[Foundation-l] Cleaning up Wikibooks (was Re: Incubator Wiki for New Wikimedia Projects)

[Robert Scott Horning]

Ray Saintonge wrote:

> Anthony DiPierro wrote:
>
>> 1) Wikibooks is for textbooks, and this should be narrowly construed
>> to mean classical textbooks, not to include any learning resources
>> such as encyclopedias.
>
> I tend to interpret the role of Wikibooks very broadly, certainly to 
> go beyond the idea of the classical textbook.  In some ways the 
> classical textbook is antithetical to good education because it tends 
> to mould its users into the same series of learning experiences.  A 
> single Wikibook should begin with a subject that can be included in 
> Wikipedia but which requires expansion into a book that in theory 
> could be published as a stand alone entity.  The Cookbook was a good 
> example of this.  There was a great debate at one time about the 
> inclusion of recipes in Wikipedia.  Some were accepted as proper to 
> Wikipedia, but the bulk ended up in Wikibooks where NPOV could also be 
> approached with a more relaxed interpretation.
>
> Ec

A huge issue that has recently erupted on Wikibooks is resulting from a 
thread started by of all people Jimbo in the Staff Lounge:

"In the next 24 to 48 hours, I will delete a variety of pages from 
Wikibooks which are a clear and simple violation of our charter. 
Jokebook <http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Jokebook>, Getting a date 
<http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Getting_a_date>, Naturism 
<http://en.wikibooks.org/w/index.php?title=Naturism&action=edit> are all 
not textbooks and need to be moved to another site. There may be 
more.--Jimbo Wales <http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/User:Jimbo_Wales> 
17:27, 13 November 2005 (UTC)"

While I may agree with him in regards to those particular Wikibooks, 
this has resulted in a huge examination of the overall philosophy of 
Wikibooks and what should and should not be there.  In particular, Jimbo 
also changed the wording of an official policy from:

"As a general rule, any book you might expect to find in the non-fiction 
section of your local library or bookshop is acceptable."

to become instead:

"As a general rule, most books you might expect to find in the 
non-fiction section of your local library or bookshop are not 
acceptable. This is for textbooks."

This is Jimbo's website, so I guess he can make arbitrary changes like 
this whenever he wants to.  Still, as a Wikibook admin I am scratching 
my head to understand the full impact of this official policy change. 
 In particular, it means that non-textbooks like the Cookbook may have 
to go, at least if we have a consistant textbook-only policy.  A large 
number of items are also being trans-wikied from Wikipedia to Wikibooks, 
so it is important as well to Wikpedia users to understand what the 
implications of this policy change is going to be.  And this is a policy 
change, as much as Jimbo wants to hide from that fact.

There is a general tolerance of new content that goes onto Wikibooks, in 
part because it is a smaller project and we are trying to attract and 
keep contributors even if they add content that perhaps should be there. 
 Writing a book is harder, and in some ways much harder than even an 
encyclopedia entry.  Driving away new contributors just because they do 
something against policy is especially harmful.  Jimbo's comment that 
followed was especially harsh:

"I'm happy to give more time, but these books are already candidates for 
speedy deletion. The point is that, to give on example which was 
thankfully already deleted, a racist white-power book is not a textbook, 
never will be a textbook, and should have been deleted on site and the 
creator banned for vandalism on site. --Jimbo Wales 
<http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/User:Jimbo_Wales> 21:03, 13 November 2005 
(UTC)"

The user that added this white power book has otherwise done Wikibooks 
quite a bit of good, and banning him would only make an enemy rather 
than a useful contributor.  I prefer to follow the model of trying to 
mentor and encourage proper behavior where possible, and this user was 
not showing signs of traditional vandalism, nor would I want to drive 
this user to go in that direction.  We did delete the white-power book 
after a surprisingly short period of time on the Wikibooks VfD page.

I think this issue needs to be brought to the attention of the larger 
Wikimedia community, and to be aware that there is a huge struggle going 
on to try an interpret Jimbo's actions here.

-- 
Robert Scott Horning