That'd actually be pretty useful, although I'm looking at it from a slightly different perspective. It would be excellent to have an easy way of locating and identifying those noted as say, good copyeditors, for when you have something that needs being done.
The problem, as I see it, is that this risks making things far too complicated. One of the criticisms levelled at Wikipedia is that the community and policy layout is far too complex. If we start adding in myriad different "statuses" for editors, we're shooting ourselves in the foot.
On Wed, Feb 9, 2011 at 7:34 PM, Brandon Harris bharris@wikimedia.orgwrote:
On 2/9/11 11:20 AM, Oliver Keyes wrote:
Pretty clear problem I can see wi' this - users can be controversial, yet useful. If you want article writing help, or an example to follow in writing content, Malleus Fatuorum (on en-wiki) is a great one. That doesn't mean he's a popular one. I fear this could lead to the idea that being popular is more important than being competent.
The idea that such a system could be gameable is one that I've beenspending a lot of time thinking about.
There are several thoughts I have on the matter. The most important one comes from the fact that Wikipedia has onlyone "status" to aspire to: Administrator.
If you don't want to become a wiki-janitor, well. We've got nothingfor you. There is no other status.
But what if we *did* have other statuses? Ones that didn'tnecessarily have janitorial powers, ones that were awarded by the community?
Something like "Recognized Newbie Ambassador" for people who want tobe helpful to new users, or "Featured Editor" for those who spend a lot of time editing, or a "Recognized Researcher," for those who don't know from copy-editing but are ninjas at locating references?
In much the same way that users are nominated to becomeadministrators, they could be nominated to those positions. And their reputation "karma" (or whatever) can be used as *evidence* for the nomination (rather than having it be automatically granted).
Wikipedia has a crazy-powerful brand status. Imagine a day whenyou're at a random party and someone introduces themselves and tries to impress you not for being a "software engineer" but because they're an Editor Fellow for Wikipedia? Something to take pride in that is officially recognized by the community.
On Wikipedia, reputation *cannot* become a "currency" (even though Iused that term). It's like the music business: it's not "what have you ever done for me" it's "what have you done for me lately?" Soft expiration of the system would likely be required, and there would have to be controls to handle obvious gaming, but those are implementation details and we should think high-level.
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