Andrew Gray wrote:
On 17/12/2007, Andrew Whitworth wknight8111@gmail.com wrote:
Citizendium's small but not hurting for participants. They'll be fine.
That's not my point here. There is a certain number of people in this world who are going to be interested in actually "writing" an encyclopedia (as opposed to the people who are happy to edit, revise, or do other things to support the writing community).
Isn't one of the major lessons we've learned from the past six years of Wikipedia (seven now, I guess) that the number of people in the world interested in writing an encyclopedia is a lot bigger than we ever anticipated it being?
Probably, but it's part of a much wider trend There has been similar growth in other areas from social networking to YouTube to MMORPGs to blogging. I think there is also a widespread dissatisfaction with and distrust of established social and political structures. Discussions about these can now take place in ways that previously were technically impossible. We ain't seen nothin' yet.
The one-author, one-page idea (from what I've heard knol is supposed to be) sounds like a disaster waiting to happen
Yes and no. It's workable, *if* there are other caveats which haven't been announced yet - some kind of weighting, structuring, etc. We shall see.
It beats having to face the question of NPOV. Insisting on a neutral article on a subject like Israeli-Palestinian relations reflects one of the most important features of Wikipedia. A reader who is confident that he can find a reasonably balanced treatment of the subject will come back when he can't trust other sites.
A one-author, one page policy would allow separate biased articles on either side of the subject.
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