The people slogging for tenure will do it? The professors won't delegate it to the grad students? The grad students won't be the people who are already writing for us?
If Larry gets tenure-track people to believe it will help them, then it really might be a breakthrough.
Charles
I think the first scenario would still be a major breakthrough; requiring graduate students to write their literature papers for Wikipedia is a whole different beast from (a few idealistic) graduate students writing on top of their other duties. Any sort of large-scale validation within the academy of the value of writing for Wikipedia would be a huge step forward, even without formal recognition mechanisms for tenure-track people. In the humanities at least, the book-writing culture is pretty solidly entrenched. There's more flexibility at the pre-degree and post-tenure stages.
I think any of us, if asked, should be willing to write recommendations for contributors. Whether they will have traction will depend on how knowledgeable and intelligent the person considering it is.
Fred
That's an excellent idea. When the time comes that I need letters of recommendation, I'll call on a Wikipedian or two; even if it doesn't help me, it might help someone down the line as a precedent.
-Sage