Comments on: Those darn wikis

By: neil

neil — Tue, 23 Aug 2005 05:03:04 +0000

well, i replied to a blog entry from like a year ago, so oops. bump
just sayin hi. long time no see man

-neil

By: NetworkWorld.com Community

NetworkWorld.com Community — Fri, 05 Aug 2005 20:42:00 +0000

Why the Los Angeles Times wiki failed so quickly
Last week, the Los Angeles Times posted its first “wikitorial” - an editorial that anybody could edit. It was gone within 48 hours - victim of prankster/vandals who kept posting X-rated images. Ilya Haykinson, who, along with Wikipedia founder Jimbo Wa

By: Linda Greenberg

Linda Greenberg — Wed, 29 Jun 2005 21:39:17 +0000

I want to have faith in wikitorials. While a “collaborative editorial” is certainly difficult (if not impossible) to achieve, I believe that there is still room for wikitorials that engage in collaborative debate. On an issue in which there are two fairly clearly demarcated sides, it could be fascinating to watch 2 pro- and con- type wikis develop and evolve in conjunction with each other over that given issue.

By: Tim Windsor

Tim Windsor — Sat, 25 Jun 2005 12:50:56 +0000

Even if all the participants in this experiment wore white gloves and drank their Earl Grey with pinkies extended, this was doomed to failure, because a “collaborative editorial” is an unreachable goal. Editorials are strongly-argued opinions. Wikis, in my limited experience with them, are much better suited to fact-finding and consensus.

But I do have to disagree with one thing Ilya says. I do think it was the defacing that ultimately forced LAT to pull the plug. There’s just no way that a serious news organization such as The Times is going to allow itself to be a publisher of goatse. Once that happened, it was “game over,” at least for now.

By: Five Live Links

Five Live Links — Thu, 23 Jun 2005 04:33:49 +0000

ilya haykinson talks about what went awry with the L.A. Times wikitorial
One thing people always seem to get wrong: Anonymity does not equal untrustworthy. In fact, some people who are given anonymity online will act in a more straightforward and consistent manner because they’re not under multiple competing pressures from…

By: Tim Yang

Tim Yang — Thu, 23 Jun 2005 01:01:59 +0000

Ilya, I completely agree with your views. But LATimes ignored them. The wiki had a purpose, but the wrong one. LATimes wanted to use it to build community, however they chose to use a system of complete anonymity — how did they think they could build community without trust…

They also chose the wrong kind of articles to turn into wiki format. Wikis are good for sharing knowledge, not for sharing opinion.

By: Blogging.LA

Blogging.LA — Tue, 21 Jun 2005 22:09:29 +0000

More on the LA Times wiki project
Waxy links to Ilya’s thoughts on his involvement with the LA Times wiki project and notes “though it failed, this kind of media experimentation should be commended instead of ridiculed.” This is a very insightful read for sure and I…

By: Kyle Hamilton

Kyle Hamilton — Tue, 21 Jun 2005 18:05:14 +0000

Part of the problem is that there will /always/ be an Eternal September (abusing a term from way back when in Usenet, when new students who didn’t know how to use it would lower the signal:noise ratio enough that a lot of people who did know how to use it would just stop reading and responding for a while). There are always going to be people who want nothing more than to vandalize. There are always going to be people who read the newspaper, see “Hey, we can put our own stuff up!”, and immediately think “Let’s put something offensive up!” instead of thinking “How can I explore the topic that it’s about?”

I think it’s more of a “gee-whiz” factor than a “let’s think about it” factor.

Some of the things I think that LATimes should have done: invite “guest editorials” — essentially, letters to the editor on various topics, and allowing users to go on their own soapboxes and having the editors point users to good ones. (Essentially, make it a kind of wiki-blog, for everyone.) Delete the pages with low hit-count or low reputation (note: this implies a thumbs-up/thumbs-down on whether the content is good, compared to a thumbs-up/thumbs-down on whether the reader agrees with what was written). Watch the trends, and give people who consistently (98%+ of the time) rate “this is good content” and “this is bad content” along with the reality some kind of extra voice — maybe don’t even let them know about it, just bump their reputation modifiers up a bit. Truly make it an effort to get the community involved, versus making it a way to try to reach the community in a new medium.

Invite participation, and enforce it, and allow the users to enforce it. (Maybe put up a “highly-rated” and a “lowest-rated” pages list… so that those who truly care about the project can read the good stuff, and take responsibility for clearing out the bad stuff.)

But yeah. A wiki is about collaborating, and is best served by having people involved who want to collaborate. It’s worst-served by inviting everyone to willy-nilly make their own changes.

By: Ilya Haykinson

Ilya Haykinson — Tue, 21 Jun 2005 18:03:40 +0000

Well, perhaps or perhaps not. I am skeptical of using a wiki for editorials as well. However people used to think having a wiki encyclopedia is a strange idea, and people still criticize wikinews as flawed — yet, both are around.

By: Michael Kuker

Michael Kuker — Tue, 21 Jun 2005 17:57:22 +0000

I think the issue people have isn’t the fact that the Times was experimenting with wikis, per se. I think the issue is how the medium affects the message. It makes no sense to have a collaborative editorial. None. A “wikitorial” is just blantant buzzword mongering and trend-whoring.

Perhaps a better idea would be a collaborative community calendar or local news site.