The Wikipedia Effect at ALA Annual Conference
Posted by: Rebecca Vnuk
The Reference Books Bulletin Editorial Board program at the just-ended ALA Annual Conference was a big success. Called ”The Wikipedia Effect: How Wikipedia Has Changed the Way the World Finds and Evaluates Information,” the program presented three different perspectives. Paul Kobasa (Editor-in-Chief; Vice President, Editorial, World Book) took the audience on a tour of encyclopedia history (it turns out Wikipedia is not the first encyclopedia to have a social mission) and talked about how Wikipedia has challenged the traditional publishing model. Phoebe Ayers (Board Member, Wikimedia Foundation, and Librarian, Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, University of California, Davis) spoke about Wikipedia’s guiding principles. The third speaker, Debra Hoffmann (Information Literacy Coordinator, California State University, Channel Islands) gave a fascinating account of a class in which students were assigned the task of creating Wikipedia entries–and in some cases discovered that within minutes their entries had been edited almost beyond recognition.
Rbb Editorial Board Chair Dave Tyckoson (Associate Dean, California State University, Fresno) put the program together and also served as moderator.
July 7th, 2011 at 9:50 am
Any chance of getting the texts for these three talks?
July 8th, 2011 at 10:09 am
Was anything recorded or transcribed of that event? It sounds really interesting and I would love to hear more about it.
We struggle with the do’s and don’t's of using Wikipedia both with faculty and students.
Thanks,
Toni
July 8th, 2011 at 10:21 am
We’re working on getting the slides as well as notes from the presenters. When we do, we’ll post them here.
December 12th, 2011 at 9:37 am
Is there any update on getting the materials from the conference? Was the session videotaped and could be available for purchase? Additional information would help tremendously in teaching about Wikipedia.