Wikipedia Butte College

Wikipedia hasn't yet become a verb as "google" has, but maybe it won't be long. An article in the July 31, 2006 issue of The New Yorker (not, alas, available online) tells the story of this strange encyclopedia put together by a community where thousands of Wikipedians around the world have contributed more than a million entries. A "wiki" is a collaborative Website where just about anyone can add or edit material. The Wikipedia, for better or worse, is more and more often the first stop for student researchers. There is plenty of reason to be wary of its offerings; writer Stacy Schiff calls it "a lumpy work in progress." Nevertheless, when Schiff "showed the Harvard philosopher Hilary Putnam his entry, he was surprised to find it as good as the one in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. He was flabbergasted when he learned how Wikipedia worked. 'Obviously, this was the work of experts,' he said." It turns out that Butte College has a short entry in the Wikipedia, but it's just a sentence. Perhaps we need someone (like you?) who knows the history of the school to enrich the article. After all, a Wikipedia worth its salt, with articles on (again quoting Schiff) "the Boston molasses disaster, the Rhinoceros Party of Canada, Bill Gates's house, the forty-five-minute Anglo-Zanzibar War, or Islam in Iceland," ought to do justice to Butte College. Click on the title of this post (if you haven't already) and it will take you to the Wikipedia entry for the school. Setting up free access is easy. It's the writing that will seem strange. At any moment someone may come along and edit what you've said. But then you can edit what that person writes. Be brave.