08/27/09: Ballroom Blitz @ Wikimania
Category: Social Netizens
Posted by: scott
Other Categories: Social Netizens , Interfaces , Sustainability , of course , Business , Innovation , Information Visualization
NYT - A War of Words Over Wikipedia’s Spanish Version
Much like the concern over the hegemony of DNS by english speaking countries (dominated by the US), this speaks volumes about the problems of global information and recalls the famous (but little recognized) 'Kitchen Debates' where Kruschev and Nixon debated the power of information transfer across political and social boundaries. Information wants to be free and technical systems want to be consistent. Neutrality is a manifestation of politics though - political systems do not mesh well with technical ones. Martin Wattenberg's visualization of Wikipedia definitions over time speak to this issue. They basically suggest that definition-wars resolve themselves over time as long as there is sufficient participation from parties with different views.
The takeaway? Wikipedia is a discussion not a dictionary.
Much like the concern over the hegemony of DNS by english speaking countries (dominated by the US), this speaks volumes about the problems of global information and recalls the famous (but little recognized) 'Kitchen Debates' where Kruschev and Nixon debated the power of information transfer across political and social boundaries. Information wants to be free and technical systems want to be consistent. Neutrality is a manifestation of politics though - political systems do not mesh well with technical ones. Martin Wattenberg's visualization of Wikipedia definitions over time speak to this issue. They basically suggest that definition-wars resolve themselves over time as long as there is sufficient participation from parties with different views.
The takeaway? Wikipedia is a discussion not a dictionary.
