Know it All

1. I think that the author had many points in this article. The first point I feel that the author was trying to give the pros and cons of Wikipedia. Another point was how he compared Wikipedia to Britannica's Encyclopedia. Wikipedia gives people the opportunity to edit everything and anyone can add topics. Wikipedia lets people add their own topics so that means that there is way more entries than a normal encyclopedia.

2. "It is also perfectly configured to be current: there are detailed entries for each of the twelve finalists on this season’s “American Idol,” and the article on the “2006 Israel-Lebanon Conflict” has been edited more than four thousand times since it was created, on July 12th, six hours after Hezbollah militants ignited the hostilities by kidnapping two Israeli soldiers. Wikipedia, which was launched in 2001, is now the seventeenth-most-popular site on the Internet, generating more traffic daily than MSNBC.com and the online versions of the Times and the Wall Street Journal combined. The number of visitors has been doubling every four months; the site receives as many as fourteen thousand hits per second. Wikipedia functions as a filter for vast amounts of information online, and it could be said that Google owes the site for tidying up the neighborhood. But the search engine is amply repaying its debt: because Wikipedia pages contain so many links to other entries on the site, and are so frequently updated, they enjoy an enviably high page rank."

I think that this is a very good example of credible writing. The writing gives a lot of of details. I never realized how often the site was actually visited. When the author said that Wikipedia receives more hits daily than MSNBC.com, the online version of the Times and the Wall Street Journal combined was shocking. Another good line in the quote was that the site receives as many as fourteen thousand hits per second was amazing. That is a huge number of people to visit every second.

3. From a visceral point of view i would have to give Wikipedia the edge off the bat right from the starting page. When i see the start page from Wikipedia that has the globe with all of the different languages. From the behavioral aspect they are both effective. If you are looking for a really abstract fact you are better off looking at Wikipedia but if you are looking for the common everyday topic you might be better off using Britannica. The reflective design has to goto Wikipedia. Everyone know the website and has heard of it so that makes it cool. I had never heard of Britannica before this article so i dont really think that it is that sweet.