On 3/12/07, Erik Moeller erik@wikimedia.org wrote:
I have made this point in exactly this way many times in person and observed the enlightenment on people's faces. Perhaps it is something that works better from face-to-face, but nevertheless, I'd be cautious not to rely only on "insider opinion" as to whether this line of argument "clicks" or not.
If you say so :)
My main point here is that people are often surprised that we actually have all those crazy policies & processes; they seem to often think that Wikipedia is basically operating by some minimal Darwinian ruleset, with anonymous editors assembling works quietly and truth occasionally rising to the top unpredictably. In presentations, I see a lot of surprise when I give people examples of AfD and FAC discussions, etc.
Heh, sounds like your argument is "We actually do try and get things right. Honest!" :) But yeah...it would certainly be interesting to analyse Wikipedia's "approach to quality" compared with an ISO 9000 organisation.
There is definitely some lingering confusion and some inconsistency about this, partially due to Jimmy's past double role as Chair and President of the Wikimedia Foundation (he is neither today). But that's the present situation.
I am definitely lingeringly confused. To be honest, I don't have the faintest idea what his role is these days. Perhaps someone would like to enlighten me. And if he is no longer, benevolent dictator, who is? And if no one, is that a problem? What does it mean when he tells the press that we're going to implement a credentials model? Is that the same as if I told the press that we aren't? Is this a popularity contest?
The admin misunderstanding is definitely common. There's probably an equal or greater number of Wikipedia readers who've never heard of admins in the first place, so I'm not sure it would make sense to explain it in the context of a list like this one.
Who's your audience? The admin/editor thing seems to come up so often in newspaper articles. "Wikipedia editor" seems to be used as a term of respect or authority.
Steve