Wikipedia - Can we trust it?

Wikipedia is one of the most famous sites all over the world. It is a kind of encyclopedia in many languages and it consist of articles on various topics. It sounds really useful at first, but when we understand that everybody can change,edit or write articles there, we start to think that the information provided there is not so trustworthy. So, is this the truth?


When we hear the word 'encyclopedia' in our mind immediately pops up Encyclopedia Britannica.We used to trust it. According to an article, comparing Wikipedia and Encyclopedia Britannica, they both have a few inaccuracies. In other words, Wikipedia is almost reliable as Britannica.(BBC article about Wikipedia and Encyclopedia Britannica)
After the scandal presented in the same article , where a man purposely edited wrong information on Wikipedia to mislead a colleague and in this way tarnish one US journalist's reputation, Wikipedia's administrators changed the rules for editing information randomly. For example, the biographies of living people are semi-protected and can be edited by people whose account has been confirmed.

Another research conducted in Italy in 2010 showed that Wikipedia is the 6th most visited site in the world,which prove that people believe in the written there.Even though Wikipedia is still not claimed as a trustworthy resource of information and many scientists and teachers don't consider it as a reliable source of academic writing.