[Wikipedia-l] Waiting for 1.0

Fri Jul 16 19:31:45 UTC 2004

Magnus Manske wrote:

> Since Jimbo has announced the "move to 1.0" some month ago, not much 
> has happened. Meanwhile, the tone of the press concerning wikipedia 
> seems to be slowly drifting from "interesting, lots of potential" to 
> "source of unreliable information". There's the "single printed 
> volume" deal waiting in the wings, and Mandrake Linux would be 
> interested in a wikipedia-on-DVD.
>
> Since there seems to be long-standing consensus that wikipedia needs 
> some form of review (as an additional option, *not* as a replacement 
> for the wiki way!), I would very much like the discussion about the 
> "how" to start again, and to reach a clonclusion this time, for a 
> change :-) 

Hmm! "Clonclusion" = "conclusion" or "clone-clusion". :-)

> It seems to me that most of you would agree to a method similar to this:
> * A (logged-in) user can approve a single version of an article.
> * At least two approvals are needed for the "wikipedia seal of 
> approval" :-) 

I really don't see approvals as being the serious bottleneck.  The 
difficulty seems to be in transition between talking about something and 
doing something about it. 

> Now, the rapid change of wikipedia articles unveils this problem:
> * Does the second approval need to be for the *same version* as the 
> first, or can it be for a later one, which then gets the "seal of 
> approval"? 

It should be essentially for the same one, except for corrections of 
minor spelling errors or typos.

> Also, given the different goals of an approval system, should there be
> * one approval only
> * one approval for "web version", one for "CD-ROM version", one for 
> "printed version (single volume)", one for "printed version (30 
> voulmes)", etc. 

The existing Wikipedia should be the "web version".
The same approval should cover the CD-ROM and single volume versions.
We should not be giving serious consideration to the 30 volume version 
until we have developed experience with the single volume version

> Also, should there be
> * yes/no approval(s)
> * or rather a rating (0-9 or something) 

The numerical rating has much merit. and an average rating can be 
generated as a composite of these.

Making the 1.0 "print ready" requires making some tough choices based on 
more than a higgledy-piggledy random assortment of approved articles.  I 
start from the premise that a 1.0 will eventually be followed by a 2.0.  
That means that we don't need to expect perfection in 1.0, nor do we 
need to cover absolutely every subject in Wikipedia, even if we already 
have some excellent articles in a subject.  We would put our best foot 
forward by starting with those subject areas that are our best.

We probably also need a timetable for getting 1.0 out, and deadlines 
that need to be met.  Perhaps we need a production oriented 1.0 
committee, that can be decisive in its actions.  A subsequent 1.1 
committee (perhaps with different members) will be there in the wings 
for the next step.

Ec