Write, Breathe, Live

Misleading

When my sons and I do research for their assignments, we sometimes check out what Wikipedia has to say. Having grown up with 26 volumes of the International Encyclopedia at my parents' house, I am sure glad that the Internet now has these sites where you can search for almost anything and find it ... no more heavy books to lug around and no giant bookshelves to crowd the small enough spaces we have at home.

It is distressing then to find out that a lot of information on Wikipedia and other seemingly credible websites are false. Yeah, yeah, so sue me. I wasn't diligent enough to check in the first place. But from now on, I will.

Anyway, in one of my egroups, the current hot topic is an entry in answers.com where someone posted a writeup on supposedly the Philippines' 17th President, (what the ...?! Arroyo is only the 14th!) who turned out to be a student currently enrolled in UP Los Baños (argh, my Alma Mater to boot!).

Okay, so the guy was perhaps just expressing his dreams for his future and he is entitled to that. But to blatantly post that in a site where a lot of students around the world must probably be getting answers from for their homeworks? Tsk, tsk, bad taste!

What made it worse is that he is a fellow Development Communication student. Heaven forbid! I can just imagine some of my dead professors turning in their graves at this very moment because somebody from our beloved college had a not-so-bright idea of posting lies in a website that is suppose to provide truthful answers. What was/were he/they thinking?!

Imagine someone, from say Africa or the Middle East, who's researching about the Philippines unfortunately finding the entry. Who do you think should feel more ashamed? The student who reports to class confident that he/she got valid information? Or the stupid person who uploaded the data on the Internet (again, in a supposedly credible site) in the first place? You tell me.

Yes, I am condemning the way the lies have been spread and adamantly refuse to push the perpetrator/s into the limelight by deigning to even post the erroneous entry's link in my blog.

For goodness' sakes! We are DevCom people! We should be the ones promoting truth through excellent communication!

Oh well, that being out of my chest, I rest my case.