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Just a thought...

We’ve all been told in law school that we shouldn’t cite it as authority, but after being cited in a court case is it likely that wikipedia could be popping up in law essays everywhere? Any thoughts?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2006-07-03/Wikipedia_cited_by_the_England_and_Wales_High_Court

Scots_Law :smile:

Reply 1

ellewoods

My thought is, no, never ever.

I got a severe kicking for citing an A-Level text book in my second year work, law schools are incredibly stuffy on what is deemed credible enough to be cited.

Dare write "Google" anywhere near your work at my uni would practically fail you on principle.

And my uni isn't even one with particularly rocking standards lol!! :p:

Reply 2

TommehR

There was that research a year or so ago in which they found that Wikipedia was pretty much as accurate as the Encylopedia Britannica. I'm sure that you'd be allowed to cite the latter as authority so I reckon that in a few years the former will become acceptable although at the moment I don't think you'd get away with it. It'll just take a bit of time for the new technology to integrate.

Reply 3

Scots_Law

I, personally, have never used it in an essay (one of my friends got told off for doing so) but surely if it’s being used as legal authority in court then it should, in theory be good enough for an essay at university? :confused:

Scots_Law

Reply 4

Lewisy-boy

Yea, but anyone can go on Wikipedia and change anything, therefore if you cite it and the marker looks it up on the URL you cited it could have changed to guff!!

Reply 5

dragon_1706

Lewis-HuStuJCR

Yea, but anyone can go on Wikipedia and change anything, therefore if you cite it and the marker looks it up on the URL you cited it could have changed to guff!!

That's exactly it. I read recently that people had edited the section about Tony Blair to include some quite offensive stuff. So unless you already know a lot about the subject in question, it's impossible to know whether what you're reading has any real authority.