On 11/6/07, Charlotte Webb charlottethewebb@gmail.com wrote:
Isn't this more or less what I said in my (quite unpopular) response to the "[WikiEN-l] Could we use a chore wheel?" thread...
I don't think so.
Proposition A: Paying some users devalues the experience of editing for free for other users. Proposition B: Volunteer editors prefer self-direction to being bossed around.
The common thread is perhaps "Anything that makes people think of editing Wikipedia as work is bad." But the two ideas are pretty different, mostly because in B, nothing was ever going to stop the self-directed from avoiding the chore wheel. If anything, it even works in their favour: "Ha! Look at those poor saps on the chore wheel! Hours wasted every month fixing typos! And look at me, gallivanting around writing articles about Norwegian mushrooms. What a lark I'm having!"
Seriously. The WMF paying some editors is not something we can opt out of. But a chorewheel is something we can opt out of signing up for.
Steve