[Wikipedia-l] Re: In a massive, and often anonymous context, how do we know each other?

[Anthere]

Joseph Reagle a écrit:
> Hello, I have a question about your article that appeared in Wired. One of 
> my difficulties within the Wikipedia community, or, say for example, this 
> e-mail list, is the large number of people one is likely to come across. It 
> can be difficult to keep track of everyone, particularly in the context of 
> editing a diverse set of web pages So, I was wondering how do people come 
> to know of each other? In particular, for your article, how did you select 
> the folks you did? Asked Jimbo? Looked at the top contributors? 
> 
> Thanks!

At least for me, I come to know the others in watching what they say and 
do. When I notice someone put a wise or funny or creative comment a 
couple of times in a row, I go to his user page. I try to decipher the 
person a little bit. Then I go to his contributors list. Try again to 
see what could make him tick. Then I store the information somewhere. 
And go on noting what he writes. Usually, one day come where I think 
"oh, but X would be the perfect person for this". And I go ask the 
person :-) Hence meet him a bit more :-)

For the article, this is very simple.
There was a meeting in New York in december. Some people show up at this 
meeting, and the journalist asked to be there as well. Those who wanted 
to talk to him surroundered him and he listened.
Very naturally, most of those who showed up at the meeting are very 
involved contributors on the english wikipedia, so not very surprising 
they appear among the top contributors.

Ant