Wiki Dudeman wrote:
An
"award" for a good post or encyclopedia edit can simply be a
compliment:
"nice post" or "good edit". This is also at the heart of civility,
and
should be done much more than it is in the Project.
That's why I like barnstars so much. They are easy to award, and people
don't get obsessed over them to the point of dedicating their wikipedia
time to the purpose of solely getting barnstars.
Yes indeed. I've done on-line community stuff for a long time, and I
can't think of anything so subtly brilliant as the barnstar system.
Given by anyone, they don't reinforce any particular power structure.
Given for anything that somebody thinks is good, they don't privilege
one particular view of goodness. As awards, not rewards, nobody
dedicates themselves to chasing them. And since they can come for
anything, they don't bias people much to particular kinds of work.
But still, they're damned nice to get. They seem to be a system of
almost pure appreciation, rather than the manipulation that is the
purpose of most reward systems.
And I agree completely with your earlier point about adminship. A lot of
people seem to pursue admin status like they would leveling up their
World of Warcraft character, which is unfortunate. Understandable, but
missing the point.
In "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy", Adams describes a governing
system where the presidency is an entirely ceremonial post, meant for
people who pursue it for the wrong reasons. It's too late for us, but
I'd love it if some similar project created "administrator" and
"janitor" posts. One would be showy and useless. The other would be
boring and maybe even a little denigrated, but would have the ring of
keys that opens every door in the building. :-)
Exactly, William. They truly hold the keys to the kingdom :-). And, without
the janitors, we'd all be constantly bogged down and tripping over
yesterday's trash.
Marc