[WikiEN-l] Re: Nupedia?

[Sheldon Rampton]

I think the way forward from here is to emulate the systems used in 
scientific peer review and publishing. What makes Wikipedia work, in 
my opinion, is that is already emulates the model by which scientific 
knowledge has been able to accumulate: an "information commons" to 
which anyone can contribute and which anyone can use.

Until the 19th century, the scientific system was truly open to 
anyone, and credentials didn't matter much. As the quality and 
quantity of scientific information increased and its power to 
transform technology and society became evident, the stakes got 
higher and peer review entered the system as a way of trying to 
determine which scientific projects should be funded and considered 
reliable.

Right now Wikipedia is a hobby for most of the people who use it, 
which places it in a position analogous to the days when science was 
the hobby of gentleman tinkerers. I don't think many people right now 
are particularly using Wikipedia as part of their job or in any other 
context where they absolutely need to rely on its accuracy. When I 
personally look things up on Wikipedia, for example, I don't have to 
rely on its accuracy because there are other information sources that 
I can use to double-check anything I find here. If its reliability 
becomes more important to users, people will begin to develop more 
deliberate procedures for fact-checking and credentialing.

One way that Wikipedia could incorporate peer review would be to 
develop its own panels of accredited experts on various topics. Right 
now users are a largely undifferentiated mass. There are some 
differences between anonymous IP users, registered users and sysops, 
but those differences merely reflect different permission settings in 
the software and don't correspond to any distinctions in terms of 
individuals' actual expertise in specific fields.

In the future, we may want to have some volunteer committees: a 
science committee, a history committee, a humanities committee and so 
forth. These could be further differentiated over time as need be. 
For example, there could be science subcommittees in areas such as 
biochemistry or particle physics. Individuals with credentials and 
expertise in each field could be invited to serve. Suppose, for 
example, the science committee consisted of several Nobel laureates 
and other leading scientists. If a dispute arose over a particular 
article, the committee would be invited to mediate and render an 
opinion, and if mediation alone was insufficient to resolve the 
dispute, the committee could even be given authority to impose a 
binding decision.

All of these changes would consist of social self-organization of 
Wikipedia users. They wouldn't entail or require modifications of the 
software.
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|  Sheldon Rampton
|  Editor, PR Watch (www.prwatch.org)
|  Author of books including:
|     Friends In Deed: The Story of US-Nicaragua Sister Cities
|     Toxic Sludge Is Good For You
|     Mad Cow USA
|     Trust Us, We're Experts
|     Weapons of Mass Deception
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