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The ad blocking software I'd like to see would detect and zap into a heap of ash those unrelated-photo clickbait ads; I'd rather suffer through some honest banner ads anytime.

Web publishers should get together to make a "Reader's Charter" that pledges to stop clickbait and intrusive ads. It's not that complicated. Here's mine

You might be interested in this: The Sexists at the Top of Wikipedia

I'm wondering what you mean by "Search Engine"? Do you mean a way to sort and rank websites? That's only part of what Google does. You may want to identify what is missing from Google before following the models of the past.

Exactly. There is too much emphasis on the people as Wikipedia's problem, when in fact it's the software that's the problem. I write about problem of Wikipedia's software design in this blog post, and have implemented the solutions you suggest (randomizing and mixing the editors to avoid the accumulation of power) in Newslines, my crowdsourced news site.

For those wishing to catch up, I made a news timeline of the rise and fall of the site

I find your post interesting, and your points in many ways are an accurate analysis of many major problems with Wikipedia - yet I still find your point 11 ("The wiki is the problem") a non-sequitur. A wiki is in essence a model for data storage, where the expectations for interaction and data management are closer to control versioning than to the classic CRUD cycle. As such, it's a neutral tool that could be used in many other ways and improved to cover most of the current shortcomings; in particular, there's no reason why those other "practical solutions" and workflows for organizing content couldn't be built on top of a wiki-like storage layer, so the contradiction you see doesn't exist in essence.

The problems you mention are for the most part caused by the community dynamics and rules, with a few caused by the current wiki platform, rather than the wiki storage model itself.

The only point directly related to organizing things as a wiki is point 6, "Page ownership" - which is a real problem, but only exists because of the decision to build an encyclopedia where each page is an article that can be edited by anyone, not because the tool for storing the page is stored a wiki system. Every other point is caused by the project's original view as an anarchist playground which permeates all its policies, not any inherent limitation of the software.

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As for the approach taken by newslines.org, I agree that there's a need to give visibility to contributions from any user without giving the next editor in the line the possibility of removing them completely without trace; though that doesn't the benefits of a wiki.

Newslines is good for news-driven topics, but there's a need for an encyclopedia-like description of the topic, that a list of unrelated news doesn't cover; there needs to be a coherent wording that describes the highlights of the topic and how each part relates to the whole, and a wiki page covers that need. Compare the pages for Ebola at Wikipedia and at Newsline - which one would you prefer for first learning about the disease, and which one for staying up to date with recent developments? It's clear that they serve different, complementary purposes.

The wiki gives power to some users who are vocal about having that power removed. Unfortunately, those who are used to the "the wiki way" can see few other ways to organize content. To them, everything must be done on a wiki, whether that is the most appropriate tool or not. Flow is yet another example of choosing the wiki's flexibility over solutions that could easily be more practical. This inflexibility is also true for many of the non-encyclopedic pages of Wikipedia, such as news and biography pages where different editorial workflows and presentation will give better results. If you are interested I wrote a blog post about the many problems that are specifically caused by the wiki software.

Why u donate bro? Don't you know they don't need the money?

I am the founder of Newslines. We are the closest thing to a Wikipedia for news, although we are really a mix of daily news, Wikipedia and YouTube. Our writers create news-based timelines on any person, product or news event.

There are many problems with the way Wikipedia deals with news (see my article Wikipedia's 13 Deadly Sins. On the reader side, news pages are text-based, very unstructured, and don't have embedded videos and cannot be sorted or filtered. On the writers' side there are many problems with the 10-year-old wiki software that create unnecessary conflict and trouble for anyone trying to add data. By using a simpler approval process we have very few edit wars, happier writers, and a better reader experience. Also, our model makes it much more difficult for groups of readers to push their point of view.

Since we launched in May, our writers have added over 25,000 news events, on thousands of topics. Unlike other work-for-free-while-we-make-billions sites, we paid our writers $1 per post for those posts. In the next few weeks we are moving to a revenue share, where writers and editors can get paid for their efforts. Some of our writers have already made thousands of dollars and we hope they will make much more with the new system.

Some examples: Google Glass, Ben Affleck, Michael Brown, Paul Graham

I am the founder of Newslines. We are the closest thing to a Wikipedia for news, although we are really a mix of daily news, Wikipedia and YouTube. Our writers create news-based timelines on any person, product or news event.

There are many problems with the way Wikipedia deals with news (see my article Wikipedia's 13 Deadly Sins. On the reader side, news pages are text-based, very unstructured, and don't have embedded videos and cannot be sorted or filtered. On the writers' side there are many problems with the 10-year-old wiki software that create unnecessary conflict and trouble for anyone trying to add data. By using a simpler approval process we have very few edit wars, happier writers, and a better reader experience. Also, our model makes it much more difficult for groups of readers to push their point of view.

Since we launched in May, our writers have added over 25,000 news events, on thousands of topics. Unlike other work-for-free-while-we-make-billions sites, we paid our writers $1 per post for those posts. In the next few weeks we are moving to a revenue share, where writers and editors can get paid for their efforts. Some of our writers have already made thousands of dollars and we hope they will make much more with the new system.

Some examples: Google Glass, Ben Affleck, Michael Brown, Paul Graham

I am the founder of Newslines. We are the closest thing to a Wikipedia for news, although we are really a mix of daily news, Wikipedia and YouTube. Our writers create news-based timelines on any person, product or news event.

There are many problems with the way Wikipedia deals with news (see my article Wikipedia's 13 Deadly Sins. On the reader side, news pages are text-based, very unstructured, and don't have embedded videos and cannot be sorted or filtered. On the writers' side there are many problems with the 10-year-old wiki software that create unnecessary conflict and trouble for anyone trying to add data. By using a simpler approval process we have very few edit wars, happier writers, and a better reader experience. Also, our model makes it much more difficult for groups of readers to push their point of view.

Since we launched in May, our writers have added over 25,000 news events, on thousands of topics. Unlike other work-for-free-while-we-make-billions sites, we paid our writers $1 per post for those posts. In the next few weeks we are moving to a revenue share, where writers and editors can get paid for their efforts. Some of our writers have already made thousands of dollars and we hope they will make much more with the new system.

Some examples: Google Glass, Ben Affleck, Michael Brown, Paul Graham

I am the founder of Newslines. We are the closest thing to a Wikipedia for news, although we are really a mix of daily news, Wikipedia and YouTube. Our writers create news-based timelines on any person, product or news event.

There are many problems with the way Wikipedia deals with news (see my article Wikipedia's 13 Deadly Sins. On the reader side, news pages are text-based, very unstructured, and don't have embedded videos and cannot be sorted or filtered. On the writers' side there are many problems with the 10-year-old wiki software that create unnecessary conflict and trouble for anyone trying to add data. By using a simpler approval process we have very few edit wars, happier writers, and a better reader experience. Also, our model makes it much more difficult for groups of readers to push their point of view.

Since we launched in May, our writers have added over 25,000 news events, on thousands of topics. Unlike other work-for-free-while-we-make-billions sites, we paid our writers $1 per post for those posts. In the next few weeks we are moving to a revenue share, where writers and editors can get paid for their efforts. Some of our writers have already made thousands of dollars and we hope they will make much more with the new system.

Some examples: Google Glass, Ben Affleck, Michael Brown, Paul Graham

I am the founder of Newslines. We are the closest thing to a Wikipedia for news, although we are really a mix of daily news, Wikipedia and YouTube. Our writers create news-based timelines on any person, product or news event.

There are many problems with the way Wikipedia deals with news (see my article Wikipedia's 13 Deadly Sins. On the reader side, news pages are text-based, very unstructured, and don't have embedded videos and cannot be sorted or filtered. On the writers' side there are many problems with the 10-year-old wiki software that create unnecessary conflict and trouble for anyone trying to add data. By using a simpler approval process we have very few edit wars, happier writers, and a better reader experience. Also, our model makes it much more difficult for groups of readers to push their point of view.

Since we launched in May, our writers have added over 25,000 news events, on thousands of topics. Unlike other work-for-free-while-we-make-billions sites, we paid our writers $1 per post for those posts. In the next few weeks we are moving to a revenue share, where writers and editors can get paid for their efforts. Some of our writers have already made thousands of dollars and we hope they will make much more with the new system.

Some examples: Google Glass, Ben Affleck, Michael Brown, Paul Graham

I am the founder of Newslines. We are the closest thing to a Wikipedia for news, although we are really a mix of daily news, Wikipedia and YouTube. Our writers create news-based timelines on any person, product or news event.

There are many problems with the way Wikipedia deals with news (see my article Wikipedia's 13 Deadly Sins. On the reader side, news pages are text-based, very unstructured, and don't have embedded videos and cannot be sorted or filtered. On the writers' side there are many problems with the 10-year-old wiki software that create unnecessary conflict and trouble for anyone trying to add data. By using a simpler approval process we have very few edit wars, happier writers, and a better reader experience. Also, our model makes it much more difficult for groups of readers to push their point of view.

Since we launched in May, our writers have added over 25,000 news events, on thousands of topics. Unlike other work-for-free-while-we-make-billions sites, we paid our writers $1 per post for those posts. In the next few weeks we are moving to a revenue share, where writers and editors can get paid for their efforts. Some of our writers have already made thousands of dollars and we hope they will make much more with the new system.

Some examples: Google Glass, Ben Affleck, Michael Brown, Paul Graham

http://www.newslines.org/ exists to aggregate news in a timeline by SUBJECT, where the subject could be a person, place, event etc.

It does fill a niche that I think is not really covered well by wikipedia, google news, or any of the services I've yet seen.

*disclaimer, newslines.org is a startup of a good friend of mine and I do have a financial interest.

For those interested, I made a timeline of Ron Klain's life.

Thomas Eric Duncan has died of Ebola

But for Wikipedia to actually become a platform fully embraced by women, it would have to change its culture in fundamental ways, reducing its emphasis on anonymity and providing more opportunities for meaningful companionship and satisfying social relationships between its contributors. Failing that, women will simply continue to vote with their feet, and find their enjoyment and altruistic fulfilment elsewhere.

Most of the reasons for the lack of female participation in Wikipedia, including those above, are false. On Newslines, my crowdsourced content site that aims to replace Wikipedia's biographies and news-based events, 80% of our contributors are women and minorities. See our leaderboard

Wikipedia can never work for minorities and women because its software and policies are specifically designed to exclude them. The reason we get more women posting is because Newslines is created specifically to allow users to add content without the conflicts that are inherent in a wiki-based system. Wikis are built through conflict. Wikipedia's conflict-driven software and policies attract ego-driven white males eager to gain power through the display of their knowledge. The intensity of this conflict excludes other groups.

I go further into this in this post, but the gist of it is that 1) we pay our writers to contribute 2) we have system that allows people to add information with no conflict -- so far over 11,000 posts with no trouble 3) posts are assessed on the quality of the post, not on who made them -- no conflicts of interest or harassment possible 4) and we don't allow editors ownership of the page -- denying powerful groups the ability to censor people and text.

The real crime though, is to blame the people who are excluded for the failings of the system. How many times do we have to hear -- by the people who created the system that excludes them -- that women and minorities are not interested, they don't have enough time, they don't know enough, they can't use the interface, they prefer fluffy stuff, and that they are are lazy? It's time to move past these old arguments and see Wikipedia's dysfunction for what it is - a software, policy and leadership failure.

But for Wikipedia to actually become a platform fully embraced by women, it would have to change its culture in fundamental ways, reducing its emphasis on anonymity and providing more opportunities for meaningful companionship and satisfying social relationships between its contributors. Failing that, women will simply continue to vote with their feet, and find their enjoyment and altruistic fulfilment elsewhere.

Most of the reasons for the lack of female participation in Wikipedia, including those above, are false. On Newslines, my crowdsourced content site that aims to replace Wikipedia's biographies and news-based events, 80% of our contributors are women and minorities. See our leaderboard

Wikipedia can never work for minorities and women because its software and policies are specifically designed to exclude them. The reason we get more women posting is because Newslines is created specifically to allow users to add content without the conflicts that are inherent in a wiki-based system. Wikis are built through conflict. Wikipedia's conflict-driven software and policies attract ego-driven white males eager to gain power through the display of their knowledge. The intensity of this conflict excludes other groups.

I go further into this in this post, but the gist of it is that 1) we pay our writers to contribute 2) we have system that allows people to add information with no conflict -- so far over 11,000 posts with no trouble 3) posts are assessed on the quality of the post, not on who made them -- no conflicts of interest or harassment possible 4) and we don't allow editors ownership of the page -- denying powerful groups the ability to censor people and text.

The real crime though, is to blame the people who are excluded for the failings of the system. How many times do we have to hear -- by the people who created the system that excludes them -- that women and minorities are not interested, they don't have enough time, they don't know enough, they can't use the interface, they prefer fluffy stuff, and that they are are lazy? It's time to move past these old arguments and see Wikipedia's dysfunction for what it is - a software, policy and leadership failure.

This reminds me of Newslines.org, a news-based crowdsourcing project that overlaps to a certain extent with Wikipedia, with the difference that they *do* pay their contributors. They report that their gender split is reversed: they have more women contributors than men, and also have more contributors from ethnic minorities than Wikipedia (in fact, their two leading contributors are black women).

Indeed. The one thing that Wikimedia needs is a competitor. The present de-facto monopoly is a very unhealthy situation, especially given that Google aims to rely more and more on Wikipedia and Wikidata, pulling some of that information onto their own pages (to populate the Knowledge Graph, the information panel in the top right of search results pages). Of course, by doing so, Google is also cannibalising Wikipedia to some extent, as anyone who just wants to check a birth year e.g. now doesn't have to go to Wikipedia at all. Google will already display that information, pulled out of Wikipedia, on the search results page. And of course, Google has ads ... much is always made of the fact that Wikipedia doesn't have ads, but in practice, you will see more and more re-users of Wikipedia making money from it. The Wikipedia licence has always allowed commercial re-use. The losers in this really are the volunteers: their work is used to line other people's pockets.

Perhaps there will be a move at some point towards crowdsourcing sites like http://newslines.org/ which pay their contributors. Newslines is still in its infancy, and it's hard to tell to what extent it might take off, but interestingly, the site has no gender gap, and is not dominated by young white males: their two most prolific contributors to date are two black women. There is a large overlap between what they want to do, and what Wikipedia is doing, given that a lot of Wikipedia content these days is news-based.

I made this news timeline of Swartz a while back. If you see anything missing drop me a note.

Confused? Feel free to check out my Mt Gox timeline

For those who need an overview of the rise and fall of Mt Gox, I made a handy timeline

Stupid Slashdot non auto link format! Timeline of McAfee's exploits

Aaron Swartz Timeline

Aaron Swartz Timeline