Show me an expert?

Recently, I have been pondering and discussing how social media is guiding us to redefine our definition of an expert. True experts will always be those people with the information and skill level to get a job done at the highest possible potential. The key here is sources.

There are three types of sources that we generally accept in our understanding of an expert, and these are not changing. We allow people to show expertise by sharing experiences and observations, by doing qualitative research, and by citing others in research and experiences (case studies). We know that there are times and places for each of these methods; this applies on and off-line. We also know there are different sets of standards; we have different expectations for our doctor than we do for our mechanic.

Wikipedia, the encyclopedia which any Internet user can contribute an addition to the article, receives a lot of flack about its open structure. What does the average person know about writing an encyclopedia entry? Co-founder Jimmy Wales considers himself an anticredentialist who is letting people break down the walls around knowledge to let anyone share content. Wikipedia has a strong community who edit posts and determines if users cite valid sources and stay away from commentary. For example, in this article about Anshe Chung, editors have flagged the content. Here is what the content looked like on March 8^th. You can go to the article and see what it looks like now.




In an excellent and extensive article How accurate is Wikipedia's content? out of the Wharton School of Business, a case looks at Wikipedia as a middle ground between academic journals and free-form content. Kendall Whitehouse, senior director of information technology at Wharton, explains the most interesting question is “whether the wisdom of the crowd [in authoring ‘citizen-authored content’] is ultimately a better approach compared to scholarly review and edited content,” pointing out that Wikipedia’s strength is that it has thousands of eyes looking at it. The editorial eyes are there but as the content grows Whitehouse and other critics are still concerned about the process as well as the ability and the willingness to edit all the content.

When I use Wikipedia, I take everything with a grain of salt, and I expect that I need to evaluate the validity of the content. I like Wikipedia for quick lookups and for leading me to other sources. Writing the encyclopedia is hardly ever the main source use to prove a point – it is the resource used to help guide research and lead to primary sources. Peer-reviewed articles have a different place than an encyclopedia.

The eyes on Wikipedia and other content are a valuable tool for defining an expert online. Comments will surface when content might be viewed as inconsistent. If your blog get lots of traffic or well respected, perceived inconsistency may be broadcasted on the evening news as a reason not to trust the blogosphere, but it’s also a triumph of the medium to get instant feedback from a community of interested co-creators.

When I write about social networking, many consider me to be an expert. I get my expertise by citing other research and writing. I also cite case studies both of my own experience and of others. Citing a case study of how a company handled a given situation is a valid a source as more numbers centric research in many cases.

Take a look at LinkedIn Answers, where users establish their own credentials to post about topics ranging from economics to management to technology, but answers are reviewed by all the others users with access to the question. This form of peer-review provides for a higher level of questions and answers. The fact that question askers can award a top answer also helps to give other credentials and creates a system for knowing who an expert is.

Forums online that bring together experts have a slightly different issue; experts like to cite their own opinions. For example a forum exists for carpet cleaners to ask questions of the community on technical issues, business practices, and many other random topics. When you bring together many diverse views and abilities you can tease out great answers and many success stories.

I hope (notice this is an opinion) that people don’t fight the change in definition of how we define an expert, but rather force their peers to reach higher standards of citation by supporting those users that do so. If no-one reads a blog, the author won’t post. If the bloggers’ readers write on my blog – please cite a source, authors will hopefully get the idea.

Please let me step on to my soap box. This also means that schools need to teach students to know how to properly evaluate a text. A student should see “I hope,” and know that this is an opinion. Students must learn to cite and care about sources or this shift will result in a population with fewer experts.

Go out, become an expert in your field. Read, write, cite, research, read more, write more, cite more, comment more, become an expert and prove it to others.