Wikipedia, Klosterman, and Doing Research in 2011

This week Chuck Klosterman interviewed Al Yankovic for the B.S. Report. In the 33-minute interview, Chuck fires one question after another, most of them very pointed about specific events in Al's life. These include a telegram saying that Al should not make eye contact with Prince, Eminem denying him from making a parody video for "Lose Yourself," the story of how Al performed hours after hearing of his parents dying from carbon monoxide poisoning and how he started a club called "Volcano Worshippers" in high school.

At one point Chuck cites "a story I read" and "in doing research for this interview" as to how he knows all of this personal information. That's almost true. The story that Chuck stumbled upon was Weird Al's wiki page. Literally, everything that Klosterman brought up is on here.

- - -

That is not debatable. Those are facts. To this point, I have not made any evaluations of Chuck's research.

Clearly, Wikipedia is the first step for any doing research on anything. It is unbiased and thorough yet concise.

Simply put, it allows anyone to get the complete story on a subject in 5-10 minutes. The Weird Al article is 8500 words, the length of a short story. Reading the whole article might take you twelve minutes, but you could skim it in four.

Wikipedia doesn't tell you every factoid ever recorded, but it certainly provides more than enough information for someone completely unfamiliar to record a 30-minute interview.

- - -

I'm not surprised that Chuck did all of his research on Wikipedia. It would be the first place I would go. And upon reading 8000+ words on Weird Al, I'd find it sufficient as well.

But what I find interesting is that Chuck never mentions Wikipedia. He says "a story that he read." And I know why. Doing your research on Wikipedia has a connotation. That it's the easy way out. Reading a story suggests a deeper involvement.

But in 2011, should we feel shame or guilt if we only use Wikipedia? I don't see the point. It's not the same as reading the Cliffs Notes instead of reading the book. It's got all the information you need, clearly presented.

I use Wiki every day. And I rarely need to go beyond it.