Wednesday, November 15, 2006

Ok, so maybe wikipedia isn't that great



I will proclaim my love of wikipedia to anyone that asks. I check it all the time and used to argue its neutrality and reliability...that is until I checked the entry on the shooting at my high school in 1997.

Most of the content was copied word for word from the shooter's website and it merely listed the victims at the very bottom of the page. However, the most disturbing part was that the majority of the entry had been written by a teenager from Australia who admits to mental illness but says he is "attempting to resolve these issues [his] self, but with great difficulty" AND who only edits or contributes to entries about school shootings or other violent events.

I guess the best part about wikipedia is you can edit when you see something wrong. Well, I saw a lot of things wrong so I spent several hours editing the entry. Not exactly memories I love to revisit but I felt it was important. Actually during my research, I found a lot of interesting follow-up stories and learned more about the people with whom I share those memories and their lives now, which was actually very nice.

I thought I might post about that day but even ten years later I'm not really ready to talk about my experience in-depth...at least not tonight anyway.

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