[WikiEN-l] Wikipedia struggles, Mozilla set for life?

[David Goodman]

Why should it be? Why should we expect  progress to stop with us? Why
should we assume that nobody will devise an even better medium of
collaboration than a wiki? Why should we even assume that the concept
of internet encyclopedia will be relevant 8 years from now? As usenet
went, so shall we.


On 10/23/07, Robert Rohde <rarohde at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 10/23/07, Nick <heligolandwp at googlemail.com> wrote:
>
> > We need an open and sensible discussion about adverts, but I suspect this
> > won't be happening. It's not upto the users now, it's solely upto the
> > board
> > and if they want to try and run Wikipedia on donations, it's their
> > prerogative.
> > <snip>
>
>
> Actually, there is another option.  Some corporation could decide that $100M
> in advertising potential is a great incentive to try and build a better
> mousetrap.
>
> A corporation willing to invest $10M could very credibly seek to fork
> Wikipedia, develop an advertising supported model, and introduce changes in
> the community structure that might attact new volunteers.  It is not a sure
> thing by any means, but a large stable bankroll from advertising would go a
> long way.  There is no guarantee that the most important internet
> encyclopedia in 2015 will be the one run by the WMF.
>
> -Robert Rohde
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-- 
David Goodman, Ph.D, M.L.S.