One of the primary reasons for its stupendous growth and acceptance is that is all user generated content in a generally accepted framework. So users around the globe use and provide enriched content which otherwise would have been difficult and expensive to generate.
But then allowing the users to edit the content also has a downside and that has to do the the quality and authenticity of the content. Wikipedia has put in place some governance mechanisms while preserving the overall collaborative concept. One of the recent innovative additions is a tool called wikipedia scanner.
Wikipedia Scanner -- the brainchild of Cal Tech computation and neural-systems graduate student Virgil Griffith -- offers users a searchable database that ties millions of anonymous Wikipedia edits to organizations where those edits apparently originated, by cross-referencing the edits with data on who owns the associated block of internet IP addressesWhile the scanner cannot identify the individuals who edited, it can zoom in on the network used to make the changes. Look at what the scanner unearthed:
- CIA network used to edit the profile of Iranian President
- US Democratic party network used to edit the profile of Rush Limbaugh (popular right wing radio talk show host)
- Vatican network used to edit the profile of Jerry Adams (Sinn Fenn leader)
- Diebold network used to delete information from the company's own profile.
update # 1 - Rush Limbaugh spelling corrected..