[WikiEN-l] What's going on? - Inquiry 2

[Thomas Dalton]

On 13/09/2007, WikipediaEditor Durin <wikidurin at gmail.com> wrote:
> The overarching problem here is that Wikipedia is collapsing. This list
> is just a symptom of that.
> * The Foundation has become ineffective and no longer cares about
>    its mission and goals. There's a number of symptoms resulting from
>    this state. One such symptom is the abysmal state of fundraising.
>    In hard numbers, the fundraising is better. In terms of per-capita
>    analysis, absolutely terrible. In short, the importance, scale and
>    complexity of Wikipedia has dramatically increased while fund
>    raising has only slightly increased. It's not keeping up, and the
>    more that it can't keep up the worse the problems will become.

As far as I'm aware, the Foundation isn't in financial difficulties,
so the fundraising must be sufficient. Just because Wikipedia is
growing at a particular rate doesn't mean our costs are growing at
that rate.

>    Another symptom; massive turnover at the Foundation level. Though
>    the words we've been hearing from the departing people have all
>    been nice, any outside observer can see that an organization that
>    loses people by the droves has serious problems, regardless of
>    what face they attempt to put on it.

I can think of two people that have left, one of which was only ever
intended to be temporary. Perhaps my memory is at fault, but I don't
remember any "droves".

> * This list, which used to be an effective forum and regarded by Jimbo
>    as being THE place to do business is now ineffectual. Jimbo used to
>    be a regular here. Looking from the perspective of number of posts
>    per month, his participation here is down 43% this year from last year.
> * Issues of scale are not being addressed. Analogous; Usenet newsgroups
>    were useful when there was a small community per newsgroup. When it
>    became thousands per newsgroup, they became useless. See
>    "Dunbar's number" article.

Both valid points.

> * Prior decisions on key points are being disregarded, despite lengthy
>    debates leading to those decisions. Precedent is meaningless now.
>    The community has lost its ability to move forward because all
>    decisions are immediately obsolete and carry no relevance for tightly
>    related circumstances.
> * General behavior on Wikipedia has led to a narrower definition of the
>    typical Wikipedian. Wikignomes, for example, are no longer valued.

I disagree. Do you have any evidence to support those assertions?

> * While we have a crossed 2,000,000 articles, one automated study
>    showed that about 3% of our articles...just 60,000...have anything
>    above a few sentences and a handful of references. I.e., vast swaths
>    of Wikipedia are very far from being encyclopedic in content and
>    structure.

That's far worse than I would have estimated. Do you have to details
of that study? A link perhaps?

> I could go on for a *long* while about the ails of Wikipedia and
> all the various symptoms that show its imminent demise.
>
> Of course, all of what I've said above will be disputed, and I'll be
> shown by massive writings that I'm insane, criminally wrong, etc.
> The arguments will continue ad nauseum. I do not care for rebuttals
> at this point. I just hope people read this and take it to heart. Yes,
> the end of Wikipedia is nigh. Yes, I'm the quack standing on a corner
> with a sandwich board on me. Don't say I didn't warn you.

You're going to get rebuttals whether you like them or not. That's how
rational discussion works. Refusing to listen to rebuttals is a
symptom of religion, not rationality.