Wikipedia – one of the greatest experiments in social media and cummulative knowledge – is instituting a new policy change. The “free encyclopedia anyone can edit” will be restricting editing articles about living people. Any changes made will be flagged and require approval from an experienced editor.
I think a lot of people will be saddened by this. But Wikipedia has grown to become a primary source of information for people, and perhaps a little oversight to make sure that the info that is published is correct and true is not such a bad thing. It’ll be interesting to see if this policy is extended to all Wikipedia articles.
You can read more about it at Mashable.