On 3/4/06, Jonathan <dzonatas(a)dzonux.net> wrote:
Consider that the open content is pretty liberal, are
we just peacefully
editing or peacefully tinkering? That same article has this to say about
it: "Media can also lure us into thinking we are creating by design when
in fact we are just tinkering. Consider the difficulty of transforming
clay-a perfectly malleable and responsive substance into anything
aesthetically satisfying. Perfect "debugability," or malleability, does
not make up for lack of an internal image and shaping skills.
Unfortunately, computers lend themselves to such "clay pushing"; they
tempt users to try to debug constructions into existence by trial and
error."
This is a nice analogy. I'm not sure what it has to do with this
issue, but I like it anyway :)
I don't see how anonymity can actually ruin distinguished efforts,
peaceful editing, or lack of teamwork if the anonymity is not to
completely keep people anonymous. One can always sign there user name to
an entry and reveal who they are. Given there are options to reveal who
made the change, it's not kept a secret. Just the identity of who made
the change is not obvious to the casual reader, which includes editors
that haven't edited the article for a day.
It seems to me like going into a functioning business and telling
everyone to don disguises and continue working.
IMHO, this whole idea is a bit misguided by some ideal that every edit
should be considered independently of who made it. Which would imply
that reputations and past history are no indicators of future
performance. Which is demonstrably false...
It's not like we run around reverting edits by problem editors without
reading them. But if a trusted editor, and a known vandal each made
the same edit - say, changing the population of a city without citing
a source - then we should treat the two cases very differently.
Treating them the same is denying ourselves valuable information.
Steve