A common theme that is discussed in my New Media class is the concept of credibility on the Internet, and what society can believe to be the truth since it is so easy for anyone to post anything online. A prime explain of this is the phenomenon of the free encyclopedia called “Wikipedia.” In the book The Future of the Internet and How to Stop it, there is a section on the lessons for Internet users that can be learned from websites such as Wikipedia. The main quote that summarizes the main point that I found interesting is on page 133. “Like the development of the Internet’s architecture, then, Wikipedia’s original design was simultaneously ambitious in scope but modest in execution, devoted to making something work without worrying about every problem that could come up if its extraordinary flexibility were abused.” This quote explains what is the side effects of constantly trusting the Internet as a source, but most of society will find it to not out weigh the benefits. Personally, I constantly use Wikipedia, and trust it as reliable more than I should. But I’m sure that it will someday come back and haunt me for it.
