Jon wrote:
A number of comments:
1. If the aim is to provide multimedia learning materials for all age
groups, not just university-level, then Wikiversity is a very bad name.
Go for another one - Wikilearning, Wikicollege, Wikischool, something
else. Just something which does not automatically imply that it is just
for university-level learning. Otherwise, you will put off a lot of your
target audience just with the name. Seriously. Give a dog a bad name...
well, you know the rest.
I know that you have another intention with the name Wikiversity, and
this isn't quite the idea you had in mind for that term. Still, the
Wikiversity concept as outlined is something that has played out for
some time on Wikibooks, and means a great many things to many people. I
could go into root words for university as well to demonstrate that
being a university does not necessarily have to be adult learning alone,
nor does it have to stick with traditional topics that are usually
associated with college environments.
2. Do bear in mind that Wikibooks does use multimedia
already -
at least in terms of audio files - and will wish to continue to do so. Some
textbooks already have exercises and Q&As. If these can be made
more dynamic on Wikibooks in the future, then I'm sure they will. Audio
textbooks also, to my mind, fall within Wikibooks' domain. It's not
clear to me whether the Wikiversity proposal seeks to dilute effort
on these elements of textbooks, or not.
Honestly it looks like this proposal is going to focus Wikibooks more
into the textbook-only project that you have been advocating lately, not
less. I would have to agree, however, that there does need to be some
sort of distinction for book-like content that would appear on Wikibooks
and what other kinds of content would be more exclusive to Wikiversity.
3. The aims Cormac lists for Wikiversity do not appear
to agree with
Michael Irwin's aims for Wikiversity. If the scope is not clear amongst
the potential initial participants, it sure won't be clear amongst potential
students.
Just read the proposal. Mr. Irwin has been given plenty of input in the
process as well, and I anticipate that he will be adding much more to
the proposal with this public comment period. I would even dare say
that I have yet to find even two people that agree 100% on what
Wikiversity really ought to be, although there have been some common themes.
4. Wikiversity seems very ambitious (more ambitious than Wikibooks, and
Wikibooks, to date, has not yet delivered as much as we would wish). It's
fair to ask - however noble the ideas- why you think they will work.
Kind regards
Jon
I could say the same thing about a great many things, including Linux,
and even Wikipedia. This is trying to suggest that a project that is
just starting out is doomed to failure simply because it isn't already a
complete idea with finished results. Clearly Wikiversity is going to be
an experiment with a wide range of activities, and it will be
interesting to see what will happen.
One thing that I think admins/moderators on Wikiversity is going to have
to deal with are issues related to explosive growth of its user base. I
would anticipate even more active editor/contributors on Wikiversity
than currently exist on Wikibooks right now in less than six months, and
perhaps even more if for only the reason that Wikiversity is going to
get hammered with publicity when it is "turned on". There are a number
of Wikimedia users that are interested in the concept, and have been
cooled off by trying to contribute to the Wikibooks demonstration
project in part because they see that it might be deleted and their
efforts wasted. By being an independent project, many of these
contributors are going to flock to Wikiversity... especially in the
initial policy debating period as well when they have to sit down and
figure out what the standards should be with some actual content to
reflect against. In this regard, I think Wikiversity will be much more
successful than Wikibooks, not less so.
--
Robert Scott Horning