--- Jimmy Wales jwales@wikia.com wrote:
I had an idea the other day while I was on a radio interview.
I personally don't like the idea, because it does create a sense of "I have a PHD in Astrophysics and you don't so stfu" that I don't think would be conducive to the exercise of wikilove.
I would say that userpages are a great place for this sort of information. If you have a degree in Engineering from CalTech, put the year you graduated. If you have 12 years experience in laying Italian marble, say so. If you're been working for the Japanese Consulate in Los Angeles for 9 years, write it down.
I think that very little of the world's knowledge and expertise is accurately captured by academia's diplomas.
If you're a veteran helicopter pilot, you training coming from Desert Storm and now you're an instructor at a military base, I would say your degree and certifications are probably rock-solid.
If you are making cheese and have been taught by your father, who was taught by his father, who was taught by his father and forebearers and ancestors all the way to the 11th century, you may not have a high school diploma, but you probably know more about cheese than a recent agronomy phd.
I would say that there is a perception that if "William Thurmond Sr." edits an article, it will be more authoritative than if "pixidust" edits it. Yet "pixidust" may understand 17th century scottish litterature better than Thurmond Sr. Heck, she may really be Ann Margaret Bershire, Ph. D. and Professor of Linguistics at Cambridge University, who prefers to let loose on WP as "pixidust" because she doesn't want to get the cold shoulder from her high and mighty crusty colleages.
I would also say, as someone pointed out, that the very lack of prominent information about authors leads people to contribute who don't want to be in the limelight of controversy, something which I think is the plague of most other online content systems.
I think that when professionals come in to look at wikipedia and see the articles in their area of expertise, and see the quality of the writing, the clarity in which ideas are expressed, and the accuntability of the system, they immediately realise that this is not usenet.
Chris Mahan 818.943.1850 cell chris_mahan@yahoo.com chris.mahan@gmail.com http://www.christophermahan.com/
__________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Mail - Helps protect you from nasty viruses. http://promotions.yahoo.com/new_mail