Don't Use the Web too Much (or For Serious Research)

I doubt that anyone in the drug industry who is truly serious about science uses Wikipedia, except out of curiosity...but I do occasionally hear that some younger scientists and engineers do most of their research (for papers, dissertations, theses) online.  This can be a problem....for instance, when you cite a recent online source in the topic you're writing about, but fail to see that exhaustive work in that area had already been published 50 years ago...and that your hypothesis was proven dead wrong....only, today, chances are, your professor may not know either...

Emil Ciurczak has written extensively on this. Here's a sample.

Unfortunately, many people in the media are relying on Wikipedia, which is neat as a community tool, but not to be taken too seriously as a bona fide source. An Irish graduate student just proved this point...by publishing a neat quote in a composer's  Wikipedia entry after he died....one that was picked up by obituary writers all over the world before Wikipedia expunged it. For more, read on.

Maybe someone should try this with a technical entry and see if anyone gets duped...

Speaking of the Internet...it's rather scary what you can find there.  Some career guru recently advised listeners to google themselves to see what comes up.  Did this a few days ago, and, lo and behold, the Twitter page that I created,not because I wanted to but because someone invited me, and which I have not TOUCHED since, and which is completely empty,shows up on page 1...and I also learned that a technical article I wrote several years ago is now being used as....yes...a free online typing test.  Oh, the shame!

AMS