On 4/20/05, lmsanger@sbcglobal.net lmsanger@sbcglobal.net wrote:
To Andrew Lih: Andrew, let me throw this back at you: who has ever proven that all of the bulleted items *were* essential to the success of Wikipedia? Why assume without argument that they were? Making unwarranted assumptions is the enemy of critical thinking and problem solving.
You were the one who wrote the memoir and put forth the assertions without supporting argument, and it's up to me to prove the negative? It seems the "critical thinking" lapse is not on my end. I simply asked you to elaborate on them, because they're contrary to current community norms that are quite widely attributed as the reasons for the project's success.
My question is - are you familiar with Benkler's "Coase's Penguin" and his thoughts about peer production? Have you tried to compare your views on "anti-elitism" and "make special roles for experts from the very beginning" against current scholarship on the operation of open source projects and commons-based peer production? I'd be interested to hear your insight, because I do think you could add much to the field. And since you are in academia, and an important part of the history of Wikipedia, it is a natural extension of that area of scholarship. It would be great to see the next Slashdot or Kur5hin article be, "On commons-based peer production, by the co-founder of Wikipedia "
Despite the many Wikipedian villagers with torches and pitchforks running you out of town, I'd find it eminently more useful if you stayed and engaged in dialogue, on a whole range of issues:
* the socio-psychological rewards of participation, something I haven't seen addressed much in your writings * jealousy/altruism factor in Microsoft's Encarta's recent "wiki-like" adaptation, which is more like Nupedia's model and has a regard for experts in the final review process * the sifting process, which you were a part of, and has gained more momentum in recent months
-Andrew Lih (User:Fuzheado)