[WikiEN-l] Re: simplicity of markup and presentation

Wed Sep 3 17:09:15 UTC 2003

Bj wrote:

> I agree that unnecessary markup is... unnecessary. But there are two 
> sides of the coin, on one hand we don't want people to have to install 
> MS Frontpage (or whatever it is called) and have three years web 
> design experience. But on the other hand, most Wikipedia pages are 
> rather ugly and boring. They are like just text! I mean who wants to 
> read four pages of NPOV encyclopedic text where the most interesting 
> things are the paragraph breaks? :-)  

The choice is between information and pretty packaging.  If Wikipedia is 
going to have any long term reputation it will depend on the 
information, not the packaging.  Boring is OK.  Fixing the boring should 
not come at the expense of the primary purpose of the encyclopedia.  For 
people with slow connections pictures can be a problem.  Others who pay 
by the on-line second, both to their ISP and the telephone company, may 
not appreciate paying to download uninformative pretty pictures. 
 Furthermore, if we want to appeal to impoverished parts of the world, 
we need to take into account the fact that their services are rudimentary.

> We're modern people with attention spans measured in seconds. 

This sounds like an argument in favour of dumbing down.

> For example, take the Rambot* city pages, how much better wouldn't 
> those pages be if their information was presented in a more attractive 
> way? I have already complained about the lack of pictures, but as that 
> problem seems to be unsolvable unless someone spends a million dollars 
> on lawyers researching copyright laws, we have to find other ways to 
> make the information pretty. 

This has nothing to do with lawyers.  Perhaps on your next vacation you 
can choose an area (one county might be a convenient size), go there 
with your digital camera, take pictures of all the little towns in that 
area, and submit them to Wikipedia to illustrate those articles. 
 Problem solved.  -- and without a lawyer.

> Currently the easiest and only way to make pretty articles is to use 
> html. It has the disadvantages that it makes it harder for most 
> editors to edit articles and someday it might cause severe browser 
> incompatibilities and problems for disabled users. But isn't that a 
> problem with all new features? 

Huh?

> I'll bet someone already has asked themselve how to edit the table of 
> contents..

That's easy.  Just edit the headings.

> . So instead of letting the not so smart people be a hinderance for 
> the way of the future lets make them smarter by providing good 
> documentation and make everything as easy as possible so that everyone 
> can be happy. 

That's an outrageously elitist attitude.  The project is not about 
making people "smarter", it's about providing information.  How are 
these "not so smart people" a hinderance anyway?  If you think that 
better documentation will solve the problems you're welcome to write it. 
 That should not be difficult unless you are one of the "not so smart 
people". ;-)

Ec

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