Wikis That Work?, Is it the concept or the implementation that is a problem? Options

[dogbiscuit]

It occurred to me that a recent interest of mine had got me using a wiki, and that the experience was satisfying and the results of it were useful.

I do a lot of walking and cycling and so have an interest in maps. Having got a GPS navigation device, I was interested in getting maps (though maps on the smaller devices aren't very usable for actual navigation) and came across www.OpenStreetMap.org which is a great big open source map of the world based on a Wiki approach, albeit with specialised mapping software.

To my surprise, it is accurate and pretty complete for the areas I am interested in, though missing just enough that it has suckered me in to contributing. Of course, in the UK we have some of the best maps in the world with the publicly funded Ordnance Survey, so it is interesting to have something where I can measure the results of a public work against a professional source - even more so because the OS released some of their mapping into the public domain so people have been able to link the two together.

Thoughts are that this is a Wiki with a pretty clear set of goals, the only conflict seems to be cyclists vs walkers vs motorists where there is still a little bit of clarity required. The other noticeable thing is that the administration of the project is virtually invisible. I've been poking around for a couple of months and simply have not seen anything of what might appear to be management - the Wiki is just magically there and it works. The mailing lists are the model of civility (in the real sense of the word!). People and companies are producing tests and checks to validate the quality of the mapping, and even over a couple of months you can see the end product getting more refined.

Has anyone else any involvements in wikis that really work and are producing measurable quality output? What are their defining characteristics?

[jayvdb]

I'd like to think that Wikisource is a wiki which "works", and Open Library is no different. I think the key ingredient is a well defined scope, which is the anti-thesis of Wikipedia.

However all these small collaborative projects have the advantage of being young and/or small; many of them will likely develop the same problems as English Wikipedia if they allow their community to grow to the same size. Administrators are more responsible when they have the time to properly consider each issue rather than allow them to fester, or allow someone who has a vested interest to push it under a rug.

As a result, I think English Wikipedia needs to be split into smaller projects, and/or become a distributed system.

[CharlotteWebb]

As a result, I think English Wikipedia needs to be split into smaller projects, and/or become a distributed system.

Given the current feudal system of wiki-projects (each able to set their own insular style guides and inclusion standards) that scenario already exists to some extent.

I'm not sure what you'd gain by balkanizing article groups further and onto separate wikis. In fact it seems to me as the software is currently designed this likely would involve duplicating content which doesn't fit cleanly into a particular discipline, while making navigation and linking more difficult and article histories impossible to follow with the same page(s) evolving in several places concurrently.

I suppose if one improves (re-writes?) the software to more seamlessly integrate the positive aspects of a wiki and address certain logistical issues, the prospect of splitting wikipedia into wikisports.org, wikiroads.org, wikimichigan.org, wikichurchyardelegies.org, and whatever the fuck-else* might be worth an experiment. You know, stuff like cross-wiki redirects, page-moves, transclusions, link coloration (based on page existence), unified watchlists, talk-page alerts (ye olde orange banner of doom), etc... a wide variety of little things to benefit readers and editors by dissolving the barriers (well, other than language) which lead most users to contribute only to one or two projects.

But look at which "cross-wiki" "features" they have implemented instead: global blocks, global user-rights, global blacklisting, etc. which only benefit stewards, (cough cough) lifeguards, and traffic cops while keeping The Man's foot lodged firmly in your ass wherever you roam.

Okay, so maybe I've jumped to undue conclusions here. Obviously I'd be interested to hear more about what you actually meant. Start a new thread if necessary.





* Yes, perhaps following an lang.foobar.wikipedia.org pattern would be saner... you'd probably have a huge "misc" or "impossible to categorize" section and/or a bunch of tiny ones in any case.

This post has been edited by CharlotteWebb: Thu 10th June 2010, 4:03am

[jayvdb]

As a result, I think English Wikipedia needs to be split into smaller projects, and/or become a distributed system.

Given the current feudal system of wiki-projects (each able to set their own insular style guides and inclusion standards) that scenario already exists to some extent.

The missing component is that the admins are not restricted to a WikiProject, which means that there is one governance model for the entire project, and that governance model is a mess. Smaller projects would have different governance models, tailored towards their content matter and contributor base.

In a proper distributed system, each page could have concurrent lines of development occurring on different projects, and in practise each project would develop rules and guidelines to assist in making that manageable.

To break free of the current model, the simplest approach would be to have one central wiki which is 'integration only - no content development'. Several well defined projects would be started, such as a BLP project, and a "current events" project, and the "current" en.wp project would become a 'miscellaneous' project for the rest (like you suggest). Once that stablises, well developed WikiProjects would break away.

[CharlotteWebb]

The missing component is that the admins are not restricted to a WikiProject, which means that there is one governance model for the entire project, and that governance model is a mess. Smaller projects would have different governance models, tailored towards their content matter and contributor base.

Stop, fief:
You might notice a more typical admin laments being restricted to one wiki, and that their lack of authoriteh when pursuing opponents onto other WMF sites, or in isolated cases the whole internet.

In a proper distributed system, each page could have concurrent lines of development occurring on different projects, and in practise each project would develop rules and guidelines to assist in making that manageable.

Would that effectively mean one article about Reagan as an actor, and one about him as a politician? Solomon-like wisdom, I'd daresay.

To break free of the current model, the simplest approach would be to have one central wiki which is 'integration only - no content development'. Several well defined projects would be started, such as a BLP project, and a "current events" project, and the "current" en.wp project would become a 'miscellaneous' project for the rest (like you suggest). Once that stablises, well developed WikiProjects would break away.

Interesting choices as both wiki-projects (sorry, project-wikis) would be feeding content steadily back into the main heap as time progresses. I suppose the "integration only" wiki would consist mostly of redirects to other projects, to maintain consistent and predictable urls (which probably means they'd need to be updated automatically and immune to "RFD" or whatever fucked up bureaucracy spawns to replace it).