[WikiEN-l] Wikipedia hits the big time

Wed Mar 16 15:18:20 UTC 2005

Ed Poor wrote

>I think we're finally beginning to be taken seriously. We have half a
million articles, and we're approaching the level of respectability
which Encyclopedia Britannica labored for centuries to achieve.

>The question is, where do we go from here?

Good question.  Obviously a million articles on wiki-en in a couple of years 
time is within reach.  That now would 'merely' consolidate WP in English; 
the versions in other languages are coming on fast (especially the German). 
Getting it all interwikied might look like busy-work, but would surely be an 
outstanding cross-language project, historically speaking.

>Larry Sanger left the project
for a mix of reasons, but SOME of them made sense (at least to me). We
never resolved the tension between:

A) Anyone can edit any article, any time; and,
B) People can count on every article to be accurate and fair.

Well, I think the project opted for A.  We can never have quite enough folks 
to give warranties for B.  The next best thing is to have thousands of 
Wikipedians editing, and A has turned out to be (unexpectedly) good at 
making WP a popular place.

>I was approached by the director of a foundation (with a multi-million
dollar budget) to create a fork of Wikipedia leading to a print edition
to be published no later than 2008. If I do this, maybe it will get me
out of your hair? (The Cunctator wrote, "Rinse, wash, repeat.") But I
worry whether a fork is the best approach, or even necessary at all.

I wrote a few days ago that some sort of tipping point would be reached.  I 
personally feel that this is also part of the WP model - what one could 
expect of a successful attempt to make commoditised knowledge open-source. 
I for one will lose little sleep over this.  I think the WP communities are 
probably less schismatic, over content, than one might fear.  But time alone 
will tell.

Charles 