Academic Use of Wikipedia: Infographic

Any student that’s taken classes during the Internet era has both been told to never use Wikipedia for research papers and used it anyway. With a treasure trove of information available on virtually any topic, person or event one could think of, Wikipedia can be used as a valuable tool when used properly. Legal Morning came up with a great infographic about proper academic use of the every growing, ever changing online encyclopedia to help sort out when it's appropriate to use--and when you're better off citing a more permanent source. Here are some of the highlights from the infographic and scroll down to see it in full. Feel free to share with students!

• Wikipedia has more than 30 million articles and is available in more than 285 languages
• Read the outside sources referenced in the body of the Wikipedia article and use those as citations and for information about the topic
• Wikipedia Projects can be a great way of finding authoritative sources on a particular topic
• Use their reference desk, similarly to how you might use a library reference desk