[Foundation-l] On Wikinews

[Theo10011]

On Tue, Sep 13, 2011 at 4:37 PM, emijrp <emijrp at gmail.com> wrote:

> I agree with this analysis.
>
> 2011/9/13 <me at marcusbuck.org>
>
> > English Wikinews is in a market with many, many professional
> > competitors. Competitors with a paid staff that steadily create
> > reliable news output quick and in most cases _for free_. While good
> > encyclopedias were still sold for thousands of dollars in 2001, news
> > were already available for free back then. So there's no big advantage
> > for the reader in using Wikinews instead of some other news resource.
> >
> > A further point is steadiness. A Wikipedia doesn't loose much value if
> > you leave it unedited for some days because of contributor shortage.
> > On Wikinews on the other hand most readers will leave forever if there
> > are no current news since days. It's very hard to build a userbase if
> > you cannot guarantee a continuous flow of new news.
> >
> > And it's hard to gain authors if you have no readers because the texts
> > will only be of interest for a few days. If you write a news article
> > and noone reads it you have wasted your time. On Wikipedia however, if
> > you write an article you can rest assured that people will read your
> > text. If not today then in a year.
> >
> > Other than a Wikipedia where even a single person can build an
> > increasingly useful resource over time, Wikinews has a critical mass.
> > If it doesn't reach the criticial mass of steady contributions, the
> > project will never lift off.
> >
> >
> > It's my opinion, that Wikimedia should try to support a Wikinews by
> > paying a editor in chief and a core team of reporters to secure that
> > the project always stays above the critical mass.
> >
> > Ideally that isn't done in the oversaturated market for English
> > language news but in a language that doesn't have any native language
> > news outlets. Pick the language with the biggest number of speakers (I
> > guess that'll be in rural Africa or Asia) that has no own media and
> > hire an editorial team. Send them out to make contacts into the
> > diaspora of the language and into the countryside to find volunteer
> > reporters and correspondents. Let them do a mix of world news and
> > original local news reporting. Go into print. A few newspapers per
> > village will probably suffice if you distribute it to the right places
> > and propagate sharing.
> >
> > Provide free and open news to people who haven't had access to native
> > content before.
> >
> > That of course means spending some money. Perhaps it won't work. But I
> > think it is worth actually exploring it further and trying it out. At
> > least that would be a form of Wikinews that could actually _make a
> > difference_. The current model of "give them a wiki and don't do much
> > else until six years later the project crumbles to dust" does not lead
> > to anything making a difference.
> >
> > Marcus Buck
> > User:Slomox
> >
> >
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> >
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I don't quiet agree with that analysis. You comparison with professional
competitors might have held true in the last age of publishing, the playing
field has been much more leveled. Even the New York Times has a hard time
being competitive in this age, when they can't compete with individual
bloggers posting and copying stories from everywhere. Amateurs already won
that race.

The same point applies to Encyclopedias- Wikipedia is proof that just about
anyone can contribute to an encyclopedia, not just a published versions  by
white, old, Academicians and instead refine it, continuously to compete with
any other Encyclopedia. Now, the difference of concept between an
Encyclopedia and a News source are undeniable, you can not refine a news
article and you have to be correct and quick at the same time. The
difference is, Wikipedia already does this, breaking stories do link back
Wikipedia article from Google News. The difference between the two projects
is the number of contributors.

The concept of this movement is based mainly on volunteers. it has proven
that random volunteers from around the world can accomplish anything, if we
pay people to contribute, it goes against the ethos of all the projects.

The biggest strength that a Wikinews like project can always have, is the
most diverse contributor base anywhere. We have contributors from so many
countries, they all know how to contribute, they speak a hundred languages
and have access to things a news/wire service will never have. Wikinews was
never able to capitalize on this.

Theo