del.icio.us: wikipedia

My general recommendation to clients has been that having an entry in Wikipedia for your brand/product is a good thing. Underlying that, I suppose, is the thought that their brand is high profile enough that it might just be an inevitability that their brand/product will end up with an entry and they might as well play an active role in contributing to that entry.

Note -- this does not equate to suggesting they should include false information or that they should delete unfavorable information. It means they should be willing to participate in the conversation about what is included in the entry versus sitting back and wishing it all would just go away.

Anyway, Luke Knowles at the Virtual Marketing Blog has "4 Reasons Not to Put Your Company in the Wikipedia": 1) including a link to your corporate site in the Wikipedia entry doesn't help your search results, 2) you risk having your Wikipedia entry rank higher than your corporate/product site, 3) you risk having others post false or unfavorable content in your post, and 4) factual unfavorable content will show up in the entry and you can't do anything about it.

This all seems to be more applicable to smaller companies/brands who have a choice and who are struggling to ensure that their product/brand site shows up on the first page of relevant search results. Again, for larger brands/products, the existence of an entry is an inevitability in which they must actively participate.

Even if the unfavorable content is not in your Wikipedia entry, it's in your search results and it's better just to face it head on.