[WikiEN-l] purpose served by anonymity / unmoderated edits

[Steve Bennett]

On 3/20/07, Bennett Haselton <bennett at peacefire.org> wrote:
> Well Citizendium also builds up articles by having them go through an
> initial growth period, before they are "approved" and signed off on by
> editors, and any future changes also have to be approved by editors.
>
> If the difference were only due to the fun of real-time editing, then there
> would be just as many Citizendium users participating in the
> real-time-editing process during the growth period of an article, as there
> are on Wikipedia.  I think it's safe to say that Wikipedia's first-mover
> advantage and name recognition is the main reason this is not the case :)

Hmm. If someone told me that any change I made to Wikipedia would have
to be "approved" by someone, or that the change would be somehow
"provisional" or "second-rate', I would be less motivated to work on
it.

>If the person's name is not right there on the article (even if it can be
>looked up in the history), then the reward associated with signing off on
>it, decreases.

"Article approved by Professor John Smith. And written by 190 nameless
contributors." Hmm. I'm not against...but I guess I would have to see
it in action.

Steve
[whoops, wrote this earlier, forgot to send it]