Agreed. A good example; on the English Wikipedia, I'm a massive law nerd
with 40-something legal GAs and FAs to my name. I'd never even have studied
the subject if it wasn't for a group of Wikipedians, some of whom have later
helped me with or collaborated on articles. The importance of social
interaction cannot be understated, and it's why I have no truck with some of
the more severe "OMG WIKIPEDIA IS NOT MYSPACE" people. People come here to
build a collaborative encyclopaedia, yes, not to socially interact - but the
key word there is "collaborative". Social contact is inevitable and
incredibly helpful to us as a community; hells, it's what *makes us* a
community and not just a hundred thousand people who independently agree
that Wikipedia is nifty.
On Tue, Aug 3, 2010 at 7:50 AM, James Alexander <jamesofur(a)gmail.com> wrote:
On Tue, Aug 3, 2010 at 2:09 AM, Keegan Peterzell
<keegan.wiki(a)gmail.com
wrote:
This has been an interesting thread to follow,
there should be one
non-Wikimania, because it does matter. I've met several Wikimedians at
the
couple meet-ups I've been to with whom
on-wiki I had many disagreements
with. Meeting face to face clears that air with the human contact.
James
Forrester is the champion of meetups for good
reason. I met him in D.C.,
far from where I live, while he was in for less than 24 hours, far from
where he lives. I butt heads with MZMcBride many times, but I slept on
his
couch. It's not just about localization for
chapters; the opportunity to
travel and meet those whom you've known online for a very long time or
only
by the periphery is a great experience.
--
~Keegan
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Keegan
This is exactly right. I can not even begin to explain the impact that
meetups have had on my view of the projects as a whole especially for those
I've met but for everyone else too. Even very infrequent personal and
social
contact can be hugely rewarding I think both for the contributers and the
projects as a whole. I've always felt we should do more both in person and
online when possible (IRC or Voicechat for example). I've toyed with the
thought of trying to get the WMF to install a mumble server for people to
talk on ;) or just setting one up myself I do think the impact that social
interaction has on trust/creativity and general cooperation is hugely under
appreciated by a lot of people on wiki (and off for that matter).
James Alexander
james.alexander(a)rochester.edu
jamesofur(a)gmail.com
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