Wikipedia: The Greatest “Great Book”

“Most of the electronic encyclopedias currently available do not reflect the power…of the new medium…. They only begin to suggest the flexibility that the computer can bring to the organization of a great book” (Bolter 95-97). Bolter wrote these words in 1991, and much has changed since then. The example he gives for the most advanced electronic encyclopedia is Hyperties, which simply has linking windows pop up from highlighted words with elaborations. Today, we have much more complex versions of “great books” (88), as Bolter calls them, referring to either libraries or encyclopedias, both attempts to compile all knowledge in one place. One such example is the Wikipedia: The Free Encyclopedia (www.wikipedia.org), established in 2001.

According to its definition of itself, it is a “multilingual, Web-based, free-content encyclopedia written collaboratively by volunteers and operated by the non-profit Wikimedia Foundation” (wikipedia.org). The definition is pasted directly from the website, with all highlighted words being links (which actually work in this document as well). This shows just how connected the articles are to each other; practically every other word can lead to another article. This is hypertext to the extreme, where hypertext is defined as “a body of written or pictorial material interconnected in such a complex way that it could not conveniently be presented or represented on paper” (Nelson 144).

How does hypertext make Wikipedia such a superior encyclopedia? Two main aspects are improved, the organizational aspect (influencing the possible depth and breadth of the work) and the mechanical aspect.

A persistent conundrum faced by authors of encyclopedias throughout history has been the problem of organization—should the encyclopedia be organized topically (showing the “philosophical vision” of connections between concepts) or alphabetically (facilitating access) (Bolter 91)? Wikipedia, like other electronic encyclopedias, incorporates both of these systems of organization and more. Its search function allows the reader to find any article containing the specified word, granting easy access, while various topical outlines also exist, with such categories as related links to any one article, current events, and the general set of all hypertextual links within the articles (including those to other articles as well as those to different spots in the outline of the article itself). Wikipedia fulfills Bolter’s vision concerning the practicality of an ideal electronic encyclopedia: “[T]he reader would not be permanently constrained by any one view: he or she could shift back and forth among outlines” (94). Organizational innovation, as a key means to facilitating various forms of access, is the foundation for fundamentally improving an encyclopedia.

The mechanical element is rather simple; it just takes away the physical work a reader would have to go through to find articles and those articles related to them.

In these abilities, Wikipedia approaches closer to the ideals originally set forth by Vannevar Bush and Ted Nelson for the information retrieval system of the future. Bush describes “[w]holly new forms of encyclopedias…ready made with a mesh of associative trails running through them….The chemist, struggling with the synthesis of an organic compound, has all the chemical literature before him in his laboratory, with trails following the analogies of compounds, and side trails to their physical and chemical behavior” (46). Granted, Wikipedia is not as specialized as a doctor would need, but the technology involved is exactly what Bush is describing, with hypertext establishing numerous associative connections for efficient investigation in whatever degree of depth or breadth required. Nelson comments on another aspect for the development of information retrieval, that “[i]nformation systems must have built in the capacity to accept the new categorization systems as they evolve from, or outside, the framework of the old” (144). Knowledge is constantly changing, and more information is always amassing; the best retrieval systems will be able to adapt to this change. Wikipedia, with its option to be viewed in various outlines, through word searches, or through numerous associative links establish innumerable categories. Clearly, Wikipedia is one of the leading developments in new media application, providing better organization and faster access. It is truly the greatest “great book.”

**Stay tuned for a further discussion of another aspect of Wikipedia—the almost indecipherable distinction between author and reader—in my next reading response.