Why Citing Wikipedia Is Not a Good Idea

When using references to back up statements or facts in an article, avoid using Wikipedia as a source. Why is citing Wikipedia a bad idea?

• Wikipedia is not always accurate.
• Wikipedia's pages change as contributors edit them.
• Wikipedia is not an authoritative source.
• Most people will find Wikipedia in a search before they find an article written about a topic. Therefore, repeating information that Wikipedia provides (without expanding upon it), may not be useful to a customer who wants articles to rank highly in search.
• Citing Wikipedia indicates an author may not have gone very far to get his/her information. Using the internet for research is fine, but digging deeper and gathering unique information from a variety of sources makes articles more useful, informative, and unique.

Wikipedia is good if you need to brush up your background knowledge of a certain subject. It can give you ideas and may even provide links to reliable source material. However, given the amount of information elsewhere on the internet, in journals and magazines, and in books, there is every reason to expand research beyond the Wikipedia entry for your topic.

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