On 16-08-2001, Bryce Harrington wrote thusly :
I snipped some parts of Bryce's post that are not relevant to my
answers.
On Thu, 16 Aug 2001, Krzysztof P. Jasiutowicz wrote:
Hello all,
The same article was put on a Wikipedia page.
I just have a few random, not-worth
keeping comments so will reply here
rather than on the wiki site. (Btw, good idea to post it there.)
I think that we have grown a Wikipedia community.
Wikipedia is a
volunteer project that was made possible by Bomis. However, we have
invested in our favourite project a lot of enthusiasm, time and (in
some cases) money. It is quite natural that we want Wikipedia to
prosper.
In my opinion it is a time to stop and discuss. Discuss the future of
Wikipedia.
How does Bomis see it ?
How does Nupedia see it ?
How do we ?
Personally, as long as Bomis is providing tarballs and enough to
*potentially* allow for forking, we've zero incentive to do it at all.
Sort of, the more control they're willing to give away, the more control
we can all trust them to have, I guess.
Reliability
The other side of the free writing style in Wikipedia is quite
possible lack of reliability.
This lack of reliability would in the end undermine Wikipedia's
credibility and ultimately her success.
No one in the world expects credibility
from Wikipedia. And Wikipedia
requires nothing from the world at large to be successful. Thus to me
it seems like there is only a tenuous connection - at best - between
credibility and success, regarding Wikipedia. If Wikipedia were *only*
intended to be a literal replacement for a traditional encyclopedia,
sure. But it's something a tad less, and something a tad more.
I'd like to
write an article for Wikipedia about it but maybe later
today.
That said, I do not think that the lack of credibility
is as clear cut
as would appear at first glance. Yes, logic says one should expect to
see a distinct lack of credibility in Wikipedia. However, the evidence
we're seeing is that many articles actually *are* reliable and credible.
In a small but growing number of cases, the articles are actually
*better* than you'd find in a traditional encyclopedia.
I agree and this is a
Wikipedia magic but a casual reader might not know
the difference. You say that judging articles in your area of expertise.
This issue
must be tackled, and as soon as possible. I don't agree
here with [[Larry Sanger]] and his view "self-healing". It is an
example of elated wishful thinking that is misleading us.
Well I have disagreed
with Larry on many things, but on this particular
one I think he is correct. I've been involved with Wikipedia since the
start, and have watched the evolution of many articles. I think this
"self-healing" is not an expression of an idealistic wish of his but a
characterization of a real thing that we have been observing again and
again.
I don't know that I would go so far as to say that self-healing will
ensure that at some tangible point wikipedia will be 100% correct.
Actually I'm fairly confident that will never happen. But then, does
that matter? No encyclopedia is 100% correct, and probably not even 75%
correct, when you consider how much is unknown or incorrectly known in
the world.
To be really self-healing we need dozens of such enthusiasts as we are
otherwise someone might put some nonsense pretending to be valid in an
article none of us is competent enough.
I think we should strive for a better kind of credibility than
"this article can be right or wrong, but it is not totally wrong".
I would like to analogize to science here. Scientists
300 years ago did
not say, "Let's make sure we have everything completely and reliably
figured out as soon as possible, and record it." Instead they came up
with a process that allows for establishing what they believed true,
with processes for testing and validating and adjusting as we go. A
self-correcting approach to accumulating knowledge. With Wikipedia we
are using a similar approach - we record what we believe to be true, and
then it is challenged and tested, and hopefully replaced with something
better.
OK I take your point. I am just afraid that we are losing what
Wikipedia _could be_ ?
So in your opinion Wikipedia is a discussion forum rather than a
reference source.
[big snip]
Regards,
kpj.
--
Krzysztof P. Jasiutowicz, M.D | Błądzi człowiek, póki dąży. Johann Wolfgang
Czestochowa, Poland ... | Goethe
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