Evaluating authoritative sources using social networks: an insight from Wikipedia
Year: 2006
Type: article
Abstract: Purpose The purpose of this paper is to present an approach to evaluating contributions in collaborative authoring environments, and in particular, Wikis using social network measures. Design/methodology/approach A social network model for Wikipedia has been constructed, and metrics of importance such as centrality have been defined. Data has been gathered from articles belonging to the same topic using a web crawler, in order to evaluate the outcome of the social network measures in the articles. Findings Finds that the question of the reliability regarding Wikipedia content is a challenging one and as Wikipedia grows, the problem becomes more demanding, especially for topics with controversial views such as politics or history. Practical implications It is believed that the approach presented here could be used to improve the authoritativeness of content found in Wikipedia and similar sources. Originality/value This work tries to develop a network approach to the evaluation of Wiki contributions, and approaches the problem of quality Wikipedia content from a social network point of view.
Source: Online Information Review
Institutions: Copenhagen Business School, Ionian University
Language: English
Subfield: Communication
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W1967402201