[Citation Needed]

I hate to beat a dead horse (I also hate that expression), but I want to join the party and talk a little bit about Wikipedia. Sorry.

Poor Wikipedia. Every single first day of class, during every professor's how-to-do-research speech, Wikipedia's treated that one uncle who went to prison once whom everyone tries to avoid at family gatherings. That sort of "Don't touch it, you don't know where it's been! Anyone can edit it!" attitude.

And it's true. Anyone can edit it. But what's often forgotten is the massive amount of editors proofing new changes to articles, software that keeps track of all new changes and allows for reversion to previous unaltered versions, as well as the site's strict insistence on neutrality and citations standards.

I think it could be argued that Wikipedia is one of the most transparent sources of information online. Though admittedly it's not the case with every article, many of them are meticulously cited, with nearly every major point linked back to an original source. I can think of few other sites that give source lists this extensive:

148 verifiable sources, and that's just for the article on Batman. Furthermore, Wikipedia has systems in place for designating its most well-written articles (see: featured articles), as well as a system of flags to designate portions where neutrality or quality of research are disputed. And because every part of the site is a collaborative effort, the argument could be made that over time, Wikipedia's content will likely trend towards neutrality more strongly than other sources with clear bias (like, say, The Huffington Post or Fox News.) It's also worth mentioning the 2005 study by Nature which found that Wikipedia's accuracy was close to the Encyclopedia Britannica's, at least in terms of science articles.

Wikipedia's not perfect, and it should obviously be used with caution and common sense; not everything it has to offer is rock solid...yet. But if we're going to talk about the rapidly changing digital nonfiction world, I think it's important to acknowledge that as Wikipedia advances in age and size, so does its credibility. [citation needed]

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Since I mentioned the Huffington Post earlier, I'd like to touch on that a little more. I used to read it regularly, until I realized that every other top read article was about Kim Kardashian's latest wacky exploit. And even the 'serious' articles are entirely blown out of proportion:

When a front page headline is more concerned with sensationalizing fear than introducing solid reporting, I'm automatically going to call the whole enterprise into question. How can a publication even pretend that neutrality is a priority when it puts the word "FEAR" in 60 point font overtop a blown up image of a syringe, juxtaposed with a controversial politician? Editorializing is one thing, but when there are few lines dividing it and reporting, I'm going to seriously re-evaluate how much I rely on that source. To be fair, Huff Post sources a lot of its content from AP and/or Reuters, but in that case why wouldn't I just go directly to those sites for my news?