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_ News Worth Discussing _ The Truth According To Wikipedia
Posted by: Newsfeed
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/claire-gordon/the-truth-according-to-wi_b_819247.html
Claire Gordon, Huffington Post
A few months ago, my friend was cited on the German Wikipedia entry for The Social Network. This was exciting, because I had just seen Das Social Network at …
Posted by: Sarcasticidealist
This is a really excellent article, maybe the best article about Wikipedia I've read from somebody without an in-depth familiarity with the site.
I have nothing further to add.
Posted by: Jon Awbrey
QUOTE
Having scanned some three score and ten articles on the Baloney Bias of Wikipedia'Âs Lost Boys over the past week and commented on many of the more outlandish bits of regurgitatÂed hash from the Wikimedia FoundationÂ, I would like to thank you for your thoughtful and witty commentary on the non-issue at hand.
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Posted by: thekohser
QUOTE
It was great to see a reference again to "Wikipedia Art". A couple of my favorite pieces generated in response to that movement were a couple of musical manifestos that really put Wikipedia into perspectivÂe. Here are their videos:
Posted by: Jon Awbrey
One more time …
QUOTE
In its impact on the ecology of knowledge, Wikipedia amounts to a non-sustaiÂnable exploitatiÂon of cultural resources.
Wikipedia is analogous to a multinatioÂnal timber conglomeraÂte that clear-cuts living forests to crank out its lumber and its pulp, with no understandÂing of the living system that it sucks on like a destructivÂe parasite.
— http://www.huffingtonpost.com/social/JonAwbrey?action=comments • http://www.huffingtonpost.com/social/JonAwbrey/the-truth-according-to-wi_b_819247_76606699.html
Reply to objection —
QUOTE
I am saying that our cultural resources are cultivatedÂ, develop, and evolve by means of processes that need to be valued as much as we value their products.
I am saying that Wikipedia Culture, as it currently exists in reality, and not in the fantasies of those who promote it, exploits the contents of our common culture in a way that undermines the very dynamics that created it.
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Posted by: Jon Awbrey
Continuing discussion …
QUOTE
John,
I think we have a good dialogue starting here, but these blog boxes get narrower and narrower as the reply tree grows, so I may have trouble sustaining the conversatiÂon on this site. Claire Gordon's article is one of the very few intelligenÂt commentariÂes on the supposed gender gap issue to come out of many score blogicles in the PR riot that Sue Gardner incited last week, so we dedicated a separate thread to it at The Wikipedia Review, namely here:
http://wikipediareview.com/index.php?showtopic=32897
Since I can edit stuff better there, I'm thinking I might experiment with posting replies there first, and then copying them back here.
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Posted by: Jon Awbrey
QUOTE(Newsfeed @ Sun 6th February 2011, 7:22pm) 
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/claire-gordon/the-truth-according-to-wi_b_819247.html
Claire Gordon, Huffington Post
A few months ago, my friend was cited on the German Wikipedia entry for The Social Network. This was exciting, because I had just seen Das Social Network at …
QUOTE
Update. There are now several threads at The Wikipedia Review on this and related topics:
1. Wikipedia Women Facebook Group — http://wikipediareview.com/index.php?showtopic=33052
2. WMF GenderGap Discussion Forum — http://wikipediareview.com/index.php?showtopic=33040
3. Concern About Porn On Wikipedia — http://wikipediareview.com/index.php?showtopic=33021
4. Media Coverage Around The World — http://wikipediareview.com/index.php?showtopic=32780
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Posted by: Peter Damian
An excellent article. It's not just women who are marginalised. It's anyone who is not a techie, anyone over 30, which includes middle-aged farts like myself, parents, people with some knowledge of medieval philosophy, people who have read a book etc etc.
QUOTE
But when this populist patina was peeled back last week, it revealed a scarily hierarchical and gender-skewed structure. Only 13% of Wikipedia's contributors are women, 2% of users perform 75% of edits, and the average age is in the mid-20s. The architects of today's conventional wisdom are by and large young and male.
Most obviously, the four billion people without access to the Internet cannot edit the Wikipedia entries on their own cultures. And among the wired, it is the male techy community that has established a monopoly on truth.
Today's most prolific truth-makers might be vandals and fools, and are definitely, for the most part, young, male and probably bored.
Most obviously, the four billion people without access to the Internet cannot edit the Wikipedia entries on their own cultures. And among the wired, it is the male techy community that has established a monopoly on truth.
Today's most prolific truth-makers might be vandals and fools, and are definitely, for the most part, young, male and probably bored.