The EB Strikes Back

In December, nHumanities reported on a study by Nature which compared the quality of science article entries between Wikipedia and Encyclopedia Britannica and found that "the difference in accuracy was not particularly great." (See Jim Giles, "Internet Encyclopaedias Go Head to Head," Nature, 15 Dec. 2005: 900-01.)

As it turns out, the Encyclopedia Britannica found the comparison offensive, and it has struck back in an open letter to educators (PDF) titled "Fatally Flawed: Refuting the Recent Study on Encyclopedic Accuracy by the Journal Nature." In that letter, EB claims, "Almost everything about the journal'’s investigation, from the criteria for identifying inaccuracies to the discrepancy between the article text and its headline, was wrong and misleading." Says EB, "the fact is that Britannica was far more accurate than Wikipedia according to the figures [Nature provided in the article]; the journal simply misrepresented its own results."

The letter and the entire brouhaha make for fascinating reading, but nHumanities stands by its original conclusions: students always should approach Wikipedia with caution, and for academic writing, no encyclopedia article is a substitute for good research in the library's databases.