society's duty to separate what's important online

the internet's ability to saturate an individual's mind with unmeasurable amounts of information is incredibly apparent in today's world.  information itself is remarkably easy to access and obtain, a double-edged sword that can result in the inability to retain and remember new ideas.  as the amount of web content increases daily, society is given the responsibility of separating worthwhile information from the worthless.  there's plenty of the worthless out there; and it can strike an innocent individual at any time.  the line differentiating reliable material from misleading is often blurred by the difficulty to find credentials on information provided, leading the average person to assume information is correct and backed up.

wikipedia's claim to fame, that anyone can contribute to
each page's content, is a double-edged sword that leads many to
look down on it for being unreliable and unscholarly.

the most common example of this is wikipedia.  before making an argument against the site, i must make a disclaimer: i personally enjoy wikipedia, and find that the information provided can have citations and seems to be reliable.  copious amounts of information on any subject, person, or thing can be found on "the free encyclopedia," and often times it is tempting to use wikipedia for research because it is easy to find.  when searching for information on just about anything, wikipedia is usually the first or second website to appear in the search results.  it is a quick, effective way to find large amounts of information on anything one may desire to learn about.  but can this information be trusted? two arguments can be made - one for and one against the site.  one can argue that information is reliable on wikipedia because anyone can edit the page for any subject, allowing for individuals to add and build upon what is already given; one that has knowledge of the subject can contribute and improve the page's material in a simple and effective manner.  any mistake can be edited, and each page can be continuously fine-tuned.  one that opposes this belief can argue that lack of citations and the very ability for anyone to contribute is wikipedia's downfall in becoming a reliable source of information - any accurate material can be edited and altered to lead people on in believing what is correct.  how often this occurs, no one knows, but the very possibility is why wikipedia is looked down upon in the educational system - it is not scholarly and cannot be trusted.
this idea can be applied to all facets of the internet - information is incredibly abundant, and it is difficult to decide if it can be trusted.  through visual aids and flashy webpages, people are bombarded with information when viewing any webpage (maybe besides the google homepage).  if there can be a line drawn between what is important and what can be disregarded, society may have the ability to retain important and reliable information easier.  if there is a predetermined standard as to what is worth viewing and spending time on, the internet can become a much more productive medium for information.