand what it is that you are researching in a pretty much condensed way. But if any serious research needs to be done on it, one should either follow it back to the original sources or Google the subject all together.

I find myself not using Wikipedia that much, most likely because I am not in school. I have used it in the past for looking up things like VtM and WtA designations and what not though.

[fosley]

I think the biggest problem with using Wikipedia as a source is its ability to change. If I write "It has been noted the angstrom is no longer in common use (1)", then wikipedia changes their mind when it comes back into common use, the person looking at my report will wonder what I was thinking. A more temporally-rooted source will not cause such confusion.

(And, yes, I made that up. I've no idea what wikipedia says.)

[tagnostic]

i don't need the opinions of
a couple of million morons
when i could just Google it
and get all the sources i
really need,

wiki is re-dumbdant