Flash !!!

• Larry Sanger, "Our First Press Release", Citizendium List, 17 Oct 2006

Jonny

http://www.citizendium.org/release_001.html



Quite a high goal...I think there's a problem in that simply because there's a lot of basic maintenence to do...and a general question on that topic: If they're using the full database, that would include userpages as well as articles, would it not?

If it were my project, I'd want to fix all I could before even putting it online. Start with a clean and accurate slate, so to speak.

Presumably it's easy enough to do a mass-delete of User pages and Wikipedia pages.

Most of the talk pages could probably go too, though there is some good stuff on some of them.

Their current thinking on what they are taking and what they are leaving is here:

• Citizendium Pilot Planning Wiki : What Wikipedia Data Should We Import?

Jonny

Nothing has altered my opinion that Citizendium will fail. As for abuse, all that will happen is you'll know their name (or think you'll know their name)

What's a poor boy to do? I feel so torn about it. Part of me hopes for Citizendium to work out, and I'll help where I can, as I have come to feel that there is something positively rotten at the core of Wikiputrescence. On the other hand, not everybody is of the frame of mind that can regard honest critique as "help" -- certainly that was anathema to the Wikipowerbloc. On the the 3rd hand, I keep getting this sense of "trying the same thing and expecting a different result" -- is that them, or is that just me?

Ah well ...

Jonny

I am waiting for citizendiumreview.com

Moi? I'm thinking we should change our name to WickerRevue and take up some other form of basquetweaving altogether.

Jonny

I wish Citizendium could be a great general-purpose free encyclopedia. Unfortunately the weak link is Larry Sanger and what Sanger wants. WTF is wrong with categories or portals? Is an episode description of Babylon 5 on the same footing as an account of the Battle of the Somme? Or a list of porn stars equivalent to an 80's Scandinavian metal band that lasted four months and produced one album?

But who's going to tell him?

Sanger's decisions right now will cause Citizendium to wither and die. He doesn't understand the web and he has no idea what motivates a large group of people to contribute to an encyclopedia essentially for free.

wikitruth.info (whoever they are) think Mediawiki is wonderful, but I think that most of Wikipedia's problems stem from Mediawiki and the inability of developers to enable proper review, prevent abuse, increase ownership, promote feedback and delegate responsibility. Instead its a First Person Shoot-em-up of World History, where the most organized team will outgun any single peon who stumbles in.

If there were a little bit of money available, I'd take a Wikifork, pare it back to the useful and the essential (perhaps 10%) and then implement a proper review procedure and extra bits that would encourage scholarship and participation and piss off trolls. And I'd make money doing it.

For some reason Sanger doesn't like the idea of money. Maybe it makes him feel dirty.

Good point - I haven't kept track of this, but I can't see how it could ever be possible to completely solve the problem of people using real-sounding names that are fake, unless CZ is prepared to set up teams of private investigators to do background checks on everybody. I'm sure that would make 'em really popular...

In theory, though, they could come fairly close by doing a web search on each person, in combination with a personal e-mail whose address is associated with that person on their personal website, assuming they have one... That would still be a ton of eyeball work, though, and not too enjoyable, either.

Still, I would guess that verifiable real names might help curb abusive behavior, at least in some cases. Half, if they're lucky. I doubt it would help curb POV pushing all that much, especially when less-popular (or simply unpopular) viewpoints are being quashed. Edit/revert warring is probably a function of maturity and temperament more than anything else, so it's hard to tell if there'll be any difference on that score...

Conceivably, an editor (expert or otherwise) being especially abusive might actually trigger further investigation of that person's name, since logically one would assume that anonymity would have the same effect on personal behavior there that it has on Wikipedia (see GIFT).

Presumably you meant decrease ownership, assuming you were referring to ownership of articles...!

But you're right, the software could be used much more effectively for applying policy more easily, or encouraging responsible user behavior, or preventing user misbehavior, than it is now. Jimbo & Co. have become increasingly delusional about the ability of the community to police itself, or even promote civility, despite the lip service they constantly pay to those concepts. It's just too big for that now...

So, what worries me about Citizendium is that everything will work out just fine at first, given the smaller size of the community... Early adopters may or may not be most likely to be POV-pushers, but as long as there are relatively few of them, they'll probably get along quite well. But once the community grows past the point at which any one person can even conceive of it, they'll fall into the same trap as WP.

What they really need, IMO, is to enhance MediaWiki so as to make it possible to subdivide the community by topic area, pretty much at will. When one topic area gets too big, subdivide it some more. Never have more than 100 people in any one area at a time, give or take... I'm sure there's been some discussion of that, but so far there doesn't seem to be any decision on it - and it would be a fairly substantial change to the software, of course.

Not a trivial matter!

No, I meant what I said. With a share of the ownership comes pride in achievement. Part of the problem of Wikipedia is that nobody owns anything, which means it can be shat upon from a great height and nobody cares as long as there's a consensus (meaning whatever most admins believe)



I do have a system in mind that would achieve precisely that, by encouraging good scholarship (and rewarding it) and having a near automated system that demerits bad scholarship, trolling and anti-social behavior by anybody



It doesn't matter because the biases and weaknesses of Citizendium are Larry Sanger's own biases and weaknesses. Consider William Connelley who has setup a virtual fiefdom over climate science on Wikipedia. What's to stop him doing the same on Citizendium? Nothing at all. He's supposed to be an expert, but his real art is deleting anything he doesn't like that does not fit his very narrow political POV.



Yes. The ability to categorize in a meaningful way is a key characteristic of a good encyclopedia, otherwise how do you search it? It will be like Google.

Well, lots of folks are telling him -- you might as well, too. The topic of Offensive Content is currently the top topic by number of replies in the Citizendium Forums:

• Citizendium Forums : Offensive Content

Jonny

A few bits of random chronons from Slashdot:

• The Early History of Nupedia and Wikipedia, Part 1
• The Early History of Nupedia and Wikipedia, Part 2

Jonny

Dateline Citizendia, 20 Oct 2006 --

Haukur Þorgeirsson, "Publisher vs. Service Provider"

For the sake of us eternally legally challenged on the Citizendium List, maybe Daniel Brandt could help us sort out this particular briar patch one more time?

Gratia in futuro,

Jonny

This posting links to the infamous interview by Andy Peters with Brad Patrick, in which he states, "We view individual editors as responsible and have prominently displayed on every edit page that individuals are responsible for their own contributions." The latter half of that statement is, of course, completely untrue, and the first half is pure hearsay, since whatever wording that claims the user is legally responsible for content is buried so deep in the maze of policies, half-policies, and "guidelines," nobody but the most diehard Wikipedians could ever possibly have read any of it.

The topic where we originally discussed that is here:

http://wikipediareview.com/index.php?showtopic=3426

But what it all boils down to is this: Wikipedia is run by a foundation whose paid and unpaid agents produce, delete, change, and influence content. It also assists in protecting the identities of its unpaid agents who wish to remain anonymous. The idea that Wikimedia Foundation would be seen as a "service provider" by a US judge, even in Florida, is absurd. And if a lawsuit manages to succeed in obtaining the right to damages gathered from anonymous editors, Wikimedia Foundation will be forced to give up any data they may have on those editors' identities, and if they refuse, they'll be held in contempt. And the editors in question may also be subject to civil penalties.

Of course, they could probably solve this problem very neatly, and quickly, by implementing an opt-out policy. They'll probably be forced to eventually anyway, so their recalcitrance in this regard borders on being plain stupid, not to mention totally irresponsible.

More news -- yawn --

http://blog.citizendium.org/

More importantly, why don't we have an emoticon for yawn?

Yawny Cache

Larry's Latest Links

• Call for Applications to Participate in the Citizendium Pilot Project
• The Citizendium's Statement of Fundamental Policies
• Citizendium Policy Outline

And just in case you thought I was kidding about the loyalty oath:


Stay tuned -- In or Out I leave it up to you --

Jonny

Great news! It is great to have an alternative, and one which seems to support the concept of Wikipedia Review too.

Is Johnny Cache = Larry Sanger?

Huh ???

Jonny

PS. I know how you feel, though. On my more Wikiparanoid days, my personal suspicion is that Larry Sanger = SlimVirgin.

The JAWNY Report : Just Another Wiki News Yawn

A Rolling Stone Does Gather MoS, Says Sisyphus

For Wikipedia Watchers who can't get enough of Feature Article and Manual of Style discussions, or if you miss those endless discussions at DMOZ about how to make Categories mutually exclusive, there's a new pusher in town to feed your need:

• Citizendium Editors Discussion List

E-joy !!!

Jonny

The Plot Sickens ...

Wikipedia Weekly (09 Nov 2006), "Citizendium Launches", Interview with Larry Sanger


Sorry, I just lost my launch ...

Jonny Ipecache

From the Trans-Crypt-Keeper ...

Transcript of the Wikipedia Weekly

Now that's scary !!!

Jonny

At Least The Pretense Is Ended Now
Well, One Of The Pretenses Is Ended Now

After a straw poll of the sort that will be familiar to Wikipedia veterans, the Citizendium List has just been reduced to an Announcements List, like it hadn't already become that on a de facto basis due to the heavy-but-slow-handed moderation:

• Phil Wardle (Moderator), "Voting Results", Citizendium List, 20 Nov 2006

Let's see, I forget -- 24 votes total out of 300+ members on the List, with 15 voting to make it an Announcements List -- is that a Consensus, or a Mandate?

Do not run for your Robot's Rules Of Order -- using words like Quorum will be lost on the Elite Crew of this Parliamental Peerage.

Jonny

Lessons In Talking Out Of Both Sides Of Your Mouth (LITOOBSOYM)

For those of you who don't get enough of that already from Wikipedia ...

Item 1. Larry Sanger, "Copyediting Standards Group", Citizendium List, 24 Dec 2006

Item 2. Larry Sanger, "Remove rule about minor edits?", Citizendium List, 24 Dec 2006


Yes, SlimVirgin, there is a Sanger Clause ...

Jonny

First there was a committee, then there was no committee, then there was ...

• Larry Sanger, "Director of Elections/Sortition", Citizendium List, 12 Jan 2007

Sortition !? -- Where's my Fictionary ??

Jonny

It's a standard term.

http://www.constitution.org/elec/sortition.htm

Thanks, I feel better educated now -- and, yes, a little bit older.

Jonny

By way of keeping up with the times — strike that, you moving finger you — keeping ahead of the times, I decided to mutate the unofficial masthead of this report to:



Stay tuned in ...
Stay turned on ...
Stay dropped out ...

Jonny

And please no jokes about Masthead Debaters ...
This means you, Elara ...