on 6/29/07 8:12 PM, Eugene van der Pijll at eugene(a)vanderpijll.nl wrote:
Marc Riddell schreef:
It occurred to me that you may be missing an
important point here. I am not
proposing a structure for the Wikipedia Project. Rather, I am proposing that
there be day-to-day leadership that would oversee one.
But in that case there should be a structure to be overseen? Or do you
mean the current stucture?
The current wikipedia is much to large for one person to lead directly;
that must be obvious to you, right? So any overseeing has to be done
hierarchivally, using chains of responsibilty. And I would think that
would imply rules similar to those Larry is proposing for Citizendium.
The current structure of Wikipedia is simply not suited for central
There are an immense number of groups and committees that have some
responsibility over a part of Wikipedia. Some of these have some kind of
formal status, transferred by the Wikimedia Foundation (or Jimbo), but
that is only a very small part of the "governance" of Wikipedia.
Most of the work is done by small groups that have spontaneously formed,
without directing from above, and I bet the leaders of Wikipedia (let's
call them "Jimbo") don't know half of them.
As an example: take the Bots Approval Group. Before the BAG formed, the
work was done by some experienced users on an ad hoc basis. And some of
those users said: this is not working to well, we need to form a group
with x members who are from now on the only ones who can approve bots.
And because the bot writers saw the reason of this, the small BAG group
now has the responsibilty over that part of wikipedia, without ever
having been approved by "Jimbo". And as long as the BAG does good work,
there's no need for the leadership to do except just leave them to it.
If such a group has to be overseen by the WP leader(s), there has to be
a procedure to create and approve such a group. Which means that the
creation of such groups is hindered, some groups will not be formed, and
that will be detrimental to the site.
Perhaps you can look at it like this: Citizendium is going to be modeled
on a company, with rules about who does what, and people at the top
being ultimately responsible for everything that happens.
Wikipedia has more similarities to the society, with freedom of
association, and leaders who set the boundaries of accepted behaviour,
but within those limits let the "citizens" do whatever they like.
It will indeed be interesting to see what the differences between the
resulting encyclopedias will be.
I hope this long post clarifies more than it obscures.
Eugene
Once again, Eugene, my focus is not on the internal structure of the
Wikipedia Project; but, rather, the need for a strong day-to-day leadership
to oversee it. This is the discussion I am trying to encourage. If the
Community feels a need for this, the details can be worked out in a
constructive, creative way. The Community is full of minds I believe would
love the challenge to create something that is believed to be impossible.
I believe an open discussion of "leadership" within the Wikipedia Project is
being hampered by one very important thing: The fact that this Community has
been burned by leadership here in the past. For the sake of the Project's
future, isn't it time to get past that?
As a member of the Community, if you are happy with the present system of
leadership, say so; if not, say so.
Marc Riddell
PS: Isn't it also time to stop the references and comparisons to
Citizendium? Every time you mention it in the context of Wikipedia, you
identify us with it. Enough.