[WikiEN-l] Citizendium trying out not being a fork of Wikipedia for a while

[Luna]

On 1/18/07, Matt R <matt_crypto at yahoo.co.uk> wrote:
>
> "One thing that I think I didn't realize sufficiently, when writing about
> this
> question a few months ago (at embarrassing length, before the pilot
> project was
> well under way), is that the very presence of fair-to-middling articles
> from WP
> is actually a strong disincentive for people to get to work. It's like
> this:
> when you get down to brass tacks, it's no fun to clean up the mediocre
> work of
> Wikipedians.  It might be a hell of a lot more fun to start over from
> scratch."


All ego and cat calls aside, the man's got a point -- people go where
they're interested, and writing brand new articles "in your own image" is
often more interesting than cleanup work. Whatever works for them; it's
their project, after all.

I wouldn't be surprised if they "check in" on Wikipedia, now and then, just
as we're apparently checking in on them. It's useful to see where similar
but distinct projects have strong and weak points, and to see how that
knowledge can help us to improve our own project.

Additionally, I rather doubt it, but this couldn't be the start of some
licensing change on their part? The primary reason they went with GFDL,
assuming I understand their decision correctly, was for the purpose of
forking Wikipedia. By deleting the forked pages, a lot of that need is
gone... although they've put a fair amount of work into it, already, which
would still be GFDL licensed, along with the whole can of worms that such a
decision (and discussion) would open up. Switching licenses would probably
be disruptive, for them, but again, it's their project.

Just a few rambling thoughts.
-Luna