INC Reader #7
Critical Point of View: A Wikipedia Reader
Geert Lovink and Nathaniel Tkacz (eds)
For millions of internet users around the globe, the search for new
knowledge begins with Wikipedia. The encyclopedia’s rapid rise, novel
organization, and freely offered content have been marveled at and
denounced by a host of commentators. Critical Point of View moves
beyond unflagging praise, well-worn facts, and questions about its
reliability and accuracy, to unveil the complex, messy, and
controversial realities of a distributed knowledge platform.
The essays, interviews and artworks brought together in this reader
form part of the overarching Critical Point of View research
initiative, which began with a conference in Bangalore (January 2010),
followed by events in Amsterdam (March 2010) and Leipzig (September
2010). With an emphasis on theoretical reflection, cultural difference
and indeed, critique, contributions to this collection ask: What
values are embedded in Wikipedia’s software? On what basis are
Wikipedia’s claims to neutrality made? How can Wikipedia give voice to
those outside the Western tradition of Enlightenment, or even its own
administrative hierarchies? Critical Point of View collects original
insights on the next generation of wiki-related research, from radical
artistic interventions and the significant role of bots to hidden
trajectories of encyclopedic knowledge and the politics of agency and
exclusion.
Contributors: Amila Akdag Salah, Nicholas Carr, Shun-ling Chen,
Florian Cramer, Morgan Currie, Edgar Enyedy, Andrew Famiglietti,
Heather Ford, Mayo Fuster Morell, Cheng Gao, R. Stuart Geiger, Mark
Graham, Gautam John, Dror Kamir, Peter B. Kaufman, Scott Kildall,
Lawrence Liang, Patrick Lichty, Geert Lovink, Hans Varghese Mathews,
Johanna Niesyto, Matheiu O’Neil, Dan O’Sullivan, Joseph Reagle, Andrea
Scharnhorst, Alan Shapiro, Christian Stegbauer, Nathaniel Stern,
Krzystztof Suchecki, Nathaniel Tkacz, Maja van der Velden.
Colophon: Editors: Geert Lovink and Nathaniel Tkacz. Editorial
Assistance: Ivy Roberts and Morgan Currie. Copy-Editing: Cielo Lutino.
Design: Katja van Stiphout. Cover Image: Ayumi Higuchi. Priner: Ten
Klei, Amsterdam. Publisher: Institute of Network Cultures, Amsterdam.
Supported by: The School for Communication and Design at the Amsterdam
University of Applied Sciences (Hogeschool van Amsterdam DMCI), the
Centre for Internet and Society (CIS) in Bangalore and the Kusuma Trust.
You can download the pdf for free here:
http://www.networkcultures.org/_uploads/%237reader_Wikipedia.pdf
To order a hard copy of the reader, send an email to books(a)networkcultures.org
Geert Lovink and Nathaniel Tkacz (eds), Critical Point of View: A
Wikpedia Reader, Amsterdam: Institute of Network Cultures, 2011. ISBN:
978-90-78146-13-1, paperback, 385 pages.