I'm taking the liberty of also forwarding John's below crucial and spot-on observation to the WikiEN-l mailing list -- I would hope that that's ok.
-- Jens
Begin forwarded message:
From: John Collison john@collison.ie Date: 12 September 2004 18:51:12 GMT+02:00 To: Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List foundation-l@wikimedia.org Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] Rewarding volunteers Reply-To: Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List foundation-l@wikimedia.org
I have to say I agree with Jimbo on this one. I was thinking about Wikipedia in the future for a while and I think we have to be careful where we go from here. Think about it, Wikipedia started out with a simple vision: a free encyclopedia where anyone could edit anything. Now, sysops, developers etc are getting more power, anons less trusted, and there is talk of paying developers. If we're not cautious, we could end up just like a conventional online encyclopedia. Sort of like the way animal farm went :-/. I think we should try and preserve the original idea of Wikipedia (and Wikimedia projects in general).
-- John Collison (Ludraman) P.S. Sorry if I've made some mistake here it's my first time posting on the mailing list!
On 12 Sep 2004, at 15:21, Jimmy (Jimbo) Wales wrote:
Just to say my usual bit about this, I'm all for rewarding volunteers, and the best way to do that is with kind words, mutual respect, and admiration for good deeds. Mathematical formulas can never replace taking the time to say "thank you" or "I am a fan of your work" when you see an article that you like.
Algorithmic reputation systems are always a temptation, just because they are possible. But human reputation systems are much more nuanced and powerful.
--Jimbo
-- "La nèfle est un fruit." - first words of 50,000th article on fr.wikipedia.org _______________________________________________ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@wikimedia.org http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
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