Erik Moeller wrote:
The important thing is that we form a network of free content platforms for collaboration among educators.
Interesting perspective. I think it is too narrow or inverted. The most interesting opportunity to me is to create the network of free content platforms accessible to the general population or "students".
In my view our entire society has structured itself around gatekeepers of all kinds enabled by information protection techniques ranging from secrecy to legal regulation to practical regulation.
There will inevitably be large changes which I view as beneficial and contributing to individual human rights and freedoms when there is sufficient free information floating around to reduce the impact of gatekeepers of all kinds on our societies and individuals.
The tricky question for me is what to do with how-tos. I think they do have a place in Wikimedia, and a separate project for them might be a good idea. This could include gaming walkthroughs -- instructional materials of any kind. But my biggest hope is for documents from the open source community to be migrated into the wiki context. There are thousands of FAQs, HOWTOs and man pages which are still maintained by single individuals. I made a small effort to change this with OpenFacts, but this was in 2002, when many of the relevant people were still convinced that the future was in using a strict workflow approach within a CMS.
I think How tos and other kinds of information have an obvious place in Wikiversity. In my view the range of useful information should be made more accessible by the existence of Wikiverisity. Theoretical electromagnetism as well as the "How-Tos" regarding installation and calibration of transformers that were deleted early from Wikipedia because it was "an encyclopedia" and appropriate only for summaries, not useful detailed information.
regards, lazyquasar