The Rare Defense of Wikipedia

As I was reading the Digital Humanities Manifesto I found myself respecting the authors who wrote it and intrigued by their rational. I thought that some of the statements made were rather bold. For example, "The digital realm [is] open source, open resource...anything trying to close space is the enemy." I think it may be a bit extreme to call anything trying to somewhat privatize the internet an enemy, yet I do believe it can be moreso something of a progress blocker?

I was amused by the idea of Wikipedia as a Wikiversity. I was able to make a personal connection (as I'm sure many others were too) because I have often visited Wikipedia not for respectable research information but to gain background information on something that I was unfamiliar with. I respect the idea that "Wikipedia represents a truly global, multilingual authorship and editorial collective for gather, creating, and managing information. " I am aware that this statement may make some people cringe, like teachers, professors, publishers, just to name a few....but I mean, the authors do have a valid point. Wikipedia is a forum that engages the knowledge of thousands of people, all able to add in their thoughts/knowledge/experience to a particular entry. This is huge progress for the digital humanities. I think that people need to stop thinking so restrictively about the digital humanities. Why can't something like the digital humanities encompass a myriad of means to share information? I suppose this relates back to our categorization question concerning genres, and I think maybe I'm beginning to let go of that I NEED to categorize phase that many of us found ourselves in during the first weeks of class. 

In addition to these thoughts I'm curious to see what our senior visitors during tomorrow's class have to say about their experience with the internet. Have either of them found that the Internet has helped them with their English major by allowing them to quickly share information or have access to different authors? Have they utilized the internet for their own publishing endeavors? And alongside of these questions I can't help but wonder how do they feel about categorizing themselves as an English major?