page_title: The Truth According to Wikipedia
section_title: Reception
hierarchical_section_title: The Truth According to Wikipedia / Reception
caption_attribution_description: English: Andrew Keen speaking at TNW conference
context_page_description: The Truth According to Wikipedia, also referred to as Wiki's Truth, is a Dutch documentary about Wikipedia directed by IJsbrand van Veelen. It was screened at The Next Web conference in Amsterdam on 4 April 2008 and broadcast by the Dutch documentary series Backlight on Nederland 2 on 7 April 2008. It was subsequently made available through American Public Television.
  The documentary examines the reliability of Wikipedia, and the dichotomy between the contributions of experts and amateur editors. The documentary includes commentary from Wikipedia co-founders Jimmy Wales and Larry Sanger, The Cult of the Amateur author Andrew Keen, O'Reilly Media chief executive officer Tim O'Reilly, and former editor-in-chief of Encyclopædia Britannica Robert McHenry. Keen says that experts should serve as guardians of information during the Web 2.0 phenomenon; this point of view is supported by analysis from Sanger.
  The Truth According to Wikipedia received a generally positive reception, being described in Film Quarterly as "a sharp and wide-ranging overview of wikipistemology".
context_section_description: The Truth According to Wikipedia received a positive review in the journal Film Quarterly, where author Ben Walters‌ called the documentary, "a sharp and wide-ranging overview of wikipistemology". In a report entitled Teaching Seven Revolutions: A Tool Kit for Educating Globally Competent Citizens published by the Center for Strategic and International Studies, the documentary was given a rating of: "Good – especially if students think Wikipedia is the one source for
  everything". It was recommended as a resource to learn about information science.
  Author Thomas Leitch in his book Wikipedia U wrote that Keen's perspective on Wikipedia in particular and Web 2.0 in general as expressed in the documentary was a significant viewpoint. Leitch said the criticism directed at Wikipedia by Keen merited further debate because it reflected assumptions explaining why Wikipedia was met with wariness by educators that discouraged the encyclopedia's use in a classroom setting. Bastard Culture! author Mirko Tobias Schäfer called the documentary a well-received analysis of the discussion over truth on Wikipedia.
  The Truth According to Wikipedia was given positive reception by Eric Schonfeld of TechCrunch, who commented that the film was expertly created. Though he praised the documentary for displaying multiple different viewpoints, he was critical of the documentary's emphasis on Andrew Keen throughout, and said it became a tool for Keen to publicize his polemics against Wikipedia. Schonfeld assessed that Keen came away as the winner of his thesis by the end of the documentary. Of Keen's argument, Schonfeld pointed out that he did not address how researchers on Wikipedia could either be experts themselves, or subsequently become experts by virtue of improving the quality of articles on the website.
  Commenting on the documentary himself, Keen called it an enlightening documentary. Media futurist, blogger, and writer Gerd Leonhard recommended the documentary and called it most entertaining. Nicholas Carlson of Gawker Media framed the documentary as a conflict of "Experts vs. amateurs", and distilled the essence of the documentary down to a 90-second version.
  Designer and commentator in the fields of online learning and new media Stephen Downes characterized The Truth According to Wikipedia as a fascinating documentary both about its website of focus and the larger phenomenon of Web 2.0. Downes was critical of the film's use a documentary-style format in order to present its message, and argued that the viewpoints presented were not subsequently backed up by documentation.
  Ernst-Jan Pfauth of The Next Web praised the documentary's director for gathering together a varied group of experts to comment upon Wikipedia for the documentary. He posed questions raised by the documentary's analysis, and wondered whether the Web had succeeded in increasing intelligence and accuracy within society. Pfauth asked: "Are equality and truth really reconcilable ideals?"
caption: Thomas Leitch wrote in his book Wikipedia U that Andrew Keen (pictured) expressed a significant viewpoint in the documentary which merited further debate.[3]
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