[WikiEN-l] Re: WikiEN-l Digest, Vol 21, Issue 43

Tue Apr 12 16:29:34 UTC 2005

Seth Ilys wrote:

>We're a wiki. Why mess with success?
>  
>
Interesting definition of success you have.

"A lot of stuff works most of the time" isn't success for a reference.

A metaphorical analogy:  Wikipedia isn't an encyclopedia, it's a city 
with large, unbroken walls on which the grafitti artists are encouraged 
to stick to the facts; and then the little old ladies having lunch and 
discussing how wonderful the idea is are surprised when the grafitti 
artists don't stick to the facts.

There's no way to stop the vandalism if you don't institute some sort of 
security measure to preempt it.  And since the latter is not a design 
feature of wikipedia, vandalism will always be a part of the system, and 
this "graffitopedia" will always have a percentage of uselessness noise 
on its walls.

And while you're tut-tutting a little vandalism, POV and fallacy are 
polluting the majority of the pages.

--Blair