To critics of Wikipedia–which, in a spin on the open-source model, lets anyone create and edit entries–the news was further proof that the service has no accountability and no place in the world of serious information gathering.

“Wales, in a recent C-SPAN interview…insisted that his Web site is accountable and that his community of thousands of volunteer editors…corrects mistakes within minutes,” former Robert Kennedy aide John Seigenthaler wrote in USA Today. “My experience refutes that…For four months, Wikipedia depicted me as a suspected assassin.