21–30 of 56 posts
Out of curiosity, how many HNers write on Wikipedia? I do it every so once in awhile, but only only on a few topics I'm intimately familiar with, or to fix obvious vandalism.
Out of curiosity, how many HNers write on Wikipedia? I do it every so once in awhile, but only only on a few topics I'm intimately familiar with, or to fix obvious vandalism.
Now, researching & writing articles on moderately-important-to-obscure historical subjects is something I do as an odd form of relaxation. I occasionally edit articles in my actual area of expertise, but that feels more like "work". Collecting a few sources to write a decent first cut at an article on a historical figure or event feels like recreation. Plus, I learn some things.
There'a also very little controversy and conflict compared to writing about hot topics and recent events, so not much wikidrama. People will argue over all sorts of things, but strangely enough I've never had an edit war over an article like http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georg_Gradnauer or http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giuseppe_Pasquale_Ricci. =]
Out of curiosity, how many HNers write on Wikipedia? I do it every so once in awhile, but only only on a few topics I'm intimately familiar with, or to fix obvious vandalism.
http://www.tbray.org/ongoing/When/200x/2008/06/15/Deletionis...
Out of curiosity, how many HNers write on Wikipedia? I do it every so once in awhile, but only only on a few topics I'm intimately familiar with, or to fix obvious vandalism.
Out of curiosity, how many HNers write on Wikipedia? I do it every so once in awhile, but only only on a few topics I'm intimately familiar with, or to fix obvious vandalism.
The article's point resonated with me, because it seems that the whole process is based on the assumption that you're a no-lifer who spends all day patrolling Wikipedia.
They advertised themselves as the "open source encyclopedia", but they have not adopted any other concepts from the software development world, such as "quality assurance" and "stable releases".
It seems like ever since I started working for myself, I don't have time for hobbies at all - everything I do has to go through a prism of how will this affect my bottom line...
Out of curiosity, how many HNers write on Wikipedia? I do it every so once in awhile, but only only on a few topics I'm intimately familiar with, or to fix obvious vandalism.
I'm very turned off by the amount of poorly sourced point-of-view pushing that goes on on Wikipedia. I've tried to light a candle in the darkness by compiling source lists in my user space (which I link to from article talk pages), and by mostly adding current reliable sources to articles, but even at that a lot of my edits get reverted by POV-pushers (or their sock puppets or meat puppets) on ideological grounds. This continues to happen even after one group of articles I work on went through an Arbitration Committee case in August of this year. The sanctioned editors learned how to cheat on their sanctions, and the conscientious editors are still badly outnumbered (at least as to visible accounts actively editing the articles at any one time). The administrators are beleaguered, and aren't using their mops actively to clean up the mess.
http://lesswrong.com/lw/c1/wellkept_gardens_die_by_pacifism/
I have severe doubts about the statement made by Jimbo Wales quoted in the submitted link here: "'I’m not a wiki person who happened to go into encyclopedias,' Wales told the crowd at Oxford. 'I’m an encyclopedia person who happened to use a wiki.'" While I give many of the high-edit-count old hands a lot of credit for trying to maintain encyclopedic standards on Wikipedia, I can't agree that their sound editorial judgment characterizes most of Wikipedia's editorial culture. On any topic that is the least bit controversial, the culture is all about ideological edit-warring, and many active wikipedians seem to be quite proud of their lack of acquaintance with libraries or the other resources used by genuine scholars. There doesn't seem to be anyone at the top of the leadership of Wikipedia backing up the wikipedians who are doing the best work for the project and adding the most reliably sourced content.
http://strategy.wikimedia.org/wiki/Strategic_Plan/Movement_P...
http://strategy.wikimedia.org/wiki/Strategic_Plan/Movement_P...
If pg has said that someone could do to Wikipedia what Wikipedia did to Britannica (where and when did pg say that?), I'd like to know how to join that effort. What have any of you heard about efforts to bring about a friendly competitor to Wikipedia? The best way to help Wikipedia might be to build a point of comparison that does better work, just as East Germany was best helped by the continually visible example of West Germany until the Stasi couldn't make the East Germans afraid anymore.
Out of curiosity, how many HNers write on Wikipedia? I do it every so once in awhile, but only only on a few topics I'm intimately familiar with, or to fix obvious vandalism.
What are some examples of policies that would be detrimental to casual contributors?
[0]Lack of notability and lack of source information are the two big ones there.
What are some examples of policies that would be detrimental to casual contributors?
With tools like huggle, it becomes trivially easy to scan hundreds of edits an hour, and reverting is as easy as pressing 'r'. The problem is, vandal patrolling with huggle is really boring. You're on the lookout for things to revert, and can quite easily misinterpret someone changing a number ("512" to "568") as subtle vandalism. So, someone comes along, fixes a figure that was wrong, and within 1 minute, their change is reverted. It presents a really uninviting face to the uninitiated.
As for xenophobia, the wikipedia community is almost paranoid when it comes to outside influence. This distrust isn't unwarranted, as there have been many instances of various groups plotting to have wikipedia reflect their reality. What this means, however, is that external calls to edit a particular article will likely wind up at AN/I (Administrator's Noticeboard / Incidents, basically where you go to tell on people), and the first thing any new editor would be greeted with would be a notice saying a diplomatic version of "we're on to you".
Policy itself isn't the problem; it's the community. Policy both reflects and shapes community dynamics. However, Wikipedia is a "Jimbotocracy". Jimbo can, has, and will continue to, overrule the community and do whatever he wants, usually in the form of banning / unbanning / stripping or granting of privileges. In addition, ArbCom, the "Supreme Court", if you will, defers to Jimbo. While Jimbo doesn't set policy directly (although he reserves the right to), he does heavily influence it. His views on what policy should be are often taken as passed down from the mountaintop on stone tablet, so it matters what he thinks and why he thinks it.