The Closed, Unfriendly World of Wikipedia • Hacker News Board

Re: The Closed, Unfriendly World of Wikipedia

#171

Post by tptacek » Thu, Nov 24, 2011, 5:10 AM UTC

knowtheory wrote: post #143

tptacek wrote: post #51

You can tell someone hasn't spent much time at AfD, the section of Wikipedia where people (anyone in the world, really) discuss whether articles should be deleted, by the outrage they express at the "arbitrariness" of Wikipedia's notability rules. Have you spent any time at AfD? Let me help you out: here's the AfD log for the week they killed "Jessie_Stricchiola": http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Articles_for_d…

The two rules you've outline are the primary reason i contribute very little to wikipedia. I can put together a well-sourced piece outlining the importance of a variety of subjects which i am indirectly involved in, and give a dispassionate description of its relevance to the community it serves and the world at large. Wikipedians, instead of saying "do that and have neutral 3rd parties check over your work", instead…

That's not actually a rule of Wikipedia. You absolutely can contribute to Knight Foundation articles. However, because most people who contribute to articles on subjects they have a vested interested in are not good faith contributors, you may find yourself dealing with more friction than you'd like.

Don't oversimplify, though. This isn't a simple problem, and we have no right to expect it to be. There isn't a Wikipedia rule preventing you from writing about your company or the organization that funded it.

Re: The Closed, Unfriendly World of Wikipedia

#172

Post by [deleted] » Thu, Nov 24, 2011, 5:10 AM UTC

gergles wrote: post #164

zbowling wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't understand why you are getting down-voted for your comment. This is exactly what happens. I've been in on more than 30 or 40 so AfD discussions. There is usually a deep debate of it. In the end it's not about votes either. We leave long explanations as our points for or against. We weigh the arguments. It prevents the "+1 me too! I agree!" responses from adding to it so consensus by vote doesn't always matter…

The actual results were 7:6. On what planet is that "consensus"? Oh wait, another WikiMagicThing is that only some votes count and some votes count more than others and what votes count is completely up to the arbitrary decision of someone who has no accountability for their decisions. Right.

[deleted]

Re: The Closed, Unfriendly World of Wikipedia

#173

Post by sabat » Thu, Nov 24, 2011, 5:12 AM UTC

gwillen wrote: post #17

suivix wrote: post #6

I changed 'tyre' to 'tire' in an article and got a vandalism notice on my talk page. That's when I stopped contributing.

That's because 1) There is a policy against Americanizing British spellings for no reason (this is probably a good thing); 2) frequently experienced editors are much too harsh with new contributors and don't explain why (this is definitely a bad thing).

... which is completely ridiculous, for two reasons. One, Wikipedia is based in America, and so naturally its English should be consistently American. Two, modern English as spoken and written in England has grammar problems -- e.g., the insistence on using plurals for singular objects, such as corporations ("Shell Oil have announced ..."). Therefore, American English is obviously preferable.

Re: The Closed, Unfriendly World of Wikipedia

#174

Post by 1point2 » Thu, Nov 24, 2011, 5:14 AM UTC

tptacek wrote: post #125

pessimizer wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I seem to be dropping like a stone here, so let me go on forever about this: 1. Danny Sullivan hears that his friend Jessie Stricchiola, a pioneer in fighting click fraud, has been deleted from Wikipedia. 2. He somehow gets to a discussion about the deletion of her page on Wikipedia. On it is a debate between 13 people about whether her page should be deleted, and at the top of that page is a detailed explanation by…

I seem to be dropping like a stone here, so let me go on forever about this You are my new favorite commenter.

Yeah - Both of you got my up. I too like Wikipedia - and its chock a block full of good stuff - so it seems some folk have taken the time to learn the rules and add to collective knowledge contained within.

Re: The Closed, Unfriendly World of Wikipedia

#175

Post by tptacek » Thu, Nov 24, 2011, 5:14 AM UTC

epochwolf wrote: post #156

tptacek wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks! Fixed!

Coming in an hour later, it looks like you just italicized the uppercase. I think bane met to use italics instead of uppercase. If this is on purpose, well played. :)

Yeah, I was just kidding around.

Re: The Closed, Unfriendly World of Wikipedia

#176

Post by zbowling » Thu, Nov 24, 2011, 5:15 AM UTC

gergles wrote: post #164

zbowling wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't understand why you are getting down-voted for your comment. This is exactly what happens. I've been in on more than 30 or 40 so AfD discussions. There is usually a deep debate of it. In the end it's not about votes either. We leave long explanations as our points for or against. We weigh the arguments. It prevents the "+1 me too! I agree!" responses from adding to it so consensus by vote doesn't always matter…

The actual results were 7:6. On what planet is that "consensus"? Oh wait, another WikiMagicThing is that only some votes count and some votes count more than others and what votes count is completely up to the arbitrary decision of someone who has no accountability for their decisions. Right.

Consensus cannot be found in votes alone. Don't over simplify things.

See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Consensus

and: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:!VOTE#Straw_poll_guid...

If you see the world in black and white, you're missing important grey matter. ~Jack Fyock

Re: The Closed, Unfriendly World of Wikipedia

#177

Post by mikeleeorg » Thu, Nov 24, 2011, 5:17 AM UTC

kstenerud wrote: post #70

What Wikipedia really needs is for a UI expert to step in and fix what is essentially a broken UI. Requesting a reinstatement of a deleted page in a properly designed UI should take no more than a couple of clicks and 1 minute of reading, tops. Navigating a twisted web of broken or confusing or incorrect links with walls of text at every step does not a good UI make. All of the UI frustrations the op experiences snow…

I would really, really love to see this. Even with the core MediaWiki platform too.

MediaWiki is open source BTW. I would do this if I could, but alas, my UI skills are not quite there. Are there any sharp UI designers who want to do this? It would be a hell of an addition to one's resume, not to mention the world :)

Re: The Closed, Unfriendly World of Wikipedia

#178

Post by nowarninglabel » Thu, Nov 24, 2011, 5:18 AM UTC

geraldalewis wrote: post #132

nowarninglabel wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you miss the point, which is that the process is insanely opaque, which you note yourself by saying > if you get really involved in the site When I meet wikipedia people here in SF, they say, "Get involved!" Then, when I have tried to get involved, I get endless bureaucracy and everything eventually deleted. I've only managed to ever get 1 article on wikipedia (a bio of an expert in behavioral economics / neg…

> it's extremely difficult to participate, I ask honestly: why should it be easy to participate? > and I don't want to need to spend a bunch at Wikipedia reading countless rules trying to figure that out You don't want to spend time contributing, you just want readers to accept your contribution? I hope I'm misreading your intent, as it sounds like you feel you're above the vetting process? I've made some modest cont…

Your attitude speaks to exactly what is wrong with Wikipedia. You seem to think it should be difficult to participate, such that only the elite who have busted their chops should be able to do so. If you wish to end up with a dead community (which is exactly what is happening, the number contributors is stabilizing not growing), then fine, but if you wish to actually expand the wealth of human knowledge available there, then you're going to have to drop the holier-than-thou attitude.

It should be easy to participate because that is what is being asked for, it is after all "the free encyclopedia that anyone can edit."

However, I am being asked to contribute, and asked to encourage others to contribute, such as noted here: http://www.marketplace.org/topics/tech/wikipedia-loses-contr... Or more directly, read the statements from Jimmy Wales here http://www.firstpost.com/tech/wikipedia-in-india-we-needs-mo... where he says Wikipedia's interface needs to be simplified and asks for more regional language contributors. I've tried to turn on Indian friends/co-workers to editing Wikipedia, but they found it extremely daunting.

This is in sharp contrast to open source projects I've contributed to, such as Drupal, which I'll note I have quite a few contributions there, so I'm certainly no stranger to putting in a lot of work to participate in something.

The difference with Drupal is that there are very clearly defined rules for how to participate, clear instructions for how to do so, and new contributors are helped along in the process to get their code right, rather than being told their contribution is worthless, which is the attitude I get anytime I try to contribute something on Wikipedia. And that's not to say there isn't attitude in the Drupal community, there still is, but at least there one can still contribute despite it, whereas at Wikipedia, it just becomes a lost cause.

Re: The Closed, Unfriendly World of Wikipedia

#179

Post by mikeleeorg » Thu, Nov 24, 2011, 5:23 AM UTC

ciscoriordan wrote: post #75

A more extreme example is the Amanda Knox article on Wikipedia. For years it was kept deleted by a cabal of British English speaking administrators and editors (Knox's murdered roommate was British). A deletion review finally overturned the deletion a couple weeks after Knox's conviction was overturned. http://blogs.seattleweekly.com/dailyweekly/2011/03/amanda_kn...

I didn't know about the Wikipedia issues around that tragedy, but found it interesting from a sociological standpoint. So I tried looking for similar cases of the line between fact & opinion blurring on battleground Wikipedia, and found this, in case anyone else is interested:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reliability_of_Wikipedia

(And it's on Wikipedia itself, natch.)

Re: The Closed, Unfriendly World of Wikipedia

#180

Post by bane » Thu, Nov 24, 2011, 5:26 AM UTC

tptacek wrote: post #175

epochwolf wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Coming in an hour later, it looks like you just italicized the uppercase. I think bane met to use italics instead of uppercase. If this is on purpose, well played. :)

Yeah, I was just kidding around.

It took me a minute, but I thought it was funny.