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I’ll come right out and say it - I’m a Wikipedia skeptic, though I must confess I am a closet-clicker for those quick-hits that help you to win a trivia bet (so Olivia DeHavilland is still alive, but she’s not the oldest living cast member of GWTW - but I found that out on IMDB, the second greatest bet settler on the Internet).

That’s why I was so intrigued to hear about Martha Groom’s new term paper for her students. Instead of writing a term paper , she had them write Wikipedia entries.

The history buff in me nearly choked with flashbacks to Stephen Colbert changing the entries for George Washington. Imagine it - freshman around the world could be polluting cyberspace with their own version of information.

But maybe there are a few lessons in this lesson, for Ms. Groom’s students and for all of us.

Lesson number one is the oldest on the Internet - you can’t treat Wikipedia (and most of the Internet, really) as a reliable source. Ms. Groom’s A+ student probably wrote a stellar entry, but should we assume other students did the same? I don’t doubt that Ms. Groom’s students tried their best, but the fact remains that when it comes to serious research, most college students are amateurs. Sites like Wikipedia may be useful for resolving dead-or-alive conflicts, but should be considered only nominally for serious research.

The second lesson is that if you’re going to post your own user-generated content on the Internet, you’ll be prepared to defend it (I’m already lifting weights to defend myself against the coming onslaught of Wikipedia lovers). There were some comments posted about the students’ entries, some which Groom admits, were less than pleasant. On your traditional term paper, a mistake results in a red-pen swipe by your professor. On the Internet, it may bring on the wrath of angry legions (or worse yet, seen by no one).

A little over a year ago, Stephan Colbert recently defined wikiality as

A reality where, if enough people agree with a notion, it becomes the truth.

That seems pretty close to Netscape’s opinion of social news, if you read their recent statement closing shop at their own social news portal (emphasis mine):

Many of you may remember that Netscape.com used to be much different than it is today. In fact, it used to contain more mainstream news before we shifted to the social news site you see now.

We received some feedback that people really do associate the Netscape brand with providing mainstream news that is editorially controlled. In fact, we specifically heard that our users do have a desire for a social news experience, but simply didn’t expect to find it on Netscape.com.

Now, to be fair, they did indicate that they plan to build a new social news site, but the bottom line is that by using words like “mainstream” and “traditional,” Netscape is saying that they just didn’t like the stories people were voting on (As a sidenote, I found this story on Digg, ironically enough).

Sound like a tough allegation? Follow me below the fold…

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“Fifty-seven percent of online adults have used the internet to watch or download video, and 19% do so on a typical day,” according to the Pew Internet and American Life project, which published its first major report on the subject this week.

You read numbers like that and it’s no wonder why so many nonprofit organizations are venturing into the wild world of YouTube. Here at Beaconfire we’ve helped a number of clients create new video for the web, or adapt their TV-oriented videos to display on the web.

Here are three quick tips for understanding the difference between TV and web video.

YouTube videos should be short. Producers should aim for about three minutes. One minute is even better. If you have a longer piece that was originally prepared for TV, give serious thought to having a videographer edit it down into short, self-contained pieces.

YouTube videos have a long shelf life. Some of the videos we’ve helped clients post continue to rack up impressive numbers of views and build the brand long after the campaign in question has wound down. Check back on your YouTube video every few weeks and make sure you update your reports on views.

YouTube offers a tradeoff. If you host the video yourself, you may be able to insert clickable links into the video, so viewers can move straight from the video to your donation form, petition, etc… That’s good. But if you host the video yourself, you won’t be able to tap into YouTube’s huge built-in audience. That’s bad.

There was a nice feature story in the Washington Post metro section on neighborhood listservs — Offering Both the Nice and the Nasty, E-Mail Lists Surge in Usage. The reporter cited Pew studies which have found that more than half of all Internet users are subscribed to one or more lists, up from just about a third in 2001. The reporter also noted that listservs were displacing traditional communications vehicles such as the home owner association newsletter and the community center bulletin board.

These findings didn’t surprise us here at Beaconfire, we play close attention to how nonprofit professionals use listservs. What did catch our eye was the size of some of the neighborhood lists. More than 2,000 subscribed to the Chevy Chase listserv, more than 5,000 subscribed to the Cleveland Park listserv. Those are big numbers!

OK, these are affluent neighborhoods in the nation’s capital — but you can bet that similar lists have popped up all across the country.

The thing about listservs is that they attract the outspoken and engaged residents of the neighborhood. For any nonprofit sufficiently local to legitimately participate in the lists, they offer rich opportunities to engage the community in the organization’s work, dispel rumors, and promote events and services. They also offer an opportunity for an overzealous staffer to make a pest out of themselves or inadvertanly brand a good cause as an unwelcome spammer in the eyes of the community.

Local homeless shelters, foodbanks, thrift stores, and park watchdogs should sign up immediately!

Here at Beaconfire, we’re as excited as anybody about Web 2.0 — but the good-old-fashioned listserv is the online community of choice for those with serious activist inclinations, at least environmental activists.

That’s the conclusion of a study we’re releasing today called Network of Networks: Email Lists, Nature Protection, and Pollution Control. After monitoring 64 environmental listservs for about six months and surveying the subscribers, we found that these groups are hotbeds of civic activism and social networking. Subscribers reported extraordinarily high participation in a wide variety of behavior such as writing Congress, calling radio talk shows, attending public hearings, and giving speeches — and they said they placed high value on the listservs’ role in helping them stay in touch with peers.

Of particular note for nonprofit organizations, concerned citizens formed many of these groups on their own initiative without any assistance or participation from a formal organization, and participants on most of these lists pay little attention to the activities of the national environmental groups. Those national organizations that figure out how to overcome this gap and successfully engage with these outspoken citizens stand reap some big rewards.

Download the report: Network of Networks: Email Lists, Nature Protection, and Pollution Control