Michael R. Irwin wrote:
I usually assume since Wikiversity is starting at zero we cannot afford to be limiting our horizons and shrinking. Of course Wikipedia has proven me very wrong. The proper frame of reference is the internet and by shrinking their potential growth and diversity they have achieved a god king ruled encyclopedia which is obviously of decent quality for most people.
Whether a learning institution can achieve success via this formula remains to be seen. Whether the arriving Wikiversity participants will put up with this formula after a few communities form also remains to be seen.
regards, mirwin
I will point out that Wikiversity is not going to have necessarily the God-King type person like Jimbo who is going to be ever-present but yet nowhere. Yeah, Jimbo himself will show up from time to time (hopfully not as damaging as he's been on Wikibooks BTW). There isn't any "one" person that is going to stand out and be able to "pull the plug" on everything, nor have the social standing of Jimbo on Wikipedia. We are going to all be more or less equals in that regard. Yeah, there are going to be some very active and "prominent" individuals that will certainly be leaders, but we won't be having somebody who is going to make pronouncements that are simply unquestioned.
I think this is a good thing BTW. And it will be very healthy for Wikiversity.
Due to the way that Wikiversity started, I think there will always be a sort of loyal opposition to the WMF board of trustees and a slight attitude of questioning what the board members are thinking about Wikiversity. Still, this is something that is in the Wikimedia family of projects, and the whole reason why we decided to go this route instead of trying to form another on-line educational community independent of everybody else.