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Encyclopedia Britannica to Take User Contributions
Barence writes "Britannica has long been a vocal critic of Wikipedia's user-generated content, and has repeatedly attacked the accuracy of its articles. Surprisingly, then, it is rolling out a new system allowing readers to potentially contribute to articles, Wiki-style. But Britannica is keen to stress that its new website will not be following the Wiki-model, describing it 'as a collaborative process but not a democratic one.' You can try out the new Britannica beta site."
Because the only thing that could be better than pure oligarchy or pure anarchy is a blend of the two.
You become what you hate
Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
I shall submit an article on the 'electronic encyclopedia, which anyone can edit.'
You can't talk about Wikipedia's flaws on Wikipedia
Let me get this straight. The encyclopedia Britannica will now be powered through user generated (but not user selected) articles... To me, it sounds like they're getting free work for a paid product.
1. Make encyclopedia
2. Get a lot of people to submit articles for free
3. Pay a few people to edit and select the best articles
4. ???????
5. Profit!
Wikipedia may have serious accuracy problems in a lot of areas (not all of coruse, but it's not hard to find them) but at least they aren't using me as unpaid labor to save them from having to hire researchers.
To help them, for free.
1 - Capitalize on the buzz created by Wikipedia, falsely open Britannica to contributions
2 - Keep hand on content, unlike Wikipedia, edit contributed content and sell as own
3 - Profit
I know there's truth in their beef against the wiki process, but really what I mostly see is a great way for Britannica to get raw material faster without having to pay anybody.
"A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
brittanica licks its own spit off the ground, that's what happens. also somebody will contribute and brittanica will earn from that? what a naive idea they have.
Could be serious, can't you just see some poor grad student needing a intervention after a long weekend following circular references...
Ok, I had a teacher tell me that Wikipedia is not an acceptable source for information due to the fact that anyone can edit the information on there. With Britannica going the same route, I wonder how long before that will not be a valid source as well? Despite them claiming they are not going to be "wiki" like, if your average Joe can submit information, I wonder how long it will go before people start attacking their credibility the way they have Wikipedia?
Encarta already tried it.
It didn't work because it doesn't feel like you're collaborating and "owning" the submission, it feels like you're giving your time and effort to some large entity which has control over the content.
Clay Shirky explains it better in Here Comes Everybody but the basic idea is that WikiPedia belongs to the people who submit, in a way, which means people are more likely to.
Second, facts are not democratic. You can't VOTE on what will be true. Trust me, it's been tried.
shocking, who still uses it?
I would add an appendage to their article on 'Alchohol' about the best drink in existence.
"I bless every day that I continue to live, for every day is pure profit."
- Videos auto-running
- Random elements zooming around
- Mouseover actions that surprise (I still don't think mainstream WWW pages are ready for a http://www.dontclick.it/ - like UI)
This also sounds suspiciously a LOT like Google Knol. Encyclopaedia Britannica is reacting to Wikipedia the way Microsoft reacted to Google/Firefox. Giant established behemoth in its field getting its comeuppance from upstarts due to its inability to adapt to changing times, and trying to pick itself off the ground to play catch-up..[Slashdot Comments We Liked]
Wikipedia is a horrible place to link to in order to describe Wikipedia. Among other things, the page you link makes this preposterous claim:
"Wikipedia is not a bureaucracy"
Nerd rage is the funniest rage.
It sounds like the article is suggesting people can offer whole articles for submission. It seems that Wikipedia works because people can write just bits and pieces. And then, if I see something wrong, or if something changes, I can just make that minor little change myself. So, to fix some minor error in an Encycopedia Britannica article, I have to write a whole article? What if the article has some error within an article, or something has changed making the article no longer up-to-date and I want to just suggest a correction?
For instance, in the article about Benito Mussolini, they go out of their way to talk about how he was violent and evil right up front.
In the article on Che Guevara, there is only a passing mention about how some people find his methods controversial, and its buried half way down.
Was Mussolini heavy-handed? Yes. But Guevara killed hundreds of people with his own gun, sentenced kids to prison for sassing their parents, etc. He exported violent revolution from Cuba to Africa and the rest of Latin America which lead to the deaths of tens of thousands, if not more.
Che Guevara was NOT a nice guy who gave candy to kids. However, clearly Wikipedians love him.
This is an example of "facts" being "voted on," and an example of why reliance on wikipedia for anything other than science or maths is a bad idea.
hell, be wary even of that, no matter what sort of good news that it espouses for African elephants.
First, it has taken them 7 years to figure out how to respond to Wikipedia, let alone have any kind of tenable internet strategy? Good for them.
Second, they are still clueless about wikipedia, and can't even critique it properly. Wikipedia is not a democracy, it is based on consensus decision making, which has a different set of flaws. Their straw-man concept of editor versus the masses is literally stolen from the 20th century.
Third, have any of you checked out their site? Are you kidding me? It is full of junk! Adds, photos, stupid celebrity information, etc. I mean, this is web design 1990s style, covered with the "modernizing" sheep's clothing of flash. They just don't get it: we don't go to an encyclopedia to get bombarded by useless information and junk. On the contrary!
Finally, they've got the whole paradigm upside down. You don't build a website by making it closed and proprietary, and then let the "community" trickle in amidst various and sundry rules. You have to start the site completely open, and slowly develop structure in response to your community.
Britannica, I have no idea who is paying your bills anymore, but do us all a favor: read your entry for evolution then obsolescence, again and again, until you get it.
I just tried using the Beta, waaay too slow. Wikipedia wins!
No no no! They're just embracing Web 2.0.
No go to a peer reviewed history book and read up on the same people .... look familiar? yes they are biased as well ....
.... the same goes for Che Guevara
...
As Henry Ford said "History is more or less bunk"
Mussolini was not a particularly nice person, but must have done some things people approved of or he would have not been in power
History is not decided democratically it is decided by the winners, and by peoples bad memories
Puteulanus fenestra mortis
Mussolini's party won elections and he was appointed PM by Victor Emanuele III. Guevara road the coat-tails of Castro, who seized power through guerrilla tactics and a terrorist campaign. there is more of case for Mussolini as a legitimate figure of power.
As to the rest of your statement, I agree. Its just most unfortunate.
Probably the best action from Wikipedia contributors would be to post an animated lolcat on Britannica's entry with neon blinking lights surrounding the text 'owned', but I have a tingling feeling this would deviate slightly from Wikipedia's NPOV principle.
Wow, it feels *really* encyclopedic to be slapped across the face with banner ads. Looks more like a vacant-domain-page to me. So 90's!
--
The most common initial word in a Wikipedia sentence: "However".
(Scene : A front door of a flat. A man walks up to the door and rings bell. He is dressed smartly, like a Salesman.)
Salesman: Burglar! (longish pause while he waits, he rings again) Burglar! (woman appears at other side of door)
Woman: Yes?
Salesman: Burglar, madam.
Woman: What do you want?
Salesman: I wart to come in and steal a few firings, madam.
Woman: Are you an encyclopaedia salesman?
Salesman: No madam, I'm a burglar, I burgle people.
Woman: I think you're an encyclopaedia salesman.
Salesman: Oh I'm not, open the door, let me in please.
Woman: lf l let you in you'll sell me encyclopaedias.
Salesman: I won't, madam. I just want to come in and ransack the flat. Honestly.
Woman: Promise. No encyclopaedias?
Salesman: None at all.
Woman: All right. (she opens door) You'd better come in then.
(Salesman enters trough door.)
Salesman: Mind you I don't know whether you've really considered the advantages of owning a really fine set of modern encyclopaedias...(he pockets valuable) You know, they can really do you wonders.
(Cut back to man at desk.)
Man: That man was a successful encyclopaedia salesman. But not all encyclopaedia salesmen are successful. Here is an unsuccessful encyclopaedia salesman.
(Cut to very tall building; a body flies out of a high window and plummets. Cut back to man at desk.)
Man: Now here are two unsuccessful encyclopaedia salesmen.
(Cut to a different tall building; two bodies fly out of a high window. Cut back to man at desk.)
Man: I think there's a lesson there for all of us.
Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
Generally Encyclopedias are not considered valid sources for research papers anyway. They're great for getting a quick handle on what you're supposed to be doing your paper on but there aren't too many circumstances where they are considered okay for that use. I still feel wikipedia is just as good if not a better source than any other encyclopedia, it's amazing how fast those articles are updated. As long as you're careful not to believe every little thing you read you are probably going to get the best and most updated information from wikipedia
You'd think in all these years of bashing Wikipedia they would have checked Wikipedia's core policies before writing the press release.
Hideous. The beta site is absolutely ugly. It makes my eyes hurt.
Really? An encyclopedia that accepts user submissions? Wow, only on the Internet!
Actually, this notion is a bit false. It was misinterpreted over the years. The original quote was "Wikipedia is not an experiment in democracy", which meant, it's an encyclopedia, but not a primary vehicle to test democratic methods. But it didn't predicate for it _not_ to be democracy in any way.
In fact, I believe (and I am not alone) that unless Wikipedia doesn't accept more democratic decision-making processes, it will fail. There is really no third way - either you have democracy (rule of the majority), or you have some form of authoritative system (rule of minority).
This all of course doesn't mean that facts can be decided by democracy - the democratization of Wikipedia is concerned of governance (things like how to decide who has power, what articles should be accepted and things like that), not specific articles (like what should be in the specific article).
.. really saved my day. I mean, this is really dangerous, collective decision-making by _all_ the people!
Britannica are hardly well placed to criticise the accuracy of Wikipaedia. They've spent decades trading on an unearned folk reputation for accuracy. Einbinder, _The Myth of the Britannica_ is an excellent source on this. Now please excuse me as I have a report due on space.