[WikiEN-l] Is Wikipedia dying?

[Nathan]

On Thu, Nov 5, 2009 at 2:06 PM, Ryan Delaney <ryan.delaney at gmail.com> wrote:
>> This article by Evgeny Morozov, nominally a review of Andrew Lih's
>> book "The Wikipedia Revolution", is worth reading:
>>
>> http://www.bostonreview.net/BR34.6/morozov.php
>>
>> -Sage
>>
>>
> I've long puzzled over why journalists constantly post editorials
> criticizing Wikipedia and proclaiming that it will never take off. I thought
> that eventually we'd win them over.
>
> Then I realized why this will never happen.
>
> News media is a business. We are a threat to their model. Therefore, it's
> important to them to convince their readers that Wikipedia is unreliable,
> whether it is or not. They will never stop criticizing and attacking us as
> long as  we undermine their bottom line.
>
> As such I have no interest in news print or journalist opinions of
> Wikipedia. Their paychecks depend on our failure. Pay them no heed.
>
> - causa sui
> _____________

I'm not sure about that; journalists are no more a monolith than are
Wikipedians. I think its just human nature; I don't have the citations
handy, but quite a few studies have shown that we focus much more
intently on the negative elements of anything than we do their
positive counterparts, regardless of relative weight.

Just as much, we can't refuse to acknowledge the fact that Wikipedia
does have its problems - journalists may miss the scope, and some lose
the plot entirely, but by and large the issues they identify are real:
we do place a high bar on new contributions, we do have a problem with
battlefield editing, we are vulnerable to interest groups and
individuals and companies can be harmed by inaccurate information
about them that we host. The only problem we are currently addressing
in any coordinated way is usability - on the other problems, progress
proceeds at geologic speed. This is a function of leadership - the
Foundation has it, and the projects do not.

Nathan