On Jul 24, 2006, at 2:06 PM, Stan Shebs wrote:
But I don't think there's a whole lot of
incentive or reward for
leadership, so attempts tend to be brief and unsuccessful. Even if
one manages to organize several like-minded editors into a
cooperative effort, the newest of newbies can still come in and
disrupt, oftentimes with the support of onlookers shrieking about
cabals, and the would-be leader sees his/her investment in WP come
to naught.
Then don't. Make a fork. Only allow "like-minded
editors" to edit it,
and go for it. Heck, maybe it will work better than what we've got
now. I, at least, would be glad to have the competition. And as for
money issues, until/unless you get massive traffic, the hardware costs
won't be too high. I'll chip in some (~$25) seed money, if you really
need it.
This is not a joke. If you think you can make more progress in
producing a free encyclopedia by working in an environment where "the
newest of newbies" can't "come in and disrupt", then do it, and show
us. Rent some hardware, install Mediawiki on it, copy over a recent
database dump, apply whatever restrictions you think will help you, and
get down to work. If it really works better than what we've got here,
I'll bet many good editors will flock to it; if not, then we'll have a
real-life example to point to when this discussion comes up again. And
even if it just lets you, Stan Shebs, write a few more excellent
articles, that's a win in itself. By all means - go to it!
<snip last paragraph>
Jesse Weinstein