'Forget
altruism. Misanthropy and egotism are the fuel of online social
production. That's the conclusion suggested by a new study of the
character
traits of the contributors to Wikipedia. A team of Israeli research
psychologists gave personality tests to 69 Wikipedians and 70
non-Wikipedians. They discovered that, as New Scientist puts
it<http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn16349-psychologist-finds-wikipe…ml>,
Wikipedians are generally "grumpy," "disagreeable," and "closed
to new
ideas."'
http://www.roughtype.com/archives/2009/06/the_sour_wikipe.php
I wonder how the mailing list will react....
Always knew this, Wikipedia is generally an outlet for folks who have low
interpersonal social skills, or at least insufficient outlets for self
expression. As to "Disagreeable and closed to new ideas", that is policy,
Wikipedia is a compendium of established knowledge, not a place for new
ideas, which we call original research.
The flaw in the latter part of your
comments is that I don't believe
that they were talking about content. Had it been about content you
would certainly be right. Biting newbies, aggressive insistence on
established procedures and guidelines across a wide range of article
types, or general impatience are all part of the more disagreeable
qualities to be found. As a community grows in size and self-importance
it becomes easier to ignore new ideas by reacting to them with silence.
By quietly disposing of new ideas the community's immune system is at
its bacteriophagic best; it is just not smart enough to distinguish
between cancers and cures.
Ec