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Librarians' Internet Index (LII) also lists wikipedia if you do a search 
for encyclopedias.  Their descriptions states:  "Without editorial 
oversight, the quality of the content on this site varies dramatically, 
but it is worth exploring."

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page>
I know this because the site was recently blocked by a filter at my 
former school district.  The tech director has heard me talk about the 
erratic quality of wikipedia, so he emailed me asking for reasongs to 
keep it blocked.  I told him that, from my perspective as a librarian, I 
would love for it to be blocked because since evaluation isn't taught in 
the curriculum, they don't have a real librarian in any of the schools, 
and students are allowed to search at will through the internet when 
they're doing research, I'd rather they didn't have access at school 
unless the teacher is using it for a project specific to wikipedia.

He asked me to recommend some good free online encyclopedias, so I gave 
him several, then checked LII to see if I'd missed any, and there was 
wikipedia.

I used wikipedia this week, though, to read more about Discovery's new 
show, Cash Cab.  It's good at covering esoteric subjects like that 
(although I'd double-check the information before I'd pass it along). 

Judy Crook, Librarian
Contract part-time reference librarian
Rifle, Colorado
ESL teacher education student
Western Governors University
LM_NET member for 3 years
jcrook@rof.net

Marian Poyner wrote:

>Take a look at ALA's "Best Free Reference Web Sites 2005".  It lists 
>Wikipedia!!!!!!  It does acknowledge that "the obvious drawback to this site is 
>the potential for erroneous information" but I'm really upset to see it listed 
>here.  Comments???
>

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