On 6/13/05, Jimmy Wales jwales@wikia.com wrote:
Erik Moeller wrote:
As some have pointed out, this is a choice between credentialism and open community processes.
This totally mischaracterizes what this is about. It's a choice between voting and reasoned discourse. Both are community processes.
A good point to bring up is the sort of participants that each of those methods will bring... Votes are far more likely to bring around the fear and emotion driven, reactionary, and mob mentality crowds than something that actually requires time and thought.
But the problem with things requiring time and thought is that often it discourages so many people that the decision is ultimately made by a small group with a special interest.. and many of the more neutral people are too disinterested or two annoyed from dealing with the click that they avoid it.
Which is one of the things about a number of our voting processes.. they are not strictly votes but rather the interpretation of a poll by a trusted member of our community who must answer for his or her call if it comes into question. I'd like to see more of that, and less implying that it's actually a vote.