Hi Cormac and Anthere,
First, I'd like to amplify what I wrote earlier:
... bring this good thing to fruition, or just kill it outright, so that it
, KNOWLEDGE,
can find a better home in this world.
On Friday 21 July 2006 07:14, Cormac Lawler wrote:
On 7/20/06, Anthere Anthere9@yahoo.com wrote:
In the past few days, I have been considering the three levels, data, information and knowledge. Most of our projects are actually providing "information". Wiktionary is rather providing "data". Wikibooks is sometimes providing "information" but it is sometimes wandering in "knowledge". Wikiversity will definitly entering the field of knowledge and this is what worried editors the most (the teaching part). Still, if I look well, the Foundation is claiming bringing knowledge. I see no reason why this project should not be started.
Ant
Thanks Anthere,
that's a really good way of putting it. The way I've always seen Wikiversity is that we are not simply providing information, but generating knowledge. That, after all, is what learning is all about. I would argue (and have done) that generating knowledge and learning is an incidental part of what we do as participants on any Wikimedia project - it's just that we make this an explicit aspect of Wikiversity.
To backtrack slightly, when we got going on the modified Wikiversity proposal, in the wake of the community vote and the board non-approval, we were at a loss to tie together the interests/needs of several in the community who wanted to teach courses, and the board's recommendation that we "exclude online courses". Our solution is to primarily host content, while also providing for learning communities/study groups around this content - networks/spaces for asking and answering questions, or posing and solving problems. However, I think in order to be sustainable, Wikiversity will need to put a primacy on its content, as was suggested by Daniel (Mav). We simply do not know how communities will work - this is an experimental side to Wikiversity, which could fail, though I anticipate it to be its central success :-)
I'm truly fighting with myself to find the right way to get what is in my brain into your brains, most efficiently, and vice versa. I began editing http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Ermeyers last night to try to begin informing you of what I'm actually trying to do with The Perl Wiki, in "particular."
This "particular" wiki is going to be the central wiki for the "particular" community (a global community), and it's "particular" system and it's "particular" methods are going to fully integrate with everything "generally" available from Wikimedia to the fullest extent possible. The "particular" community is going to be the main source of "particular" Expertise, Data, Information and Knowledge, and the "particular" community will have its Teachers and its Learners at its "particular" University tied right into Wikiversity and its extremely valuable "general" Educational Resources. If this "particular" University manages to get itself accredited (etc.), in the future, on its own, then that will be an absolutely great thing to happen for that "particular" community.
About The Perl Wiki, or "The Glue Wiki":
This central Wiki is going to be like "The Free Encyclopedia" of Perl.
This central Wiki is going to be like "The Free Dictionary" of Perl.
This central Wiki is going to be like "The Free Library" of Perl.
This central Wiki is going to be like "The Free Debate Forum" of Perl.
PAST: This central Wiki is going to tell "The Perl Legacy."
PRESENT: This central Wiki is going to tell "The Perl Story."
FUTURE: This central Wiki is going to lead "The Perl Future."
This central Wiki has an free and open Steering Committee forum.
How will a "particular" community work everyone? That's why I originally came here to ask my "particular" questions to the Wikimedia experts on foundation-l, just so that I begin prototyping one for my own "particular" community interests.
I hope this helps you Cormac.:)
Eric
Cormac _______________________________________________ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@wikimedia.org http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l