[Wikipedia-l] Do we really need a Sifter project?

[Erik Moeller]

Daniel-
> Erik wrote:
>> I know, but what's the point?
>> Why not just kill off Nupedia and
>> advertise Wikipedia as a single project?

> The point is that a main criticism I always here about Wikipedia is that it
> is largely not written by people trained in the areas they are writting.

They should not care whether it is *written* by people who are trained in  
the respective areas, they should care whether it has been fact-checked by  
those people. And this can be best accomplished within Wikipedia,  
especially since we already have many of those people.

> Also having a different name makes
> it clear that those articles are different than regular Wikipedia ones (a
> "stable" Wikipedia article is an oxymoron anyway).

Having a prominent, clearly labeled, protected section within Wikipedia  
should be sufficient. Linking to a specific revision of an article is  
equivalent to a "stable" Nupedia page. (We might make a minor change that  
links to specific revisions which contain the parameter "&stable=true" are  
shown as protected pages even if they aren't, so that users don't  
accidentally edit old revisions. Alternatively, clicking the "Edit" link  
would automatically load the newest revision in these cases.)

> We already have the experts - let's use them in Nupedia, revive the Nupedia
> brand as a stable, experted-approved distribution of Wikipedia and that will
> attract even more experts. All editing will still be on Wikipedia so every
> Nupedian is also a Wikipedian. I see this as setting-up great synergies
> between the two projects.

I think there's an ancient Egyptian curse on the Nupedia name that  
prevents any project running under that banner from succeeding. That, and  
I still don't see the point of doing on Nupedia what can be done within  
Wikipedia. :-)

Regards,

Erik