More Wiki Than Ever

Earlier today Slashdot took a look at a change being implemented on the German version of Wikipedia which raised quite a few eyebrows. Many of the implications, however, led the readers to believe things that just are not necessarily true. Wikipedia founder Jimmy 'Jimbo' Wales took a minute to help set the record straight. Jimbo writes: "Recent media reports have been quite confused about the new feature we will be testing in the German Wikipedia. Some explanation is in order. Wikipedia is undergoing change. The fundamental nature of that change, the fundamental trend of that change, is to open up more than before, and to become more of a wiki than ever before. If you have read otherwise in the mainstream media, well, digital culture is hard to understand, and it is no wonder that errors are made so often."

From the early days of Wikipedia, we were forced to do something that we did not like to do: protect (lock) pages. For a long time, whenever there was a major editing dispute requiring a cool-down time, or a sudden spate of vandalism to an article, the community administrators of Wikipedia were forced to put pages into a state where no one could edit them. (Admins could technically edit them, but by social custom did not, in order to preserve the level playing field between admins and ordinary users.)

Protection was a good way to prevent further vandalism, but it did unfortunately still allow the general public to see the vandalism.

After many years of this, we recognized that protection was too un-wiki for us, and so the community devised a new software feature: semi-protection. An article which is semi-protected is more open than an article which is protected, because it is open for editing for all but anonymous editors and the very newest of accounts. This innovation has been very popular in Wikipedia precisely because it allowed us to be more wiki, more open, than when we were forced to lock articles.

Encouraged by this development, and after carefully watching the use of the feature and finding it to be a net improvement, members of the German community in particular thought creatively about how we might do an even better job of openness and therefore quality. Could we simultaneously open editing still further, while also dealing better than ever with the problem that protection and semi-protection were designed to solve?

After much discussion, a clever and elegant innovation was found. This innovation holds forth the promise of Wikipedia being able to open the front page for editing for the first time in 5 years! And at the same time, it provides a finer tool for preventing much of the vandalism that had unfortunately slipped through to the general public, while eliminating the need for semi-protection!

The new feature will allow the community, using the same sorts of procedures and norms that we have used for years to determine semi-protection and protection status, to flag certain versions of articles as "non-vandalized", and these versions are what will be shown to users who are not logged in. The feature will be tested in the normal manner of all new features at Wikipedia, with a simple quiet introduction and a period of testing and evaluation within the community.

We expect the following benefits from this innovation:

• Wikipedia will be more wiki than ever, in the sense that for the first time in years, we expect that nearly ALL pages will be open to editing by ANYONE, even non-logged-in users. This means the almost complete elimination of the editing restrictions we have been forced to have for years.

• We have good reason to believe that the primary incentive for most vandalism, as the primary incentive for most graffiti in the real world, is that the vandalism can be seen by the general public. Vandals seek to shock people. The new feature will deprive them of that benefit, and we expect to see a corresponding drop in the total amount of vandalism that the community has to deal with. This is an excellent example of our philosophy of trusting the general public to do the right thing when given the right incentives, and an illustration of why openness and transparency is better than control.

• Although not all pages will have the 'non-vandalized versions' feature enabled, we expect that it will be enabled quickly by the community on all the pages that are currently semi-protected due to being popular vandalism targets. Thus, we will achieve our aim of preventing the general public from seeing vandalized versions (as we do now on these articles), but at the same time allowing open editing of these articles.

A quick summary to make this even more clear:

• PROTECTION - NO ONE can edit, NO ONE can affect the public version

• SEMI-PROTECTION - all except new users and anons can edit, all except new users and anons can affect the public versions

• VERSION FLAGGING - ANYONE can edit, all except new users and anons can affect the public versions

As you can see, each step of this chain allows MORE people to do MORE things, rather than less. Each step of this chain is becoming MORE wiki, not LESS wiki.

The news media has an unfortunate temptation to follow a story arc that goes something like this. "Open editing is impossible. It worked for a little while at Wikipedia, but now even Wikipedia is admitting that it does not work, so they are closing off public editing step by step. This proves that our traditional model is best in the end."

The fact that this story arc has no relationship to the reality of changes in Wikipedia has not stopped them. I am hopeful that this post will catch enough attention that journalists will start to grasp the real revolution that is taking place here.

Comments

Article updated

[daveschroeder]

The original BBC article on this has been updated:

There's been quite a lot of discussion about this article over on the Wikipedia mailing lists, and as a result the details of what the German group are proposing to do are a lot clearer.

Rather than hold any pending edits until they are approved, edits will still be allowed to any unlocked page on the site.

Unregistered users will not automatically see these pages when they visit, so that the chances that someone will inadvertently come across a vandalised page should be reduced, but the pages will still be available if someone wants to see them.

There's no decision yet as to who will be able to "approve" a page, and of course the English-language Wikipedia is simply watching what happens in Germany and seeing how it works, so there will be no change for those of us who use the English version.

This clarifies a number of the points I raised in the article. I was wrong to say that "Under the new approach, page edits will no longer be immediately applied to pages", since the changes will be there, and someone who wants to see the latest edits will be able to do so.

However for most users, the page they see will not be the latest edit but the latest approved page, so my wider point that this would mark a significant shift in the "wikiness" of the site if it was universally adopted still holds.

In the end, the success of Wikipedia depends on the willingness of large numbers of us to write, edit, fix and expand articles all over the site.

Whether the technology which makes this possible is a wiki or a more conventional editorial process is less important than the project itself, which has provided millions of people with a (mostly reliable) source of information that can transform their lives - or just help with their school projects.

Wales didn't "set the record straight".

If anything this is not becoming more "open" or "wiki" than ever before. It is, however slightly, less wiki than it was. Now, make no mistake, this plan may ultimately be a very good thing, but to say that restricting and approving edits, and having the default page visible to normal people browsing only be the latest "approved" page, is becoming "more of a wiki" is a little bit disingenuous. It would be more accurate to say that it might be a better model, and we're exploring it.

The most open state for a wiki, fundamentally, is to allow, and immediately publish, all edits. If Wikipedia is backing away from that, that's not becoming "more of a wiki".

The most useful state for a wiki like Wikipedia, however, may be some reasonable ratcheting back that makes it the most accurate, functional, and stable source of information for all users.

It seems like they're stuck unnecessarily on trying to defend this decision, when some type of balance like this may ultimately be the best.

Even if it makes it "less of a wiki".

Re:Article updated

[Darkforge]

If you think this is "less wiki", then you've missed the point of Wales' response. Here's a ranking from least wiki to most wiki:

1) Every page is locked: only modifiable by the admins (this is almost every page on the web right now!)
2) Every page is semi-protected: only modifiable by logged in non-new users
3) Every page is version-flagged: where anyone can make a modification, but only non-new users can "bless" the page to make it public.
4) Most pages are a wiki-like free-for-all, but some pages are Locked
5) Most pages are a wiki-like free-for-all, but some pages are Locked and some are Semi-protected (today's status quo)
6) Most pages are a wiki-like free-for-all, but some pages are Semi-protected (and none are locked)
7) Most pages are a wiki-like free-for-all, but some pages are Version-Flagged (and none are locked or semi-protected)
8) All pages are a wiki-like free-for all

Clearly, moving from 5 to 3 would make Wikipedia substantially less wiki, but that's not what they're proposing. But that's not what's happening; they're going to 7. Moving from 5 to 7 makes Wikipedia substantially more wiki.

Thanks!

Judgments of Wikipedia

[Anonymous Coward]

What is it that makes people always want to jump to conclusions about Wikipedia? A site that has the noblest goals at heart, seems to always have a torch bearing mob knocking on its door.

approaching respectability

[theglassishalf]

I always thought it would be a great idea if some group (a major university, perhaps) were to fork Wikipedia and make "confirmed correct" pages that could then be used for real research. This is an interesting spin on that: not "confirmed correct" but at least "not patently wrong", and it (may) approach this goal without needing to fork. Good luck guys.

A Security Inversion

[brundlefly]

This is a security model inversion which is better suited to Wikis than traditional security, and it's Good.

Traditional security (i.e. non-communal) says "only privileged users can make changes", and "the more privileged you are, the more you can change".

This security inverts that concept and focuses not on who can change what, but rather on how pervasive their changes are once they have made them. If the old model is a Privilege-Heirarchy model, then this is a Popularity-Broadcasting model. It says "anyone can change anything", and "only if you matter will your changes be seen by anyone else who matters".

It removes the temptation to vandalize anonymously, because anonymous folks have no rep and therefore no power. It idealizes having a good reputation, because therein lies the path to the biggest podium.

Re:Vouching

[amRadioHed]

A person would think twice about changing something when the record would show that he thereby made it inferior.

If that was the case, that would be rather unfortunate. Just because Penrose has verified that a certain page is accurate as best as he knows, doesn't mean that it doesn't have room for improvement. Especially in a field such as Cosmology where changes are so frequent and substantial. It would not be good for any sort of marking that would hinder future development of the page.