To be frank, I've grown tired of all the wiki bashing/loving going on out there, and so I've decided to write this blog. And if everyone reads this (and accepts the total correctness of all my points ), peace shall reign throughout the cyberverse.

NOTE: I will switch between wikis in general and Wookieepedia in particular without warning below. I'll try to note it but keep in mind that I'm writing because of Wookieepedia about the wiki phenomenon, and so my ideas and examples will be colored by Wookieepedia.

Personally

Airing the agenda
I'm an active contributor to Wookieepedia, and my experience there has led me to believe that wikis are an excellent resource. Also, it's been really enjoyable for me, someone who always wanted to write a Star Wars encyclopedia but never put in enough effort. At the same time, I do understand that there are no guarantees with wikis, and in my time as an editor I've found more than a few erroneous facts.

Stuff I've Heard

And whether I agree with it or not (Section to be added to mercilessly)

"Wikis are not encyclopedias, and should not be treated as such."
Absolutely true. At the risk of sounding as sarcastic as I feel, wikis are websites that can be edited by anyone, while encyclopedias are printed materials attempting to contain as much factual information as possible. One is never fact-checked, the other always is. One can be held responsible for errors, one cannot. One can respond overnight to new info, the other make take years. One anyone can edit, the other nobody can. Anyone who can't get this is a waste of air.

"Wookieepedia is a fan community . . ."
Absolutely true. Again, at the risk of sounding sarcastic, it is a fan community because it is a community of fans. There should be no doubt about that.

". . . and so is no more reliable than any other fan community."
Absolutely untrue. While Wookieepedia is not nearly as reliable as the Holocron or even CUSWE, almost everyone on Wookieepedia understands that it is their duty to write factual articles. It very rarely devolves into the sort of banal back and forth found on forums, and, while people have agendas, they subsume them for the site's good.

"Wookieepedia is the easiest to use web encyclopedia for Star Wars . . ."
Absolutely true, (at least in my opinion. Or if there is an easier one, I haven't found it. Feel free to correct me, but the number of Google searches I have done to find such a site is quite large.

". . . and that makes it the best resource on the web."
Absolutely untrue. Or rather, only true if you define "best" as "easiest to use," and then it's simply a tautology. To put it in other terms, the polish or cross-linkage of a site no more makes it a valuable resource than putting a shiny cover on a book at Kinkos does. I don't mean that it's bad to seem professional, simply that it is irrelevant.

"Everyone editing a wiki has an agenda . . ."
Absolutely true. Everyone has an agenda, in any situation. This is truth, forever and always. If you like, think of it as the laws of causation. Any event B will not occur without some cause A, and A in this case stands for agenda.

". . . and that agenda will always taint their work."
Absolutely untrue. Or rather, not true in the way it is meant. The agenda may very well simply be to improve the encyclopedia, and even a selfish one will not necessarily taint the work. It may, but it is not guaranteed to.

"Wookieepedia is not an encyclopedia . . ."
Absolutely true. See above.

". . . and so should not describe itself as 'an encyclopedia anyone can edit."
I simply refuse to get worked up over this. The tagline is simply a vestige from the days when nobody knew what Wikipedia was. We all do now, but it's a tagline, so it isn't going anywhere. It's just as accurate or inaccurate as any other tagline. Plus, give me a sentence with as many or fewer syllables that would convey the idea. I understand the irritation some feel towards this minor misrepresentation, but do not partake in that emotion at all.

The Guide

The meat of the blog
So, with all this debate ranging around you, how can you best use the potentially valuable resource that wikis are? Well, I've developed a simple guide, based on three different types of scenarios.

1) How to use wikis if it's ok if you make a mistake.

Go ahead and use the wiki already! Be unafraid. While there is no guarantee that Statement X will be accurate, the odds will be in your favor, and if the worst possible outcome is someone being a little bit annoyed at you--well, wikis are just too darn easy to use to worry about that.

2) How to use wikis if it's unacceptable if you make a a mistake.

Don't use the wiki! Or, if you want to, only use it as a jumping-off point. Use its list of sources to discover what resources you must acquire. Use the article to get a general idea of the topic, and then go to CUSWE or a real encylopedia (depending on whether the topic is Star Wars or not). Because there is no guarantee that Statement X is accurate, you have to verify said statement as many times as possible. And if the outcome of a mistake would be missing your only chance to impress your boss/get a good grade on a paper/show up that stupid smarmy b-a-s-t-a-r-d on that forum, then don't rely on a wiki. And please. If you're the sort of person who can never afford to be wrong (not that there's anything wrong with that--I myself skirt that line) don't kvetch about the mistake on a wiki you happened to run into.

3) How to use wikis if it's unacceptable if you make a a mistake but at the same time you absolutely must.

Hard to imagine a situation that would fulfill the above requirements, but ok. (I find that most people who claim to have had this sort of experience actually had one of type 2, but used the wiki anyway, at their own risk, and then were annoyed that it was wrong.)

If you must use only a wiki to discover a piece of information that you cannot be wrong about, then there are a couple steps you can take:

A) First, use your common sense. If the article is badly written, makes no sense, or refers to Gretel Skywalker, it's probably fake. If a fact is added on haphazardly to the end of a paragraph with no punctuation, and runs counter to the rest of the article, it's probably fake too.

B) Scrutinize the page for tags (bold colored rectangles with text and often a small picture). If you see any, read it and understand what it means. If it says something like "This article is nominated for deletion, see here for details," see there for details. If the tag says "sourceless," then note that nobody has provided any sources for the article. If the tag says "non-canon," then note that the article is non-canon (only applies to Wookieepedia). And so on.

C) Check the sections labeled Behind the Scenes, Appearances, Sources, and so on (Wookieepedia example here). Make sure that there are enough sources and appearances, and if a Behind the Scenes section mentions some sort of debate or inconsistency, familiarize yourself with what it says.

D) Ok, we've checked the page: the sources and appearances are good, the and there aren't any tags. Now its time to move to the discussion page. This is clearly marked at the top by a hyperlink labeled, appropriately enough, "discussion." This page will reveal subtler doubts or concerns any editors have had. If one of the editors has written, for example, "I'm worried that Statement X is wrong," then be warned: Statement X is more likely be wrong than if there was no such comment on the talk page. Read the talk page thoroughly, and become familiar with any debates over the page, and, if they are concluded, their resolution.

E). Steps A-D should be enough for all but the truly compulsive, but if they aren't, you can go one step further. Check the history, clearly marked at the top by a hyperlink labeled "history." See if the page has had a vandalism problem (edits after vandals will often be marked with a line of text saying REVERT or REVERTED). Check who the last few editors are, and, by clicking on their names, how reliable they are. A couple careful clicks will reveal whether anyone has chastised them on their talk pages, blocked them, whether their contributions tend towards nonsense or vandalism, and so on.

F) Wait a couple of days. Vandalism and innaccuracy takes some time to be caught, an amount that varies according to how well the subject is known. When you come back, check the history to see what's changed and why.

G) If the page in question passes all the tests above, there is still no guarantee, but you can come pretty d-a-m-n close. Go ahead and use the wiki, and if by some freak chance it turns out to be wrong, don't blame the wiki. Blame the user who added the b-u-l-l-s-h-i-t.

Closing Thoughts

While there are many anecdotes out there both arguing for and against wikis, it is important to keep a sense of perspective. And so I will leave you with three URLs: the first, that of CUSWE, an incredibly reliable resource, one that has never suffered an article on Gretel Skywalker. It can be found here: http://www.theforce.net/swenc/. The second, that of the Star Wars Fanon wikicity, where the an article on Gretel Skywalker might even be a step up from the average. It can be found here: http://swfanon.wikia.com/wiki/Main_Page. And finally, the URL of Wookieepedia, an imperfect creation, but one made so much better than it could be by the tireless typing of its contributors . http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Main_Page. It is neither as reliable as the first nor as hell-bent as the second, and one needs to remember that when dealing with it. In the end, wikis are like any new technology. They can work for good or for ill, depending on who uses them. To quote Pratchet: "[Guns] don't kill people. People kill people." This too is truth, for always and ever. And wikis do not lie to people, people lie to people. Be wary, but be unfraid. And go forth in goodness.