"Wikipedia founder shot dead, according to Wikipedia"

[Newsfeed]

This meme 'Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales has been shot dead, according to Wikipedia' survives 12 years later.

[Smiley]

That Haaretz piece is behind a paywall but looks rather intriguing.

Why Jimmy Wales' WikiTribune Won't Save the News

"News that Jimmy Wales is extending the Wiki model into digital journalism with Wikitribune ignores his site’s role in creating the same phenomena it now wishes to fight"

Mods: Merge with the Wikitribune thread?

[Smiley]

Wow.

Similar initiatives in the past have failed, but there is a larger underlying issue with this particular project: That the crowdsourced logic of Wikipedia is complicit in creating the conditions in which fake news first arose.

It is easy to forget that when it launched at the beginning of 2001, the crowdsourced encyclopedia was the primary example of so-called “post-truth,” with critics decrying the idea that masses of anonymous users would decide what is true or false. And though many articles on the English-language version of Wikipedia are considered a generally reliable source today, the history of Wikipedia’s success is a history of how its model of truth gained legitimacy at the expense of classic authoritative sources, from scientists to respected media outlets. Some of the very same outlets that Wikitribune is now out to fix.

Before founding Wikipedia, Wales’ first incursion into the online world was the administration of an online forum dedicated to the radical libertarian thought of Ayn Rand. Wales – or Jimbo, as he is known in the Wikipedia community – even describes himself as a libertarian, and has openly linked his political and economic outlook with Wikipedia.

Wales is sometimes called the “benevolent dictator” because of his famous reluctance to intervene in anything content-related on the site. Wikipedia co-founder Larry Sanger even left the project after Wales refused to step in during the so-called “edit wars” and impose restrictions on the creation of content on the site.

Indeed, one can even claim that Wikipedia is an example of a libertarian model of truth, according to which what is true is what the open market of ideas can agree on being true. According to this outlook, the role of the site’s administrators is to let the market run its course.

This model of truth – which places authority in the open marketplace of ideas – is a radical break with the more classic, expert-based model of truth, and has it roots in both Wales’ ideology and Wikipedia’s lesser-known predecessor, Nupedia.
Wales and Sanger initially wanted their encyclopedia to be based on academic experts, and Nupedia’s first iteration was supposed to have academics contribute and peer review content for free. However, the site failed to gain editors and, thus, Wikipedia was born as a free alternative. While Nupedia only managed to publish about 20 articles in its first year, Wikipedia managed 200. Experts, the Wikipedia founders learned, were not the way to go.

So Wikipedia embraced what is called the “procrastination principle,” according to which any content change to the site would go live automatically, even if it was made by an anonymous user, and the Wikipedia community, not the site’s management, would fix false content. In other words, Wikipedia’s growth is built on allowing errors onto the site, with the hope of attracting others to fix them. This is an example of what the web calls Cunningham’s Law, according to which “the best way to get the right answer on the internet is not to ask a question, it’s to post the wrong answer.”

The general lack of restrictions on Wikipedia has allowed the site to grow to millions of articles. But it has also turned Wikipedia into a extremely inclusive – if not promiscuous – encyclopedia, where different, at times contradictory, articles live side by side.

And though Wikipedia is run by a nonprofit, Wales does profit from the diffusion of the Wikipedia model that followed the site’s success, both ideologically and economically. An interesting example of this is Wikia, a for-profit site owned by Wales and allowing anyone to open their own version of Wikipedia for any field or topic, creating a proliferation of Wiki-style sites for everything from fan fiction to political movements – and yes, to news as well.

In a sense, the prevalence of Wiki-type sites is what makes Wikipedia so well suited to being the encyclopedia for the “post-truth” world: an encyclopedia where multiple narratives of truth can exist, as long as the free market of ideas (or “community” in Wikipedia parlance) can agree on them.

All this casts Wales’ idea of objective fact-checking in a somewhat ideological light, because though Wikipedia does not have a business model, it does have an implicit ideological model.

As one online user of the slashdot forum noted: “Oh good. I want Jimmy Wales to be in charge of what I’m told is true and what is false. It is not like people would ever lie about stuff like that for political agendas. I’ll trust Jimmy’s politics over my own common sense.”

Does anyone here know Omer Benjakob? Editor at Haaretz and currently writing an M.A. thesis on Wikipedia and science

[Kingsindian]

Tarantino linked the piece in the thread here. I agree that it's a good piece, as I said at the time. There's another thread about the Hebrew Wikipedia about another piece by the same author.

[Smiley]

Tarantino linked the piece in the thread here. I agree that it's a good piece, as I said at the time. There's another thread about the Hebrew Wikipedia about another piece by the same author.

Ah right. Thanks, I missed that. Did anyone reach out to Omer?

[thekohser]

Tarantino linked the piece in the thread here. I agree that it's a good piece, as I said at the time. There's another thread about the Hebrew Wikipedia about another piece by the same author.

Ah right. Thanks, I missed that. Did anyone reach out to Omer?

He was also mentioned here. The Wikipediocracy Twitter account just tweeted to Omer.

[Graaf Statler]

I hope you have a very, very good alibi, Kohs.

It is getting ridiculous, a few people with the mind of a child five years old who are playing they are writing a encyclopedia, and how are openly filling there pockets. And the whole world is looking in admiration to them. It's one big farce. And every day I am wondering what the press is doing, I think reading Wikipedia for there new articles. Or sleeping in there warm beds in there newsrooms, also possible.

[Randy from Boise]

I hope you have a very, very good alibi, Kohs.

It is getting ridiculous, a few people with the mind of a child five years old who are playing they are writing a encyclopedia, and how are openly filling their pockets. And the whole world is looking in admiration to them. It's one big farce. And every day I am wondering what the press is doing, I think reading Wikipedia for their new articles. Or sleeping in their warm beds in their newsrooms, also possible.

Every journalist in America (except perhaps Dan Murphy) makes use of Wikipedia during the course of their work. It is unavoidable, even if one wanted to avoid it, but more than that — it is convenient and useful and more or less accurate. A journalist doing background research is more than willing to trade a little accuracy for a lot of speed and convenience, and that is the devil's bargain that is WP.

I don't think the people who are actively writing the encyclopedia are the same ones who are "openly filling their pockets." There are a few petty grifters, to be sure, but the big funds transfers come in the form of paychecks to WMF worthies and their underlings.

You are right about WP having very solid and improving cachet with the public. Your comment about only a "few" people being involved with writing and maintaining WP is objectively disprovable (linkhttps://stats.wikimedia.org/EN/TablesWi ... sGt100.htm[/link]); the cheap shot about our mental capacities is too absurd to merit comment.

RfB

[Graaf Statler]

I hope you have a very, very good alibi, Kohs.

It is getting ridiculous, a few people with the mind of a child five years old who are playing they are writing a encyclopedia, and how are openly filling their pockets. And the whole world is looking in admiration to them. It's one big farce. And every day I am wondering what the press is doing, I think reading Wikipedia for their new articles. Or sleeping in their warm beds in their newsrooms, also possible.

Every journalist in America (except perhaps Dan Murphy) makes use of Wikipedia during the course of their work. It is unavoidable, even if one wanted to avoid it, but more than that — it is convenient and useful and more or less accurate. A journalist doing background research is more than willing to trade a little accuracy for a lot of speed and convenience, and that is the devil's bargain that is WP.

I don't think the people who are actively writing the encyclopedia are the same ones who are "openly filling their pockets." There are a few petty grifters, to be sure, but the big funds transfers come in the form of paychecks to WMF worthies and their underlings.

You are right about WP having very solid and improving cachet with the public. Your comment about only a "few" people being involved with writing and maintaining WP is objectively disprovable (linkhttps://stats.wikimedia.org/EN/TablesWi ... sGt100.htm[/link]); the cheap shot about our mental capacities is too absurd to merit comment.

RfB

You make the huge mistake, a mistake many many editors from WP-En make. Wikipedia is so much bigger than you think, there are so many chapters and Wiki's. In no way you can compare the Dutch WP with the English, German. If you are talking about Wikipedia you are talking about WP-EN, when I am talking about WP I am talking about WP-NL. And the situation I describe, is the situation on WP-NL. A Wikipedia what has died. And what is left fits perfect in my description. And chart etc are nonsens, because it's about what someone is doing on WP. Not how many edits someone makes. Counting numbers is so wrong... So your shot was cheap, not mine.

[Johnny Au]

I hope you have a very, very good alibi, Kohs.

It is getting ridiculous, a few people with the mind of a child five years old who are playing they are writing a encyclopedia, and how are openly filling their pockets. And the whole world is looking in admiration to them. It's one big farce. And every day I am wondering what the press is doing, I think reading Wikipedia for their new articles. Or sleeping in their warm beds in their newsrooms, also possible.

Every journalist in America (except perhaps Dan Murphy) makes use of Wikipedia during the course of their work. It is unavoidable, even if one wanted to avoid it, but more than that — it is convenient and useful and more or less accurate. A journalist doing background research is more than willing to trade a little accuracy for a lot of speed and convenience, and that is the devil's bargain that is WP.

I don't think the people who are actively writing the encyclopedia are the same ones who are "openly filling their pockets." There are a few petty grifters, to be sure, but the big funds transfers come in the form of paychecks to WMF worthies and their underlings.

You are right about WP having very solid and improving cachet with the public. Your comment about only a "few" people being involved with writing and maintaining WP is objectively disprovable (linkhttps://stats.wikimedia.org/EN/TablesWi ... sGt100.htm[/link]); the cheap shot about our mental capacities is too absurd to merit comment.

RfB

Half of the time, when one uses Google as a verb, they actually meant read on Wikipedia. Why? Often, Wikipedia shows up on the first page of results (and sometimes shows up as the first result).

[Graaf Statler]

And sometimes there is no other information. In the huge euro crisis I was almost the only person in Holland who understood what was going on. Why? Because I was guest from 2011 on the blog of Varoufakis, so I new who were the key players, and I am always watching the Greek news on television, to practice my Greek. There was simple no information at that moment! And because of that the Wikipedia article (written by me) was often the only thing they found, and everything changed in a very quick because of the chaos Varoufakis made in a short time. But to be honest, at the end I was thinking, why should I work for nothing, I was only scolded by Wikimedia-NL members, they were partying and I was working (it was in the time Wikipedia got the Erasmus price), why am I doing this for free.

[Earthy Astringent]

What is brain dead, cannot die.

[Poetlister]

index.jpg

Jimbo is well able to defend himself.

[The Adversary]

That Haaretz piece is behind a paywall but looks rather intriguing.

The print version isn't behind a paywall, though.

And don't feel too sorry about Jimmy W., remember, he also became Prince of Wales before he was " shot dead."

[Soldado Sin Nombre]

index.jpg

Jimbo is well able to defend himself.

Yet another diminutive in stature man-boy who has a thing for guns. The Outlaw Jimmy Wales.

[Poetlister]

Yet another diminutive in stature man-boy who has a thing for guns. The Outlaw Jimmy Wales.

If you had Mr Kohs running after you with a rifle, wouldn't you want to take precautions?

[thekohser]

That Haaretz piece is behind a paywall but looks rather intriguing.

The print version isn't behind a paywall, though.

That print version trick is pretty damn nifty, TA -- thanks! (How did you learn to do that? Does it work on all Haaretz articles? Does it work on other news sites?)

[Earthy Astringent]

Search for an article title in twitter. Almost always works.