[Wikipedia-l] Why Wikipedia needs linkbacks

[Michel Clasquin]

On Tuesday 30 October 2001 03:54, you wrote:
> Can you imagine what this project could be like in ten years, if we stay
> on track?  It really *could* beat out Britannica in terms of quality.
> And *everybody and his grandmother* will be wanting to use Wikipedia
> content.  

Forget Britannica. This obsession with "beating" an obsolete concept is 
something we need to get rid of *fast*.

Instead, let's look at what is going on on WP right now. The people 
handling the 9-11 reporting are putting up pages for WTC victims.

Think about that. In the past, to get your name into britannica you first 
needed to get famous (or infamous), to do something extraordinary. To get 
a page up on WP, all that is needed is for someone to think that you 
should be remembered. Hypothetically, we could have a page for every one 
of the six billion people on the planet. And one for every one of their 
ancestors yea unto the seventh generation. [[At this point, Jimbo looks 
nervously at his hard disk capacity]]. 

This is something new, and I don't think any of us can really predict 
where it will go. But there is no need to obsess about Britannica. It was 
a great product in its time, but moving an 18th century concept to the web 
does not move the concept itself  into the 21st.

-- 
Michel Clasquin, D Litt et Phil (Unisa)
clasqm at mweb.co.za/unisa.ac.za   http://www.geocities.com/clasqm
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