[WikiEN-l] Why are veterans so militant of late; The Future. (was Bus Uncle)

[Gabe Johnson]

On 6/6/07, Joe Szilagyi <szilagyi at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 6/5/07, Tony Sidaway <tonysidaway at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > Wikipedia, though, has remained under the effective control of a
> > pretty small part of the community.  And the core community has grown
> > more effective as it has learned what it does and doesn't want the
> > encyclopedia to be... <snip>
>
>
> Unfortunately, this makes two pretty presumtuous statements. One, it
> presumes that the 'old core' of admins, those that can trace their WP time
> back to 2004-05 and earlier, will remain in power. Simple math says you
> won't be; a simple countdown began when Wikipedia became popular that
> dictates this--*unless* it is codified somehow that some people based on
> seniority get more clout, and it's enforced.
>
> The core community per-person has 'power' in the sense that the others of
> the core community support them. There is such a constant influx of new
> people and new administrators all the time, however, that the value of the
> old cliques, cabals, and 'cores' will be simply another small party in the
> future. Sure, some of the new people will go along. But from a simple point
> of realism, and from a sociological standpoint, this will not be in the end.
>
>
> WP is a system that, by design as David said, is un-designed. The only
> immutable things are state of Florida and United States legal matters.
> Everything else can be changed with enough pushing be it a little or a lot.
> Let's not be coy--the 'core' community of editors, admins, and defrocked
> admins you refer to numbers at best around 100 people or less. Unless the
> system itself is changed to do something to assure that this core be held in
> some higher level of clout, when pushes comes to shove, there will be no
> recourse but to edit war over policy pages (gee, that's not happening almost
> daily yet, is it?) or to have absurdly overblown RFAR hearings over minutae.
>
> A system that as worded gives everyone equal rank means that a small group
> in the system, without either active bringing people into it's fold and
> working to bring others around to it's way of thinking... will fade away.
> What does that mean, Tony? Convince people of the value of the changes YOU
> want. The old ways of "click it, forget it, and then say Fuck Process with
> my apparenty incivility pass" won't work. You will need to sell the worth
> and value of what you're after. Or else the strength of crowds in the end
> will simply revert your ideas away as just another edit warrior. Fight back
> blindly by clicking away with the Fuck Process mentality, and the But The
> Cabal Is Right mentality, and you'll find yourself on the losing side of 3rr
> blocks. Enough of this, and you--or anyone--will end up on the receiving end
> of a indefinite ban firing squad on CSN or ANI or wherever.
>
> My point is, in short, that the simple weight of the massive number of users
> will be deciding on the ultimate path and fate of Wikipedia. Not Tony
> Sidaway, nor David, nor Kelly Martin, nor Jimbo Wales, nor me, nor any other
> lone person, or small group of people. In 'x' number of months or years,
> unless the system is codified differently, you and five other people saying,
> "This will not stand, this will be changed," on a given matter, may find
> yourself impotently starting down four or five times as many people.
>
> You will have no recourse but to go along with them, scream about it, or
> leave. To contrast: people liked to say that my old admin recall ideas where
> ultra-extremist, ultra-minority; and they like to say that Badlydrawnjeff's
> views are often the same. That's fine, for today, early June, 2007. The same
> perspective may well apply to the current views of the "Core' come early
> June, 2008 or 2009, when their ideas are outnumbered by people 7:1 or 10:1.
>
> Regards,
> Joe
> http://www.joeszilagyi.com

I *do* think Jimbo Wales will hold similar, or even possibly greater
power, since today's editors are significantly less likely to know him
personally, and treat him more like a god-king. However, I do somewhat
agree with your assessment overall, but how will the large majority
actually take action? ~~~~

-- 
Absolute Power
C^7rr8p£5 ab£$^u7£%y