[WikiEN-l] Eschatology and Wikipedia

[Ray Saintonge]

On 12/27/10 9:04 PM, Fred Bauder wrote:
>> On Tue, Dec 28, 2010 at 3:07 AM, Ray Saintonge<saintonge at telus.net>
>> wrote:
>>> On 12/21/10 1:12 PM, David Gerard wrote:
>>>> I can't speak for anyone but myself - but I think, and I've seen many
>>>> others who express an opinion think, that competition would be good
>>>> and monopoly as *the* encyclopedia is not intrinsically a good thing.
>>> I can't agree more.  To this end, Wikipedia should be encouraging
>>> forks,
>>> encouraging other sites to copy articles into other wikis which in turn
>>> could edit them into something consistent with the new site's
>>> philosophies.  Being the sole arbiter of NPOV can lead to very
>>> un-neutral results.  Where other sites have been copying and developing
>>> articles in their own way, WP could even have interwiki links to these
>>> other sites.
>> <snip>
>>
>>> The initiative must still come from those who would run those sites.
>> Indeed. Just out of interest, how many people here would consider
>> devoting the time and energy and resources into setting up a Wikipedia
>> fork? I know some active Wikipedians have done so, but sustaining such
>> forks can be very difficult. What practical steps can be taken to
>> encourage a diversity of useful and sustainable forks that demonstrate
>> what is and is not possible? Or is th etime better spent improving WMF
>> projects?
>>
>> Carcharoth
> I'm not available for serious sustained work on any fork but Wikinfo, but
> I can help people get set up. There has to be a vision though, of
> something better. Maybe something that is an actual wiki, quick and easy,
> rather than the template coding hell Wikipedia's turned into.

Absolutely.  It comes down to two issues: What Wikimedia *can* provide, 
and what the new project *must* provide.  In addition to funding the new 
project must indeed provide a vision. A working WYSIWYG is indeed one 
such possibility, but the mediawiki software may not be so helpful to them.

My idea was somewhat more modest in that it was content based.  Although 
it would not reflect my personal philosophy something like Conservapedia 
is something to be encouraged.  It's vision would likely only allow a 
limited and manageable subset of Wikipedia articles.  Interwiki links 
from Wikipedia to that project could be given for those who would like 
an alternative view of the subject with the understanding that the other 
project may not be bound by NPOV.

Ec