On 21/06/05, Ray Saintonge saintonge@telus.net wrote:
I also worry that, at least in one way or another, UW will turn out to be not quite as great as you had anticipated, and the currently existing community structure will be in a shambles.
Thank you! This has been one of my key objections all along. It's been like selling shares in a South Sea Bubble.
I don't agree with this view, stated in several places in this thread. I haven't read any of the articles in full, but from the portions quoted on and messages posted to this list, I don't see anything that resembles a claim that this is a "fait accompli", or that resembles selling shares in anything. What I see is the following:
Some people have had an idea for a new project, which if it worked as envisioned would be extremely powerful and useful. But rather than, like most of us do, leaving it as just another idea, they've pursued their ideas: worked out proposals; procured resources; considered how to go about implementing it; etc
In doing so, they have sought to persuade others to also contribute to their cause - not by "selling shares", but by asking people to contribute ideas, skills, etc, towards making it happen. Obviously this requires them to share their vision of what the end result might be - to answer "Why are you doing this?" - of course, they might be wrong, and I don't see anyone denying that, only saying that it's worth a try.
I don't see that there's anything wrong in having conviction in your own dreams - it's a quality I'm distinctly deficient in, to my own annoyance. When Gerard says "The current Wiktionaries will be converted to the Ultimate Wiktionary" this is part of his *plan*, of his *dream*. If it doesn't happen, he will, presumably, be disappointed, but is that really a reason to give up before he's even begun? Would it really make any difference if he said "might, if it works, be converted..."? Clearly, some believe it *will* work (and therefore will make existing wiktionaries redundant) and others that it won't work (in which case it won't exist to replace anything), and they can use their effort to work towards it or not appropriately.
Now, leaving aside that I've always been sceptical that a Wiktionary *could* work with nothing more powerful than a bunch of wikis (since I don't know to what extent the current setup is and isn't working effectively), let's look at the *risks* involved in Gerard et al's "marketting zeal":
Scenario 1: an "alpha" version is set up, and proves unpopular/ineffective compared to the existing "bunch of wikis" approach. Result: some programmers waste some time writing a piece of software that never gets used for anything; if they didn't enjoy the challenge, this may be a blow, but only to them. Everyone else goes back to doing whatever it is they're doing on the existing wikis.
Scenario 2: an Ultimate Wiktionary is set up, comes into active use, but the community is split over whether or not it is effective, with some preferring the old wikis. Result: this seems to me the worst danger, and I presume is what is meant by "...the currently existing community structure will be in a shambles". It could end up creating a fork, or forcing "the community" to make some kind of decision on which route to follow, with a "put up or shut up" message to the losing side of the debate. At worst, it could lead to *both* projects (many-wiktionaries and UW) being abandoned.
But how likely is that latter scenario, really? If there are fundamental problems with the system, or the concept itself, it will simply fail to win over users from the existing setup, and it will go away. If there are improvements that need to be made before it can be used as the primary tool by the communities, the community will demand those improvements. Damage will be done only if it is good enough to convince some people, but bad enough that others remain unconvinced that it will *ever* be as good as the existing setup. I don't think the risk of that happening is anything like great enough to give up at this stage.
And Scenario 3, of course, is that UW becomes a much more powerful and useful resource than the sum of the existing Wiktionary projects.