Steve Yelvington and Terry Heaton respond to John Seigenthaler's piece in USA Today in which he detailed his experience with Wikipedia - the site had innacurate, libelous facts listed in its entry about him - and said, in a sweeping indictment: "And so we live in a universe of new media with phenomenal opportunities for worldwide communications and research — but populated by volunteer vandals with poison-pen intellects. Congress has enabled them and protects them."

Says Terry: "This sad event, I'm afraid, is going to be used by the mainstream to beat the snot out of the ideas of trust noted in my most recent essay. Mr. Seigenthaler certainly didn't deserve this, and nobody would deny him his anger. But let's not throw the baby out with the bath water."

And Steve: "Welcome to the old world! Volunteer vandals with poison-pen intellects have always been around, and they've always had access to the media. Anonymity is not new, and in fact has been the refuge of scoundrels and social troublemakers like 'Silence Dogood' throughout the history of this country... Today we can commit these sins without putting on our pants, but that's just a matter of convenience."

Terry again: "Wikipedia is quite honestly an amazing entity, but the user caveat has always been (and will always be) "consider the source and proceed." This is an awful example of what can go wrong with such openness, but to treat it as justification for libel and slander suits against Wikipedia would be a mistake. Something needs to be done, and perhaps even new laws need to be written..."