Those of us who know Wikipedia best know that it is a rotting, stinking corpse pasted over with the thick cosmetics of the mortician's art — it exhibits all the responsiveness to critical feedback that you'd expect of a zombie whose ears have rotted off — and it's long past time that we stuck a stake in the place where it's heart should have been … before it becomes an even greater threat to public health and safety than it already is.

Jonny

Jonny, what's your plan? As long as it doesn't involve the purchase of a huge amount of ammonium nitrate, diesel fuel, and Tovex Blastrite, we want to hear your mission, I'm sure.

Greg

In a discussion I had once with a fellow who had Libertarian leanings, his answer to all of my examples of how the free market can go wrong was to tout "creative destruction". I can only assume he never imagined Jonny behind the wheel of a truck bomb. Rather, he'd have suggested the CZ fork, which turned out not to be a fork at all. Given that we've ruled two options out, what remains? Is Jonny going to get some angel VC's to front the cash (cache?) for the launch of SanePedia (Now with 15% fewer crazies!)? Is WP going to rot on the vine until something better magically comes along and swallows it?

See, where I particularly disagreed with the aforementioned Libertarian is that he ignored the market pressures that make creative destruction so rare. If you're in the horse and buggy business, you're not motivated to make automobiles, and you're even likely to want to sabotage that new market. Because WP's success depends on having achieved a critical mass and an insanely high Google rating, how is a replacement ever going to get a toehold, much less compete? The only player positioned to do this is Google itself. Can anyone say WikiTube?

Al

Up until now we've all been hoping against hope that Wikipedia could be salvaged. We tend to feel a certain sympathy for those who keep plastering pancake on the face of the corpse, all oblivious to the rot at the core — we can probably still remember a time when we ourselves were just that unaware of the larger realities.

Some people remain so deluded by their wishful will to believe that they just keep talking to the corpse — thinking that it might just wake up and start to act like a human being again. But that has proven to be an utter waste of their own lives. Nor all the piety and wit of the Egyptian and Tibetan Books of the Dead put together could make that happen, nor were they meant to revive the Dead, but merely to rest them in peace.

Some of us have thought, until just recently, that bringing the attention of the outside world to the putrid mess of Wikipedia would result in a general cleanup. It's still a good idea to publicize the problem as much as possible, but Wikipedia has passed the point where weekend work crews of adopt-a-road warriors can turn back the tide of toxic dumping on the info-x-pressway. I think it's now clear that any remedy will be less a matter of topical disinfection than a thorough draining of the Wikipedia swamp and a wholesale dismantling of the Industrial Power Structure that profits from the retail distribution of Wikipollution.

Jonny

Jonny, your private mail here is clogged, and I've sent you an e-mail through a "series of tubes". Awaiting your reply.

Greg

My plan is simple — to accelerate the natural process of decay to which Wikipedia, more than any online project we've ever seen before, is subject.

The Walking Dead Menace of Wikipedia has been able to lurch along for as long as it has only because we've all been handling it with the proverbial kid gloves, pulling the punches that it really deserves, and never quite connecting with the Achille's heels that are as plain as the glass jaw on it's face, so to speak.

But the time for being nice is past. Wikipediots show no signs of comprehending, much less observing, the fundamental principles of reciprocity — aka the Golden Rule — on which all human ethical systems are based.

Passive to passive-aggressive tactics have failed to fix the mess, and it's time to start exploiting a little more aggressively the host of design flaws that make the Wikipedia system the mess that it is today.

Jonny

You are using a lot of words and phrases that I did not use, and you have consequently imported a lot of connotations into my text that are completely alien to it. Maybe this happens because you are still taking Wikipediot assumptions at face value, for instance, their premiss that they are doing something beneficial and constructive and their inference that people who oppose them must be doing something malicious and destructive.

Sorry, I ain't buying it …

Jonny

Pull the Plug on Wikipeida it's a corrupt and perverted swamp, full of certifiable sociopaths, misfits and other pale basement dwelling bottom feeding punks.

There is no good left in Wikipeida as it now pollutes the blue water internet with its misinformation (Small example of typical misinformation), hate, and other petty games, which have hurt people and perverted the concept of an "online Encyclopedia". Wikipedia is an experiment that had gone "Frankenstein" and this monster lose, and it should be put down while it still can.

Those,who are in charge at wikipeida and who's minds still have a thread of decency, and common sense left should do the right thing, instead of feeding this out of control beast, just...

a. Pull the plug on wikipeida.
b. Sell the wikipedan domain to a responsible entity, like encyclopedia britania, and give the proceeds to some brick and mortar library, in Florida or worthy educational cause.


It's that simple... While the proof of my contentions is so deep and wide, here and other places on the internet, any simple search and honest read will confirm this.ple search and honest read will confirm this.


(ps) SING IT OUT... IT'S time to DUMP Wikipeida in to the wood chipper...

With Community drama, nasty editors, and bad content, it is a wonder the thing is still around. Enforcing and strengthening the status quo alone should bring it down quickly.

I'm not sure an all out direct assault would even work. Tor proxies, dynamic IPs, "meatpuppetry," "sockpuppetry,"... it has all been done before.

I can't think of anything else except exposing the lies, liars, and lying liars on WP.

Jonny Cache you have a good idea, but you've only suggested vague theories. There needs to be more practical instruction.

All I can think of is to go around promoting reasons why people shouldn't donate. Maybe if their main large donors can be discouraged it would work.

Beat 'em or burn 'em?

An unlawful attack would only make wikipedia gain sympathy.

Practical...

1. Out all the admins

2. Lobby law makers as to the need for changes in the law that sheild those who in charge of administration of policy and content.

3. Vandalize it.

Conscientious folks like us have to encourage and help foster/develop anything that promotes widespread perceptual change in the culture - and I do mean world culture - which will lead to the social isolation and marginalization of those who identify themselves as Wikipedia contributors. And I actually think we're succeeding... It's a lot less socially acceptable to be a "Wikipedian" now than it was in 2005, or even just a year ago. You never hear people bragging about it these days, or talking about it as though it's something to be proud of.

Which it isn't, of course... The really hard-core types don't help their own cause much either, with the never-ending arrogance and supercilious attitude.

And if making fun of such people, and pointing out those attitudes doesn't work, we can always make an issue of the scary article length and depth-of-coverage they've given to this person.

But Mr. Crocker has 62 RS and V citations. James Madison, who is a dead President or something, wrote many of the Federalist Papers and is responsible for the Bill of Rights only has 32. But then Mr. Madison's article is shorter.

You'll probably find more on the Internet about Crocker than Madison, which shows the dangers of using the Internet as the major tool when compiling an encyclopaedia.

Vandalism just never really lasts.

Unless you and others keep hammering certain pages. This would force the pages to become fully protected and then no one could edit the page. Over time, people would abandon it completely.

And isn't that the point???

Besides, it's drives wikipeida to be more paranoid and crazy and more outrageous. The more goofy the admims become, the more wikipeida is diminished and dismissed as a nutter's paridise and haunt of the soros DU and Move on smear smear squads...

I thought... if 100 determined vandals were to hit wikipeida for over a one week period, it would, I bet, bring it to it's knees....

It's a quote from NOTLD. Go rent it.

Some of what WP is doing is good, though much of it is not. The way they're doing it is terrible, and that accounts for much of the bad. Rather than pointing my thumb downward (or upward) at the whole thing, I'd rather break it up into its parts and keep the ones that don't suck. There's a saying about babies and bath water that applies here.

Al

To quote an infamous joke: "What you mean, 'we,' white man?"

I have always assumed that the mission of this site was to hasten the demise of Wikipedia by exposing its corruption and absurdities, as well as by providing some more pointed exposés of individual conflicts of interest, such as in the pioneering research of Daniel Brandt and Wordbomb. My belief was that this in turn would provide an invaluable resource to honest journalists, resulting in work such as the Ohmynews article, and ultimately arriving at a point where Google and other search engines would stop flogging Wikipedia articles out of sheer embarassment.

The enemy of my enemy is my friend... There is no reforming wikipedia. That a dream that is not going to happen in this side of hell.

Now that strategy you have is good too...

Don't know about "burying" Wikipedia -- it's general premise has merit -- I would like to bury most of it's policies though.

To me Wikipedia is a cult, with a mindset to go with it.

Lexicons like WP:MAKEUPYOUROWNRULEABBREVIATIONHERE is but one of my beefs with this "organization" that would make Occam cry in his cups. 10001 rules, that half decent admins can "cure" with about 12.

The main problem with Wikipedia is that democracy can't run itself -- it simply can't, as it'll border on anarchy and make access and sharing knowledge a Grand Mal convulsion (government of the mob, for the mob rule). At the same time, draconian measures that are too flexible, causes confusion and dischord with the very people an encyclopedia wishes to attract.

Let's face it Wikipedia won't attract the caliber of editors it needs to fulfill it's vision, as such folks work for a living. They can't police the articles for errors anymore than Bill Gates can fix your Windows. That leaves us with 15 year-old Manga lovers policing very heady topics that are the purpose of an encyclopedia -- not Pokeman and Digiman trivia.

Wikipedia needs to be rethought -- and get the cult leader out of it, as his minions imitate him which causes even more convulsions.

Could whoever substituted asterisks (*) for the currency symbols (¤) in my topic title please undo that change? The asterisks just don't look right.

Many Thanks,

Jonny

Oh, alright, I guess I'll continue, but only under protest.

My plan is exactly what I keep saying it is. It is nothing more noxious than the Standard Technique Of Amplifying Effects (STOAE). It is the same tactic that one frequently uses to diagnose the defects of a system, to wit, or not, push its operating characteristics to their natural breaking point and analyze the results. The only reason that we haven't done this yet with Wikipedia is that we've all been treating it as an essential or irreplaceable system, instead of the wholly disposable mock-up of the real thing that it really is. We've all been guilty of babying and wikipampering a critter that has only become utterly spoiled rotten for all our fawning, obsequious, solicitous, sycophanatic, and Uriah Heepishly unctious blandishments of its every caprice.

But, like I keep saying, it's way past time for Wikipedia to start pulling its load on the same Hard Scrabble Farm where all the rest of us have to scratch out our Daily Rutabagæ, or else …

Jonny

Something there is that doesn't love a truth …

So what are the major weaknesses of Wikipedia, the tiny crevices in the dike that even we good-bad-but-not-evil-doers hardly ever dream of widening more than trickle's worth?

Just off the cuff, I would have to say these —

1. Wikipediots don't really care about accountability.
2. Wikipediots don't really care about best practices.
3. Wikipediots don't really care about civil discourse.
4. Wikipediots don't really care about competence.
5. Wikipediots don't really care about free inquiry.
6. Wikipediots don't really care about knowledge.
7. Wikipediots don't really care about reality testing.
8. Wikipediots don't really care about scholarship.
9. Wikipediots don't really care about verifiability.
10. Wikipediots don't really care about truth.

It's clear that the flaws mentioned here are not wholly independent factors, so let's begin by thinking of ways to exploit Wikipedia's abject lack of concern for accountability, reality, and truth.

But right at the moment it's Happy Hour, so I'm outta here !!!

Jonny

Please. You didn't even lay your finger upon the iceberg, much less not even scratch it.

The big problem is is that Wikipedia is supposed to be an encyclopedia, you know, like those large reference books at the library, except done over the Internet and by the general public instead of by paid writers. However, somehow, pretty much everyone who is not under the radar seems to have forgotten this, and instead, they got caught up in what I like to call "meta bullshit". As my user page used to read, "If you're not working on articles, you're full of shit." It's incredibly unfortunate that a project with such a great goal got caught up in being this distracted. The problem here is that no one cares about the encyclopedia anymore.

I don't get to say this as much as I hear it … but … I have no idea what yer saying.

Maybe it's the Margaritas.

Maybe not.

Jonny

No, the problem is that it was never an encyclopedia, and nobody can turn it into one. It's certainly some sort of hyperlinked reference site, but that's all we can say for it. Perhaps, under better management, it could be turned into something that's in some ways as useful as an encyclopedia, but that's not going to happen until Jimbo exits the picture. For that matter, it won't happen unless what replaces Jimbo actually addresses the fundamental problems of WP, which are numerous and difficult.

Can we get a little "Welcome" to Messedrocker? I get confused, but I thought he was one of my "likable" editors on Wikipedia.

Greg

Ah yes I had noticed he was validating yesterday, welcome aboard Messedrocker!

Okay, I'm back, all sobered up by a really silly episode of Torchwood.

Reading Messedrocker's comments again, I see that he?she? has entirely missed the point of this thread. (Don't feel bad, MR, it wouldn't be the first time that someone tried to chute our RiverRunRevueRace in Medias Res without so much as a paddle.)

That's okay, paddling the paddle-challenged is what we do.

No, the point of this thread is not to enumerate every last flaw in the Wikipedian ice floe, to warn The Captain, much less Tennille, about the hazards to navigation that we see.

Like they say, BTDT, till we're blue in the face …

No, it's on to Plan 9 for this Xcursion.

Plan 9 ??? It's a little thing we like to call WR:POINT, to wit, or not —

Do Disrupt Wikipedia If It's The Only Phreaking Way You Can Get A RealWorld:POINT Through Their WP:POINTY Little Heads.

Capiche ???

Jonny

A better product, a better alternative.

What can I say? I know that quite a few of us have been devoting energies to other wiki models, other wiki projects. For my part, that includes Wikinfo, GetWiki, Textop (On Hiatus), Citizendium (DOA), OpenCycle (Defunked), PlanetMath, Centiare, and 3 or 4 that I'll keep to myself. Centiare has the best model of any of these, but a good model can be destroyed by a bad user population, so we'll just have to see what develops over time.

Meanwhile, time to take out the trash …

Jonny

Yep, defacing a website makes Wikipedia Review look like the good guys!



My bad -- I accidentally walked into the middle of this thread, saw your comment, and reacted thusly.



Actually, I don't remember interacting with you on Wikipedia much, if at all. But thanks for the greeting!

Well, we sort of interacted over on Digg, but I thought you were clearly joking by posting that link and summarizing it the way you did. Sounded tongue-in-cheek to me, but maybe you seriously think there's no connection between Wikia and Wikipedia, in which case you would be off your "rocker".

Greg

Xchange yer pleasantries ∑where else, δøøδs, this is not a social nitwarping site — or do I have sic DragonMeTwoTimes on ya!?

Jonny

Monday, Monday …

So let's go back to the last time that we were even remotely on topic — sorry to be such a kvetch about it — and pick it up from there.

One thing I notice in reviewing the e-gress of this thread so far is that many people are still not getting what I'm actually saying — they seem to keep hearing echoes of past messages from the Wikipediot Noise-O-Sphere that override what I'm writing here and now.

I'm not talking about yer Ruin of the Mill WP:VANDALISM, as the concept is mis-conceived Over Dey in WikiParma.

If that Flawed And Irresponsible Research Turkey (FAIRT) called Wikipedia has taught us anything, it is that one person's vandalism is another person's encyclopedia.

I know this because I first started noticing Wikipedia only a couple of years ago when its agents started vandalizing my search engine result pages on the variety of topics that I routinely surf in pursuit of my own research work. I never went looking for their brand of trouble, but there it was, in my face.

Okay, so I used to be dumb enough to buy that bit about fixing errors when you see them, and that trapped me into wasting a year of my life finding out just what a Big Φreakin Lie (BΦL) that was. I see now that many more experienced folks — like Seigenthaler, Sr., just for starters — were far too smart to fall for a line like that. So I can chalk that year up to a learning experience. Still, the fact remains that the graffiti generated by WikiPhagin Jimbo's WikiPickPocket Platoons is nothing short of vandalism to me.

So let's try to be clear about that from now on.

Jon Awbrey

Industrial grade Vandalism...

If I understand Jonny correctly, WP's policies, structure, and mentality will lead to its doom. We should endeavor to encourage rather than discourage WP's flaws to hasten its apocalypse. For instance, when the NY Times writes an opinion piece on WP criticizing it, we encourage WP to redirect the Times article to Clown (maybe this isn't a good example, but you know what I mean... or you don't). The site will become so absurd with all its flaws exposed, it will lose prominence in the eyes of its readers.

In other words, we help WP fall on its own sword.

I think that's what Jonny is saying. Correct me if I'm wrong, Jonny. I often am.

I'd say that sounds about right to me.

I could not agree more. My signature says it all:

I need to revamp a whole new crew of sockpuppets, then. Drink some of the Kool-Aid, and get into HiveMode. I will become as ridiculous as the enemy.

All right, time's up, let's do this. LEEEEROYYYYYYY NNNNJJJJENKINNNNNSSSSSS ! ! !

Greg

I do not do vandalism.

I bear a responsibility to the unsuspecting reader that prevents me from doing that.

It may be time to open another thread where we discuss the definition of vandalism, especially since Wikipediots have warped so many unsuspecting reader's unformed senses or formerly good senses about the meanings of so many concepts.

But I do not consider erasing the deceptive, derogatory, and destructive graffiti of others to constitute vandalism.

I consider it my duty to continue calling the General Public's attention to the acts and the so-called works of deceptive, derogatory, and destructive vandals of the Public Sphere, even if it is necessary to post a few bills over the so-called works of those vandals, to stage a few non-violent protests, sit-down strikes, street-theater mock-ins, or teach-ins in the vicinity of those vandals' activities.

Jon Awbrey

Yes, that's a good way of putting it.

I have been through a variety of different conversion experiences — Dark Nights of the Soul — in regard to how I view Wikipedia. The last but not the most negative one brought me to revise my sense of what tactics are presently demanded in order to deal with a threat that I now recognize as placing the public interest in far more serious jeopardy than I had ever realized before.

But it's Friday, and much too Felicitous a Fall day for such dread thoughts.

Jon Awbrey

It works for me... but the only thing I have concern with, during this time, wikipeida is like a bear with a slow bleeding wound... its mortally wounded and will die, but the question is how long and who does the Bear Mawl and kill, while it's dieing???

You idea, has merit in that it's probable the one thing that will kill it, but I'm would like to see nuclear weapons used on it and wikpedia left a hunk of smoking, radioactive dog shit.

The criterion of success in this effort is the same that allows Wikipediots to claim success in default of quality — as everyone who has been paying attention now recognizes quality to be wholly incidental to their enterprise — and the threshold of choice is simply whether the overall process goes viral or not, either Coming To Be, as they would have it, or Passing Away, as we would leave it.

Jon Awbrey

Where Were We (WWW) ???

Seems like we left off here —


I remember making a list of things to remember somewhere on this thread, and then it seems like I picked out two of the most critical points to tackle first.

I will backtrack from this point to see if I can remember what I was trying to say and how far we had gotten with the pre-action analysis of feasible lines of attack.

ATTACK ??? ATTACK !!!

Heaven forbid we should have a plan of attack …

Jon Awbrey