On Mar 6, 2007, at 10:19 PM, Mark Williamson wrote:
The worst of all is that anyone who mentions the
increasingly
hierarchial structure of our communities and the virtual impunity
afforded to certain persons (especially admins in medium-sized Wikis,
who often rule like dictators), they are instantly perceived as
anti-Wiki and/or paranoid.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WP:IAR> exists for a reason, and for
me, that reason is to totally bypass bureaucratic wonks and trolls
who get their rocks off from wiki-lawyering, and constantly
complaining about process, pet projects, pet issues, etc.
The simple fact is, there _is_ a cabal now. In fact,
there are
multiple cabals. They just call themselves different things. The
Board, Arbcom, etc. etc. etc., the number of admins now is so great
that it really is almost like real life, where people are divided by
class. Will people inherit admin accounts from their parents?
(kidding... mostly)
IAR.
We have people who jaywalk in real life, who deviate above the speed
limit, etc. We also have murderers and pedophiles on wikipedia.
Nature of the beast.
Ever since I joined, the community has been moving
more and more in
this direction. I did not take things totally seriously here until it
was suggested in a serious tone that if I were just a couple of years
older, I should be _killed_ for the whole Zlatiborian fracas and that
it was "people like me" who were responsible for the turbulent recent
history of Southeast Europe.
I take it you haven't been on the internet for very long.
Our community has faced several major trials, and we
have pulled
through all but (an early) one of them almost completely intact.
However, I am afraid that will not always be the case. Although we're
growing larger, it doesn't seem to me that we're growing much smarter,
and I think we will end up with mass exoduses and large portions of
our community breaking off and forming similarly-sized competing
projects. I do not think this future is in the best interests of the
movement, it does not fit our aims, surely divided we shall fall.
<Insert ranting counter-slogan here.> Whatever. I don't have any
reason to care. I'm not writing or editing for "wikipedia", I'm
writing and editing for people 300, 800, years from now. If we have a
break into, oh, a wikia community of people obsessed with Manga,
great! Less noise! Break into "vettedscholarpedia", cool! I only care
that we have more vehicles for carrying information.
And I know most of you will blow this off as utter
nonsense, you will
say it's not going to happen, but if we continue on our present course
I promise you it will for the wicked are among us and it is only a
matter of time before the Wiki-empire falls into tiny pieces. Mark my
words, in two months, six months, two years, however long it takes for
us to crumble, if anyone remembers this e-mail they will know that I
was right.
Sweet. Now, mark *my* words: The reason a species dies out is because
something else, or having nothing else, is better. I *hope* that
either wikipedia, or something 10 times better, is around in 300-800
years. I don't give a damn what rules it has, or what it's called, or
who runs it, or how (I plan on being dead by then). The Library of
Alexandria wasn't built because text authors gave a damn about what
the politics of turkey would be like in 300 years. Heck, with forks
in the empire, we have even *more* survivability over the next 800
years.
I just don't have the vanity, or smug self importance, left, to think
that I'm anything more than just another contributor to a possible
vast knowledge base for the future.
-Bop