I recently attended a presentation on social media given by Anthony Bradley of Gartner Research. I thought he gave an excellent presentation. Interestingly, he did not describe Wikipedia as an "online encyclopedia." The description he used was, "documentation encyclopedia." Anyway, he stated that a successful social media system/forum must have a formal and clear purpose statement written before it is launched. He listed seven principles that are necessary for a good, purpose-oriented roadmap for a social media:

1. magnetic
2. aligned
3. appropriate scope
4. promotes evolution
5. low risk
6. measurable
7. community-driven

He emphasized that social media's administration must carefully apply governance to guide and promote desired behaviors by the media's users.

In my opinion, Wikipedia is fulfilling principles 1, 3, 4, 5, and 7. I'm not sure how aligned Wikipedia is with the Foundation's mission, because I'm not sure that the Foundation has a logical mission statement. Also, I don't see Wikipedia's administration trying to measure progress of key deliverables such as article quality, user behavior issues, etc. Size and numbers of articles and account creations are, of course measured, but I don't know how useful those measures are. Of course, I think Wikipedia is sorely lacking in the "carefully applied governance" department, which I think could well be Wikipedia's ultimate undoing. Thoughts?

It looks like you've spent too much time hanging around Wikipedia to know the meaning of words like “appropriate”, “community”, and “evolution” anymore.

As for magnets, they're both attractive and repulsive, so you may be half right there.

That leaves “low risk” …

So let our pending criticism be — “low risk to whom?”

Pin that address on your map and you'll know the road that WP is paving.

Jon

1. Initially, WP attracted people who were sincerely interested in writing authentic articles of an encyclopedic nature. But it also drew an increasing number of participants who had other motives, including promoting political, business, religious, or personal causes, as well as those who participate just for lulz and drama.

2. While WMF has a mission statement, WP does not. Even if the mission seems obvious, it should be expressed in a succinct mission statement.

3. The scope of WP is problematic, partly because of the lack of clarity over breadth of coverage (the so-called inclusionist vs exclustionist battle) as well as depth. Many articles run to wretched excess on trivial subjects. Others are missing entirely or are only useless stubs.

4. WP is about as far from Peter Senge's model of a Learning Organization as one can find in a large site putatively oriented to education.

5. Participation in WP is among the highest risk adventures one can find on the Internet.

6. Accuracy, excellence and ethics are measurable parameters. You be the judge.

7. What is the difference between "community-driven" and an ad hoc ochlocracy?

As I already said in a slightly more e-soteric forum …