From: "Dahsun" <dahsun(a)yahoo.com>
To: wikien-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org
Sent: Sunday, 21 June, 2009 14:06:08 GMT +00:00 GMT Britain, Ireland, Portugal
Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] WikiEN-l Digest, Vol 71, Issue 41 FA and comprehensiveness
Hi, picking up Charles's point "Another vertex is the FA people: in theory they
don't care about the topic, do care about optimising the writing to
the point where there is no obvious way to improve quality. The third
vertex is comprehensiveness". In my experience as an FA reviewer comprehensiveness
is one of the FA criteria, and I've seen FA candidates get significantly more
comprehensive at FAC. I've also seen problems when reviewers have seen omissions that
the nominator doesn't want in "their" article.
WerSpielChequers
------------------------------
Message: 4
Date: Sun, 21 Jun 2009 11:18:27 +0100
From: Charles Matthews <charles.r.matthews(a)ntlworld.com>
Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] The London Review of Books on
Wikipedia
To: English Wikipedia <wikien-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org>
Message-ID: <4A3E08F3.7060205(a)ntlworld.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=windows-1252;
format=flowed
Cormac Lawler wrote:
I think what's interesting here is asking: how does
Wikipedia harness
the energy of the public (for want of a better
word)
in a way that can
be more productive, useful (or at least less
brain-sporkingly
nonsensical) than a newspaper open comment
section
does?
Of course just about any model is superior to encouraging
low-level
ranting. The "open comments" are generally less
interesting than a
letters page because there may be no filter. Or, as in the
case of the
Sunday Times it seems, there is moderation but only to save
embarrassment to the paper. WP's basic idea of "merciless
editing" is
one way, and it gets to one major issue at the root:
touchtyping skills
don't make you a great writer, while basic copyediting
skills can
transform rubbish prose.
But I was struck by how in the LRB review of Andrew's
book, the
reviewer singled out the collaboratively-written
afterword as better
written than Andrew's book, which he found
"full of
interest but
rather indulgent, containing too much incidental
detail about people
Lih wants to please." I can't imagine
Andrew is fully
happy about that
(!) - but it's an interesting take.
Time for one of my current pet theories: the "triangle of
takes" on
upgrading WP. Andrew Lih represents one vertex, as you can
see in his
recent NYT interview, where he cites popular culture and
politics as the
drivers in WP. Basically this is about being very current
in our
coverage. Another vertex is the FA people: in theory they
don't care
about the topic, do care about optimising the writing to
the point where
there is no obvious way to improve quality. The third
vertex is
comprehensiveness. Lih's book - well, I haven't read it yet
(sorry,
Andrew), but you can see it fitting roughly in with where I
locate him
on the triangle. The "incidental detail" is often how
popular culture or
political journalism is (deliberately) written, rather than
trying for
in-depth or serious.
Anyway, I commend the triangle: currency,
comprehensiveness, quality.
Most people around the wiki can probably plot themselves
somewhere in
the interior, and this gives a kind of map of prorities.
Charles
------------------------------
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