There were many and hilarious media mentions this fortnight. Here's a sampling from across the English mediaverse.
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Andrew Leifer of the Stanford U's paper (the ''Daily''): "Your first stop for any kind of research should always be Wikipedia, the Internet's free, ever-evolving encyclopedia of everything... [s]imilar in philosophy to the clothing brand Fubu" -- one has to admire his spirit. http://daily.stanford.edu/tempo?page=content&id=18157&repository=000...
"Orlowski Tackles Problems at the Wikipedia" ...puts encyclopedia's inaccuracies in perspective through own example. Orlowski's flair for balance and neutrality is propagated through English and German media. http://blog.searchenginewatch.com/blog/051018-152053
Wikipedia's reach quadruples in the past twelve months; leads growth spurt in reference-sites that includes eHow/wikiHow: http://www.linuxelectrons.com/article.php/2005101609035361
Worth a revisit: Nick Carr publishes David Gerard's eloquent response to his last Wikipedia posting, in full; and concurs. http://www.roughtype.com/archives/2005/10/more_on_wikiped.php
Wikipedia makes Foolish watchlist: http://www.fool.com/news/commentary/2005/commentary05100505.htm
Jimbo wales on the competition : On Wikibooks and 'slaughtering' textbook publishers -- http://www.dailyorange.com/media/paper522/news/2005/09/30/News/Wikibooks.Off... http://www.crankyconsumer.org/archives/000354wikimedia_foundation_vows_to_as...
Jimbo, world traveller: "that's like opening a steakhouse and saying, 'Wait. What if people want to stab each other with their steak knives?' ... What does that do to your community?" Benkler's beard makes an appearance, along with goggling Googlers and an air guitar. http://www.technewsworld.com/story/46275.html (nyc, sept)
And finally... Ward Cunningham leaves Microsoft for the open-source Eclipse Foundation, causes media stir. Reporters trying to reach Ward for comment yesterday (Tuesday) were told "I'm sorry, call back tomorrow. I'm at the Wikisym conference[1]; this is more important." [overheard --sj.] http://www.redherring.com/Article.aspx?a=14044&hed=Wiki+Inventor+Leaves+...
[1] a wiki conference he helped organize, in coordination with ACM and OOPSLA
-- ++SJ
SJ (2.718281828@gmail.com) [051019 15:55]:
Worth a revisit: Nick Carr publishes David Gerard's eloquent response to his last Wikipedia posting, in full; and concurs. http://www.roughtype.com/archives/2005/10/more_on_wikiped.php
Wikipedia's critics appear to be shocked when someone familiar with Wikipedia openly admits it's far from perfect ... I do hope the point I made here - that Britannica is brilliant and doomed, and if we have a good encyclopedia in ten years it's going to be Wikipedia in some form - propagates.
Wikipedia makes Foolish watchlist: http://www.fool.com/news/commentary/2005/commentary05100505.htm
I wrote in about this one too - stressing that Wikipedia itself is run by a nonprofit, though there are lots of mirrors with Google ads making more or less of a buck.
- d.
On 10/22/05, David Gerard fun@thingy.apana.org.au wrote:
Wikipedia's critics appear to be shocked when someone familiar with Wikipedia openly admits it's far from perfect ... I do hope the point I made here - that Britannica is brilliant and doomed, and if we have a good encyclopedia in ten years it's going to be Wikipedia in some form - propagates.
That is an important idea, and you stated it quite wonderfully. Another area where we need to remind people is what exactly an encyclopedia is and what it is used for... A common set of misconceptions seem to circulate around the idea that Wikipedia isn't the best reference work, and that it isn't good for citing. What these people seem to forget is that pretty much no one beyond high-school will cite an encyclopedia in their work, and even in highschool it is often strongly discouraged to over use them... this is precisely because an encyclopedia, any encyclopedia, is not a primary source.
Wikipedia may be less useful as a primary source compared to other encyclopedias, but from what we can tell today it looks like our model is likely as good, if not better, at much of what an encyclopedia is actually most useful for... Such as acting as a comprehensive general reference, and taking someone from little knowledge of a subject to a level where they can understand the primary sources.
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