Sheldon writes:
A wiki is merely a technology. It is a means to an end, not an end in itself. The end goal here is to create a free, accurate, comprehensive encyclopedia. The wiki aspect of Wikipedia has enabled it to move rapidly in what is generally the right direction, but in the process of doing so, the wiki notion that "anyone can edit any article" has been adjusted already in various ways: sysops, soft and hard bans, arbitration, and so forth. If need be, the wiki rules could be adjusted further. For example, there is no reason in theory why ... ...the point is that the Wikipedia doesn't have to rely on "some unspecified quasi-Darwinian process" .... ...We can specify any process we want....
Very well said!
I think that for some time Wikipedia has been effectively ruled by a clique that has some affinity for anarchy; they have elevated the Wiki software to the level of an ideology. But all of the rules you mention are necessary developments for Wikipedia to achieve its goal - being a reliable and respected open-source encyclopedia.
Adding a level of peer-review, or having a subset of our articles reviewed by people with academic degrees in the field are also possibilities to add onto the system we already have.
A note about the accuracy of our articles: Obviously, gross errors and POV pushing usually get quickly fixed. Wikipedia's Achilles' heel is the minor error, which can continue uncorrected for months or years. If somone wrote the wrong birth and death dates for various scientists, or rabbis or singers, or if someone made a mistake in naming the university they went to,how many people would spot the error? With the exception of articles on famous people, darn few.
The probable existence of thousands of minor uncorrected errors is one of the major arguments for a new level of review by people with some sort of academic background in the field, or by one who can be trusted to do some serious research. Such a level of review would not take away from anyone's ability to contribute; it would only improve the accuracy of articles we already have.
Robert (RK)
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The problem is that it is not reasonable to trust academics as any thoughtful and observant person who attended an institution of higher learning knows. Most academics have some axe to grind. "Clutching a viper to one's breast" comes to mind.
Fred
From: Robert rkscience100@yahoo.com Reply-To: English Wikipedia wikien-l@Wikipedia.org Date: Tue, 16 Nov 2004 10:36:59 -0800 (PST) To: wikien-l@Wikipedia.org Subject: [WikiEN-l] About the reliability of the Wikipedia process and content
The probable existence of thousands of minor uncorrected errors is one of the major arguments for a new level of review by people with some sort of academic background in the field, or by one who can be trusted to do some serious research. Such a level of review would not take away from anyone's ability to contribute; it would only improve the accuracy of articles we already have.
Robert (RK)
Fred Bauder wrote
The problem is that it is not reasonable to trust academics as any thoughtful and observant person who attended an institution of higher learning knows. Most academics have some axe to grind.
Correct as far as it goes. But more to the point is that until WP editing looks good on a CV, no academic worth having will give it the attention.
Charles
I very much hope this does not happen. Setting up 'expert reviews' would be the death of the project. Mark
--- Robert rkscience100@yahoo.com wrote:
Sheldon writes:
A wiki is merely a technology. It is a means to an
end,
not an end in itself. The end goal here is to
create a
free, accurate, comprehensive encyclopedia. The
wiki
aspect of Wikipedia has enabled it to move rapidly
in
what is generally the right direction, but in the process of doing so, the wiki notion that "anyone can edit any article" has been adjusted already in various ways: sysops, soft and hard bans,
arbitration,
and so forth. If need be, the wiki rules could be adjusted further. For example, there is no reason
in
theory why ... ...the point is that the Wikipedia doesn't have to
rely
on "some unspecified quasi-Darwinian process" .... ...We can specify any process we want....
Very well said!
I think that for some time Wikipedia has been effectively ruled by a clique that has some affinity for anarchy; they have elevated the Wiki software to the level of an ideology. But all of the rules you mention are necessary developments for Wikipedia to achieve its goal - being a reliable and respected open-source encyclopedia.
Adding a level of peer-review, or having a subset of our articles reviewed by people with academic degrees in the field are also possibilities to add onto the system we already have.
A note about the accuracy of our articles: Obviously, gross errors and POV pushing usually get quickly fixed. Wikipedia's Achilles' heel is the minor error, which can continue uncorrected for months or years. If somone wrote the wrong birth and death dates for various scientists, or rabbis or singers, or if someone made a mistake in naming the university they went to,how many people would spot the error? With the exception of articles on famous people, darn few.
The probable existence of thousands of minor uncorrected errors is one of the major arguments for a new level of review by people with some sort of academic background in the field, or by one who can be trusted to do some serious research. Such a level of review would not take away from anyone's ability to contribute; it would only improve the accuracy of articles we already have.
Robert (RK)
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--- Mark Richards marich712000@yahoo.com wrote:
I very much hope this does not happen. Setting up 'expert reviews' would be the death of the project.
But the goal of the project is to create the largest free resource of knowledge that has ever existed. Wiki is a means to that end. So if some aspects of that process start to result in a drive toward mediocre content, then we *must* make some changes to put us back on track.
Adding some type of article review system that could scale to cover a large part of our content would be a massive improvement. Experts should have seats on those review boards, but so should non-experts. Neither the views of experts or non-experts would carry more weight - both would be equal (the consensus view of the board itself is what would count).
-- mav
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What makes you think either that the current system is creating mediocrity, or that the proposed review board would be better? It seems that what is being proposed is removing the value added of an open content encyclopedia, and would be damaging for that reason. Mark
--- Daniel Mayer maveric149@yahoo.com wrote:
--- Mark Richards marich712000@yahoo.com wrote:
I very much hope this does not happen. Setting up 'expert reviews' would be the death of the
project.
But the goal of the project is to create the largest free resource of knowledge that has ever existed. Wiki is a means to that end. So if some aspects of that process start to result in a drive toward mediocre content, then we *must* make some changes to put us back on track.
Adding some type of article review system that could scale to cover a large part of our content would be a massive improvement. Experts should have seats on those review boards, but so should non-experts. Neither the views of experts or non-experts would carry more weight - both would be equal (the consensus view of the board itself is what would count).
-- mav
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--- Mark Richards marich712000@yahoo.com wrote:
What makes you think either that the current system is creating mediocrity, or that the proposed review board would be better? It seems that what is being proposed is removing the value added of an open content encyclopedia, and would be damaging for that reason.
One thing the current EB FUD was right about is that sometimes good articles are edited into becoming worse articles.
How would having a review board remove any added value? If anything, their input and selection is by definition added value. No part of article development or creation would need to change. There would just be a final check by a review board before a particular version of an article is labeled as 1.0. The article would *not* be protected from editing but a static version of the 1.0 version would be available for those people who wanted it (a diff could be used to see what changes have been made to the live version). All development would be directed toward the live version.
Discounting what critics have to say and continuing to maintain that everything is perfectly fine as-is, is just sticking your head in the sand.
A common criticism about Wikipedia is that there is no easy way to find out if the article you are reading can be trusted at all.
Versioning will help that.
-- mav
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Well, if it's strictly for version 1, then fine, but I really don't see why a group of 'experts' would make for a more reliable article, it seems that it would simply add the standard predjudices that these groups bring.
The current process of everyone being able to review seems to be better. For sure, eternal vigilence is needed.
Mark
--- Daniel Mayer maveric149@yahoo.com wrote:
--- Mark Richards marich712000@yahoo.com wrote:
What makes you think either that the current
system is
creating mediocrity, or that the proposed review
board
would be better? It seems that what is being
proposed
is removing the value added of an open content encyclopedia, and would be damaging for that
reason.
One thing the current EB FUD was right about is that sometimes good articles are edited into becoming worse articles.
How would having a review board remove any added value? If anything, their input and selection is by definition added value. No part of article development or creation would need to change. There would just be a final check by a review board before a particular version of an article is labeled as 1.0. The article would *not* be protected from editing but a static version of the 1.0 version would be available for those people who wanted it (a diff could be used to see what changes have been made to the live version). All development would be directed toward the live version.
Discounting what critics have to say and continuing to maintain that everything is perfectly fine as-is, is just sticking your head in the sand.
A common criticism about Wikipedia is that there is no easy way to find out if the article you are reading can be trusted at all.
Versioning will help that.
-- mav
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--- Mark Richards marich712000@yahoo.com wrote:
Well, if it's strictly for version 1, then fine,
Wonderful. :)
but I really don't see why a group of 'experts' would make for a more reliable article, it seems that it would simply add the standard predjudices that these groups bring.
I never said that. My idea for a review would have seats for both experts and non-experts who are interested in the subject area. Experts would have the *exact* same power to veto labeling an article 1.0 as the non-experts on the board.
The current process of everyone being able to review seems to be better. For sure, eternal vigilence is needed.
Yes - and we should leverage that in a way that satisfies valid criticism and gives us better confidence in our own product.
-- mav
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At 04:44 PM 11/16/2004 -0800, Mark Richards wrote:
Well, if it's strictly for version 1, then fine, but I really don't see why a group of 'experts' would make for a more reliable article, it seems that it would simply add the standard predjudices that these groups bring.
The current process of everyone being able to review seems to be better. For sure, eternal vigilence is needed.
Everyone would be able to review the choices the "experts" make, too. If you think the review process makes mistakes, point them out so they can either be corrected or defended. If you can demonstrate that the "experts" are in fact reducing the reliability of articles or introducing verifiable prejudices, then I expect there'd be a movement to fix whatever's causing the problem - perhaps even abolishing the whole review system as a bad idea, if it comes to that. At which point nothing at all will have been lost since Wikipedia will have continued chugging along regardless.
On Tue, Nov 16, 2004 at 04:38:40PM -0800, Daniel Mayer wrote:
--- Mark Richards marich712000@yahoo.com wrote:
What makes you think either that the current system is creating mediocrity, or that the proposed review board would be better? It seems that what is being proposed is removing the value added of an open content encyclopedia, and would be damaging for that reason.
One thing the current EB FUD was right about is that sometimes good articles are edited into becoming worse articles.
If you accept that conclusion, then you must also accept the conclusion than any changes a review board makes to an article could also make the article worse.
I'm not saying that they will or wont, I think we can't know until it's given a try. However, I don't think it's a given that a review board will at worst maintain the status quo.
Shane.
I think an EB would make it considerably worse in many cases. Mark
--- Shane King wikipedia@dontletsstart.com wrote:
I'm not saying that they will or wont, I think we can't know until it's given a try. However, I don't think it's a given that a review board will at worst maintain the status quo.
Shane. _______________________________________________ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@Wikipedia.org http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
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--- Shane King wikipedia@dontletsstart.com wrote:
If you accept that conclusion, then you must also accept the conclusion than any changes a review board makes to an article could also make the article worse.
The review board reviews, they would not edit except as individuals. A review may reject an article but have a list of items that would have to be addressed before the article could be put up for review again. The quality of the process depends on the mix of people involved and their level of dedication. So yes, results may vary. But that is no different than dead-tree encyclopedias.
-- mav
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On Wed, Nov 17, 2004 at 11:25:40AM -0800, Daniel Mayer wrote:
The review board reviews, they would not edit except as individuals. A review may reject an article but have a list of items that would have to be addressed before the article could be put up for review again. The quality of the process depends on the mix of people involved and their level of dedication. So yes, results may vary. But that is no different than dead-tree encyclopedias.
I agree that it's no different to traditional encyclopedias in that respect.
I feel the risk of the review board is mostly dependent on how much faith people put in them. If people put too much faith in the abilities of the review board compared to the normal process, we can get the situation where people assume the reviewed version must be better than the non-reviewed version. I was just pointing out that this will not always be the case. So long as people maintain a healthy scepticism in the review process, I think there's a lot of potential in the idea.
Shane.
--- Shane King wikipedia@dontletsstart.com wrote:
I feel the risk of the review board is mostly dependent on how much faith people put in them. If people put too much faith in the abilities of the review board compared to the normal process, we can get the situation where people assume the reviewed version must be better than the non-reviewed version. I was just pointing out that this will not always be the case. So long as people maintain a healthy scepticism in the review process, I think there's a lot of potential in the idea.
Yes - any such system will have to make it clear that the reviewed versions are *not* perfect and that the current version may be more up to date and better in other ways as well.
-- mav
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--- Daniel Mayer maveric149@yahoo.com wrote:
A common criticism about Wikipedia is that there is no easy way to find out if the article you are reading can be trusted at all.
I agree with Mav.
Versioning will help that.
Am not so sure.
Imagine I am Anonip the Egyptian, and I go to the article "Jerusalem" and get dropped into Revision 20040807:45. I read it, it's a lovely article, and I get all warm and fuzzy inside.
Then I decide to add something to it... Alas, we are now on version 20041116:398, the bastardized spawn of Hades, mangled to death by edit warriors, pov pushers, and a veritable army of sock puppets (would that be a drawerful?). I recoil in horror and decide to not edit, since, well, it's frankly quite depressing.
So the average man, in constant fear of the marauding trolls and hordes of vandals, steers clear of the bleeding sword-edge version and stays within the clearly marked path of the Official and Right Version of Safety.
Yet, down this path the common man no longer contributes to the W. Only the hardcore groups of ultra-perfectionists and extremists will remain to edit, polarize, and ultimately destroy the W.
Do I have a solution? No. But I would caution against versioning.
===== Chris Mahan 818.943.1850 cell chris_mahan@yahoo.com chris.mahan@gmail.com http://www.christophermahan.com/
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At 04:55 PM 11/16/2004 -0800, Christopher Mahan wrote:
Versioning will help that.
Am not so sure.
Imagine I am Anonip the Egyptian, and I go to the article "Jerusalem" and get dropped into Revision 20040807:45. I read it, it's a lovely article, and I get all warm and fuzzy inside.
Then I decide to add something to it... Alas, we are now on version 20041116:398, the bastardized spawn of Hades, mangled to death by edit warriors, pov pushers, and a veritable army of sock puppets (would that be a drawerful?). I recoil in horror and decide to not edit, since, well, it's frankly quite depressing.
Would you prefer that Anonip never see Reversion 20040807:45 at all? With the current system, version 20041116:398 would be the first version he'd see and the only way he'd be able to see 20040807:45 would be to manually dig through the article's history with no indication that any such "nice" version even exists to find, let alone where it might be.
So the average man, in constant fear of the marauding trolls and hordes of vandals, steers clear of the bleeding sword-edge version and stays within the clearly marked path of the Official and Right Version of Safety.
Yet, down this path the common man no longer contributes to the W. Only the hardcore groups of ultra-perfectionists and extremists will remain to edit, polarize, and ultimately destroy the W.
Do I have a solution? No.
I do, I suggested it last time this discussion came up.
Have the default version that all people see when they first go to an article be the _current_ version. If there's a "reviewer-approved" version in the article's history, have a "view most recent verified version" link in the sidebar that takes you straight there. Unless one actively goes out of one's way to view "approved" versions in this scenario, Wikipedia will continue to function exactly the same as before.
--- Christopher Mahan chris_mahan@yahoo.com wrote:
Imagine I am Anonip the Egyptian, and I go to the article "Jerusalem" and get dropped into Revision 20040807:45. I read it, it's a lovely article, and I get all warm and fuzzy inside.
You would, by default, be dropped into the current version. There would be a link at the top of the article to the reviewed version. Clicking on that link would bring the person to the reviewed version where he/she could then click on a diff link to see the differences between the reviewed version and the current one.
Then I decide to add something to it... Alas, we are now on version 20041116:398, the bastardized spawn of Hades, mangled to death by edit warriors, pov pushers, and a veritable army of sock puppets (would that be a drawerful?). I recoil in horror and decide to not edit, since, well, it's frankly quite depressing.
If the article had slipped into such a state, then it would be a good time to start fresh from the last reviewed version and merge-in all the subsequent good edits. What matters here is the content.
So the average man, in constant fear of the marauding trolls and hordes of vandals, steers clear of the bleeding sword-edge version and stays within the clearly marked path of the Official and Right Version of Safety.
The average man is not the kind of person who edits Wikipedia now. Last time I checked there were greater than 40 views to every edit (which was over a year ago - I'm sure it is greater than 50:1 now but we don't seem to track those stats anymore).
The big question is this:
Are we primarily here to create a community based on wiki principles, or are we primarily here to expand access to the sum of human knowledge? My answer, and I'm sure Jimbo, the board, and most longtimers will agree, is most certainly the latter.
Having a review mechanism will enable us to much more easily move into other areas of publication (like print and digital media). It will also make it possible for our work to be much more trusted by end users.
Of course we should do this in a such a way so as to minimize negative impacts on the community (which are responsible for maintaining and expanding our work), but some aspects of community and 'wikiness' may have be compromised for the sake of the product.
Wikipedia is not a social club and wiki is a means to an end.
-- Daniel Mayer (aka mav)
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Daniel Mayer (maveric149@yahoo.com) [041117 10:43]:
--- Mark Richards marich712000@yahoo.com wrote:
I very much hope this does not happen. Setting up 'expert reviews' would be the death of the project.
But the goal of the project is to create the largest free resource of knowledge that has ever existed. Wiki is a means to that end. So if some aspects of that process start to result in a drive toward mediocre content, then we *must* make some changes to put us back on track.
We went through this (you and I) on this very list just recently. You're still reasoning along the lines of:
1. We must do something. 2. This is something. 3. Therefore, we must do this.
Not only is this logically fallacious, you haven't really proven 1. as yet. Note that de: Wikipedia recently beat two commercial encyclopedias in blind testing without imposing review boards.
Adding some type of article review system that could scale to cover a large part of our content would be a massive improvement. Experts should have seats on those review boards, but so should non-experts. Neither the views of experts or non-experts would carry more weight - both would be equal (the consensus view of the board itself is what would count).
I suspect review boards will not scale. What is the processing rate of a review board likely to be? How many articles are there again? How many being created each day?
While reviewing content sounds like a good ide (to me too), there should be a way to do it wihtout seeming to repudiate the concept of the wiki. I'm not actually wedded to the idea myself, but repudiating it as you describe would be extremely jarring culturally and - and this is the important point - demotivating for the volunteers.
If it can at all be done within the wiki process, it should be. de: is solid evidence it can be achieved within the wiki process; neither your assertions nor those of the Britannica editor are solid evidence it can't.
(And I'm still seeking details of what de: did to get to that standard! Could someone on de: please tell us? cc'd to wikipedia-l for this purpose)
- d.
On Wed, 17 Nov 2004 20:21:42 +1100, David Gerard fun@thingy.apana.org.au wrote:
Daniel Mayer (maveric149@yahoo.com) [041117 10:43]:
--- Mark Richards marich712000@yahoo.com wrote:
I very much hope this does not happen. Setting up 'expert reviews' would be the death of the project.
But the goal of the project is to create the largest free resource of knowledge that has ever existed. Wiki is a means to that end. So if some aspects of that process start to result in a drive toward mediocre content, then we *must* make some changes to put us back on track.
We went through this (you and I) on this very list just recently. You're still reasoning along the lines of:
- We must do something.
- This is something.
- Therefore, we must do this.
Not only is this logically fallacious, you haven't really proven 1. as yet. Note that de: Wikipedia recently beat two commercial encyclopedias in blind testing without imposing review boards.
Adding some type of article review system that could scale to cover a large part of our content would be a massive improvement. Experts should have seats on those review boards, but so should non-experts. Neither the views of experts or non-experts would carry more weight - both would be equal (the consensus view of the board itself is what would count).
I suspect review boards will not scale. What is the processing rate of a review board likely to be? How many articles are there again? How many being created each day?
While reviewing content sounds like a good ide (to me too), there should be a way to do it wihtout seeming to repudiate the concept of the wiki. I'm not actually wedded to the idea myself, but repudiating it as you describe would be extremely jarring culturally and - and this is the important point
- demotivating for the volunteers.
If it can at all be done within the wiki process, it should be. de: is solid evidence it can be achieved within the wiki process; neither your assertions nor those of the Britannica editor are solid evidence it can't.
(And I'm still seeking details of what de: did to get to that standard! Could someone on de: please tell us? cc'd to wikipedia-l for this purpose)
- d.
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I have seen some articles degrade. In my opinion, some aspects of [[European Union]] have degraded through the wiki process during my time here. And yes, there's the old wiki mantra - "if it's broken, fix it" - well hey, I don't know where to begin, it seems /less/ coherent than in the past, despite new content. And European Union is supposedly a featured article (I haven't nominated it for removal from that, because it's not top priority for me right now. Perhaps it should be.)
I am reasonably certain that some other articles, not even necessarily contentious, have suffered due to people adding content in a disorganised fashion.
I mean, the only reason the Irish content on en: is becoming somewhat more coherent, is that a small group of us (a workable size of no more than half a dozen core editors) are keeping a tight rein on things, and looking for holes, and needed parent/daughter articles. Personally, I think more small collaborative groups on particular areas would go a long way towards keeping things organised. To organise a subject area, one has to manage a plethora of heirarchically organised articles. With EU subjects for example, that isn't happening at present.
There are failings in the wiki system, and it does us no harm to recognise them, rather than cry foul at our detractors. I feel there are many ways that content can be kept more organised / reviewed, and there's ample prospects of getting past any problems we have. But they shouldn't be ignored.
No doubt I have ranted a tad here, or missed the topic of the discussion, or come across as preachy. Please just take what you can from my comments above, as the immediate reaction of one wiki editor!
Zoney
Zoney (zoney.ie@gmail.com) [041117 22:57]:
I have seen some articles degrade. In my opinion, some aspects of [[European Union]] have degraded through the wiki process during my
[....]
There are failings in the wiki system, and it does us no harm to recognise them, rather than cry foul at our detractors. I feel there are many ways that content can be kept more organised / reviewed, and there's ample prospects of getting past any problems we have. But they shouldn't be ignored.
Certainly. I've seen the process myself.
What I'm saying is that a quality improvement process should fit with the culture, so as not to kill the golden goose. It's not that I have a dislike of review boards per se, but that I think they'd be way too jarring and fundamentally repudiate the wiki process.
Some sort of review process that leverages the wiki process - let the wiki do the work.
There are plenty of things we can do before adding something so clearly anti-wiki as a review board.
e.g. more work and tweaks on the experimental review software (at test.wikipedia.org); the proposed syntax for references, so as to make checkable referencing down to the sentence level *really easy*, so that an expectation of referencing can be more easily brought into the culture of Wikipedia. That sort of thing.
- d.
Zoney wrote
I feel there are many ways that content can be kept more organised / reviewed, and there's ample prospects of getting past any problems we have. But they shouldn't be ignored.
Well, sure, on the points you raise, piecemeal addition causes a need for 'master edits'/refactoring. General growth means main articles have to spin out subarticles. 'Be bold' is still in force, though, and people with the basic editing chops should edit where they see the need.
This is not so much about reliability as continued 'activism' and the motivations to do more than just nibble at the edges.
Charles
--- David Gerard fun@thingy.apana.org.au wrote:
We went through this (you and I) on this very list just recently. You're still reasoning along the lines of:
- We must do something.
- This is something.
- Therefore, we must do this.
No, my reasoning is that there is a good deal of FUD about Wikipedia right now and that some of it is *valid.* Just pretending that everything is fine as is does not move us forward.
Not only is this logically fallacious, you haven't really proven 1. as yet. Note that de: Wikipedia recently beat two commercial encyclopedias in blind testing without imposing review boards.
I would like to see the same test done on the English version before I jump to that conclusion.
We also need a way to mark articles as being OK for a 1.0 version. We *can not* just give out the most recent database dump.
I suspect review boards will not scale. What is the processing rate of a review board likely to be? How many articles are there again? How many being created each day?
There could be different levels of review; at the lowest level we would have what we have now, on top of that could be a reader feedback mechanism that is in beta, the top level would be a review board review. The strengths of each should be leveraged on the other. Users should have a choice of which versions to use.
Scale issues are very important so we must develop ways to to quickly review content. Only by starting on that road can we work out bottlenecks. Note: that the featured article process selects the best of Wikipedia content and is therefore slow. Review boards would not have 'best of' as part of its criteria but would look at a short list of criteria before marking it as reviewed. Such as:
1) Does it cover the basic aspects of the subject? 2) Are there any obvious errors of fact? 3) Are alternate views given an appropriate amount of space and qualified? 4) Mechanics (spelling, garmmar, etc)
While reviewing content sounds like a good ide (to me too), there should be a way to do it wihtout seeming to repudiate the concept of the wiki.
I agree. That is why Bryan and I have suggested that users be given the most recent version by default with a link to the last reviewed version.
I'm not actually wedded to the idea myself, but repudiating it as you describe would be extremely jarring culturally and - and this is the important point
- demotivating for the volunteers.
I AM NOT REPUDIATING WIKI!! I want to add better review mechanisms onto what we are already doing (which is not pure wiki). When I say that wiki is a means to an end, I am just pointing out that the product is more important than the process. But if changes in the process harm the product, then those changes will have to be modified. That is as true for wiki as it would be for any review system.
If it can at all be done within the wiki process, it should be. de: is solid evidence it can be achieved within the wiki process; neither your assertions nor those of the Britannica editor are solid evidence it can't.
Again, we need a way to check content before publishing it in print or digital media. We also need a way to give users the *option* to see those checked versions so that they do not have to worry if some nut job distorted the facts presented in the article version the user is reading.
Studies that show the average quality of Wikipedia are better than other encyclopedias will be *very* little comfort for those people who happen upon a particular article in a sub-par state (however brief that may be).
(And I'm still seeking details of what de: did to get to that standard! Could someone on de: please tell us? cc'd to wikipedia-l for this purpose)
Yes - that is very important information to know before we proceed with anything.
-- mav
__________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? The all-new My Yahoo! - Get yours free! http://my.yahoo.com
Mav wrote
Scale issues are very important so we must develop ways to to quickly
review
content.
I say 'thanks but no thanks' to review boards. They have impressive support, so I should present an argument.
At present I write about 50% in an area where I have 11 years post-doctoral experience, and 50% in another where I last took an exam at age 13. In the first I should expect to be 'reviewing' others' contributions; in the second I'm not confident in anything I can't fact-check in several sources.
So, where I can put my finger on my unease, is that I can see a case where, if pressed to review an article some months ago, I would have said 'sub-standard'. Clearly a term paper, wierd notation, author not quite on top of it. The problem is, it took me half a year of having it on my conscience to realise that I did know enough to rescue it, and get the point straight. And I think the wiki process shows up well, there; it has done little harm, and, with all due modesty, if I wasn't already familiar with the point, it pushes the envelope on the WP coverage.
Charles
At 10:21 PM 11/17/2004 +0000, Charles Matthews wrote:
So, where I can put my finger on my unease, is that I can see a case where, if pressed to review an article some months ago, I would have said 'sub-standard'. Clearly a term paper, wierd notation, author not quite on top of it. The problem is, it took me half a year of having it on my conscience to realise that I did know enough to rescue it, and get the point straight. And I think the wiki process shows up well, there; it has done little harm, and, with all due modesty, if I wasn't already familiar with the point, it pushes the envelope on the WP coverage.
I'm not sure what your objection here is. If you're on the review board and you come across an article you think is substandard, then you can just skip it and move on. Half a year you get the epiphany on how to fix it, so you go back and fix it and then you can mark it as being "1.0 quality" or whatever the tag will be. I don't think any of the variant systems that have been proposed include any sort of deadline or schedule for reviewing specific articles.
Bryan Derksen wrote
I don't think any of the variant systems that have been proposed include any sort of deadline or schedule for reviewing specific articles.
Given the number of ideas thrown around, I'd have to concede the point to anyone who follows the details with greater interest than I. But I think it's a bit naive to assume there would be no time pressure. For example, any subsequent publishing venture would probably take reviewed articles as the base line; and publishers, IMX, are forever setting inconvenient (for others) deadlines.
Charles
At 07:07 AM 11/18/2004 +0000, Charles Matthews wrote:
Bryan Derksen wrote
I don't think any of the variant systems that have been proposed include any sort of deadline or schedule for reviewing specific articles.
Given the number of ideas thrown around, I'd have to concede the point to anyone who follows the details with greater interest than I. But I think it's a bit naive to assume there would be no time pressure. For example, any subsequent publishing venture would probably take reviewed articles as the base line; and publishers, IMX, are forever setting inconvenient (for others) deadlines.
If we don't meet the deadlines these hypothetical publishers want us to, will they dock our pay?
I think you're jumping a few steps ahead and making a lot of assumptions here. Coming up with ways to be more confident in the quality of our articles is a good thing all on its own, even when considered completely independently of any paper publishing goals. We can try out ways to do that without having to give any consideration to whether it makes it easier for publishers to come up with a printable version.
Bryan Derksen wrote
I think you're jumping a few steps ahead and making a lot of assumptions here. Coming up with ways to be more confident in the quality of our articles is a good thing all on its own, even when considered completely independently of any paper publishing goals.
Maybe so. The creation of a system of version control, and new institutions which will 'argue from authority', are no small matters. We can know what the _intended_ consequences are. Compare those with some extended use of categories, and refining what page histories say.
Charles
I think I'm about to spend most of this email agreeing with you.
Daniel Mayer (maveric149@yahoo.com) [041118 07:19]:
--- David Gerard fun@thingy.apana.org.au wrote:
We went through this (you and I) on this very list just recently. You're still reasoning along the lines of:
- We must do something.
- This is something.
- Therefore, we must do this.
No, my reasoning is that there is a good deal of FUD about Wikipedia right now and that some of it is *valid.* Just pretending that everything is fine as is does not move us forward.
Fair enough. I'll certainly acknowledge that.
Not only is this logically fallacious, you haven't really proven 1. as yet. Note that de: Wikipedia recently beat two commercial encyclopedias in blind testing without imposing review boards.
I would like to see the same test done on the English version before I jump to that conclusion.
Indeed!
IS THERE ANYONE ON DE: WHO CAN ANSWER THIS FOR US??
We also need a way to mark articles as being OK for a 1.0 version. We *can not* just give out the most recent database dump.
I would certainly agree with that.
I suspect review boards will not scale. What is the processing rate of a review board likely to be? How many articles are there again? How many being created each day?
There could be different levels of review; at the lowest level we would have what we have now, on top of that could be a reader feedback mechanism that is in beta, the top level would be a review board review. The strengths of each should be leveraged on the other. Users should have a choice of which versions to use.
I'd like to see a more wikilike method than a review board. Something that would naturally scale, at least. An appointed board or a WP:FAC-style examination won't scale as we will need.
I'm not sure (or unsure) Magnus Manske's experimental review software on test: is the perfect example, but it's interesting to consider. What results would we get from letting the wiki do the reviewing? (What gaming would the POV warriors try?)
Scale issues are very important so we must develop ways to to quickly review content. Only by starting on that road can we work out bottlenecks. Note: that the featured article process selects the best of Wikipedia content and is therefore slow. Review boards would not have 'best of' as part of its criteria but would look at a short list of criteria before marking it as reviewed. Such as:
- Does it cover the basic aspects of the subject?
- Are there any obvious errors of fact?
- Are alternate views given an appropriate amount of space and qualified?
- Mechanics (spelling, garmmar, etc)
Yes. Wikipedia Adequate Prose, as opposed to Wikipedia Brilliant Prose.
While reviewing content sounds like a good ide (to me too), there should be a way to do it wihtout seeming to repudiate the concept of the wiki.
I agree. That is why Bryan and I have suggested that users be given the most recent version by default with a link to the last reviewed version.
I'm not actually so sure about that, but that can be debated further later.
I'm not actually wedded to the idea myself, but repudiating it as you describe would be extremely jarring culturally and - and this is the important point
- demotivating for the volunteers.
I AM NOT REPUDIATING WIKI!! I want to add better review mechanisms onto what we are already doing (which is not pure wiki). When I say that wiki is a means to an end, I am just pointing out that the product is more important than the process. But if changes in the process harm the product, then those changes will have to be modified. That is as true for wiki as it would be for any review system.
I agree. But I think care needs to be taken with the review system (I think we will need one) not to appear to repudiate the wiki process either.
We really have generated a tremendous amount of quality text with the wiki process. What Wikipedia has done really is remarkable.
If it can at all be done within the wiki process, it should be. de: is solid evidence it can be achieved within the wiki process; neither your assertions nor those of the Britannica editor are solid evidence it can't.
Again, we need a way to check content before publishing it in print or digital media. We also need a way to give users the *option* to see those checked versions so that they do not have to worry if some nut job distorted the facts presented in the article version the user is reading.
Of course.
(Stgable versions will also require pulling in the stable versions of images, to e.g. avoid pulling in chimp images for George W. Bush.)
Studies that show the average quality of Wikipedia are better than other encyclopedias will be *very* little comfort for those people who happen upon a particular article in a sub-par state (however brief that may be).
Well, yes ... I'd personally still prefer the current version of an article appear by default with a link to the stable version. But that's a separate (though related) issue.
(And I'm still seeking details of what de: did to get to that standard! Could someone on de: please tell us? cc'd to wikipedia-l for this purpose)
Yes - that is very important information to know before we proceed with anything.
There must be SOMEONE reading this who is familiar with de:.
- d.
David Gerard wrote
(And I'm still seeking details of what de: did to get to that
standard!
Could someone on de: please tell us? cc'd to wikipedia-l for this
purpose)
Yes - that is very important information to know before we proceed with anything.
There must be SOMEONE reading this who is familiar with de:.
I just dip into it. I would guess that (against a thesis I was propounding) there is extensive academic or para-academic input. I think the domination, generally speaking, of pages on the Web in English may motivate those adding pages in other languages to do more.
Charles
Mark Richards wrote:
I very much hope this does not happen. Setting up 'expert reviews' would be the death of the project. Mark
Maybe it should be the death of another project instead. That's what I suggested at:
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Authority_metric
-- Tim Starling