[Foundation-l] Wikiversity

Wed Aug 16 17:33:11 UTC 2006

--- Jimmy Wales <jwales at wikia.com> wrote:

> Cormac Lawler wrote:
> > The obvious question this raises is (as Elian has
> already asked):
> > "where do we draw the line?"
> 
> I think this is the wrong way to look at the
> question.  The whole point 
> of NPOV is that it is not about line drawing.  It is
> about a social 
> approach to collaboration.  We draw the line at the
> point where we have 
> consensus among virtually all reasonable people that
> the material is 
> neutral.
> 
>

I can understand NPOV when creating new materials. 
Although WV may still have the sort of problem
Wikibooks asked for guidance on regarding unethical
topics.  There may also be issues with following NPOV
as is outlined on WP, simply because lectures and
things will have time constraints and may not be able
to cover the whole "constallation of opinion" within a
course on the subject.  Still this is hopefully
nothing consensus cannot handle.

I guess the bigger issue I see with WV and bias has
more to do with the "learning communities".   I will
say first off I do not understand exactly how they
will operate.  But within these communities it seems
people will guide each other in learning.  Also I
imagine contributors here are expected to be
themselves rather than edit within the persona of
"textbook editor".  I do not see how to apply NPOV in
these learning communities.  I suppose that they could
be compared to the Talk pages at WP which no one
really worries about.  However as WV will be directing
users to these spaces as a place to learn and
encouraging the guidance type of interaction, I think
that bias here is a larger concern than on WP talk
pages.  Are other people concerned with bias in these
communities, or do I misunderstand the concept
somehow?

Birgitte SB

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