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Attached is a Sydney morning herald article on the pros and cons of Wikipedia. the main points listed on the con side are all related to loss of power of 'professional' vested interests. Considering where these professions have taken us a reduction in their power and an appeal to the common sense of the amateur is a good thing. Maybe itulip should get some of their intellectual positions up on wikipedia and they can be updated as the discussion on itulip evolves.
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Re: By the people: Wikipaedia
I like and use Wikipedia, but I also never forget that any info from there is manipulable.
The same opinion of Google - so long as the information sought is not monetizable by anyone, then it has some measure of reliability.
As soon as - and it is already beginning - Wiki starts getting on the corporate IR radar you will start seeing significant long term distortions of data by professional Wiki modifiers.
It happened with print, with radio, and with most other forms of media and will happen with these 'open' initiatives.
Television never had its open era. -
Re: By the people: Wikipaedia
Three threads that perhaps are relevant to your comment on "professionalism"
Disciplined Minds
Radio Reading of Disciplined Minds
and
POWER and Powerlessness - by Susan Rosenthal MDComment
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Re: By the people: Wikipaedia
A good book, that disciplined minds.
Wikipedia is anarchism working: discuss.It's Economics vs Thermodynamics. Thermodynamics wins.Comment
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Re: By the people: Wikipaedia
rajiv, i'm still trying to get to having a proper look at the alternative monetary systems you posted, I'll put this book on my list too!
I've read a fair bit of karl Popper's book Open Society and Its enemies. It basically outlines how philosophy and education systems based on it have been hijacked by vested interests to promote centralisation of power. From Plato through to Hegel the undercurrent of these 'great' men's philosphies have been to justify aristocracy and slavery in Plato's case of which he was a member of the former and the prussian monarchy/feudalism in hegels case who were his employers. the church and the higher education system have all supported such views as they justify concentration of power in the hands of a few in contral of powerful institutions.
Popper's arguement is that the primary role of the institution should be to promote freedom of thought etc with the freedom of harming others the only freedom to be illlegal. Obviously prone to rules that protect harm from occurring impinging on freedoms, so i think you just have to accept the possibility of crazies, ala terrorists, and deal with events as they occur, which will be far fewer and less destructive if there was less control in the first place.
*T*, yeah I think anarchism is the ultimate goal, but we'd have to be a seriously enlightened bunch to achieve it, so I'm not up for it yet. But I agree Wikipedia is a very encouraging pointer to what could be.Comment
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Re: By the people: Wikipaedia
In real live institutions however, things may be quite different -- that is the thesis of disciplined mindsOriginally posted by marvenger View PostComment
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Re: By the people: Wikipaedia
yep agreed its quite a leap of imagination to envisage institutions operating as Popper suggests. But as with Wikipedia if they're operating on eliminating the obviously negative and building up the positive you end up with a pretty good outcome. It all comes down to whether these institutions can be bought.Comment
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Re: By the people: Wikipaedia
M,
The constituents of the institutions don't have to be outrightly bribed.
Besides the natural tendency of the politicians/beancounters to rise to the top in any bureaucracy, there is also the finance angle.
Simply by financing those with favorable views, that is enough to skew the 'impartial' nature of academia.
That this has been more blatant recently (30 years) is simply an outcome of psychological biasing via implementation of Freudian techniques a la 'Century of the Mind'Comment
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Re: By the people: Wikipaedia
i categorise financing under bought. Maybe I need to be more explicit.Comment
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