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Wikipedia Businesses The Internet

Meet the 36 People Who Run Wikipedia 140

Posted by samzenpus from the who's-running-things dept.
blastboy writes By pretty much any logic, Wikipedia shouldn't work: A vast website, built on the labor of volunteers, with very few tangible rewards and a fairly weird hierarchy. From the article: "The stewards would prefer to go unnoticed. Only one has ever had any real fame—Wikipedia co-founder Jimmy Wales served as a steward from 2006 to 2009. They operate above the fray, giving and taking user privileges and intervening in matters that lower-ranking editors can’t handle. You can summon them for emergencies in the Wikimedia Stewards IRC chat room by typing '!steward.' Their secrecy has a certain irony, given the very public product they manage, but perhaps it’s emblematic of Wikimedia as a whole. When your foundational value is that 'every single human being can freely share in the sum of all knowledge,' hierarchies become a necessary evil."
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Meet the 36 People Who Run Wikipedia More

Meet the 36 People Who Run Wikipedia

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  • I have a friend that is a Steward and wrote a book (Score:4, Informative)

    by Saysys ( 976276 ) on Wednesday November 05, 2014 @05:08PM (#48321287)
    HI,

    While focused on an academic audience of organizational scholars, I have a friend who was a Steward and has written an ethnographic book about Wikipedia:
    http://www.amazon.com/gp/searc... [amazon.com]

    If you are more interested in accessible information he's also written an editorial regarding Wikipedia for Slate:
    http://www.slate.com/articles/... [slate.com]

  • egalite fraternite liberte (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward

    Wikipedia shows that productive non-market egalitarian collaboration on a very wide scale is possible.

    Peace to huts! War to palaces!

  • Stewards are usually like janitors* (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward

    At least on the English Wikipedia. There are a few times when actually make decisions, but by and large they are just the "key-holders" and implement decisions made by the community or by higher-up functionaries.

    * Yes I know, it's the administrators who are usually considered the janitors on the Wiki.

    • Re:Stewards are usually like janitors* (Score:5, Interesting)

      by Trepidity ( 597 ) <[delirium-slashdot] [at] [hackish.org]> on Wednesday November 05, 2014 @06:28PM (#48321841)

      In fact they're more or less prohibited from doing anything except janitorial work. For example they have the power to make someone into an administrator, but they are only supposed to do so in response to each Wikipedia's own community process deciding on it. Each wiki has its own process where you can request to become administrator, people can comment on the request, and there is some decision-making process. If the outcome is "yeah, make this person an administrator", then one of the stewards is supposed to make that person an admin. If they decided to just take some other person who hadn't been approved by the German Wikipedia, and turn them into an admin on the German Wikipedia, they'd quickly lose their own "steward" bit.

  • How do you even know these are the 36 people?! (Score:5, Insightful)

    by mandark1967 ( 630856 ) on Wednesday November 05, 2014 @05:11PM (#48321309) Homepage Journal

    Citation Needed or GTFO

  • What's wrong with hierarchy? (Score:2, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward

    We keep acting like it is a bad thing, but it does have value. Well-organized hierarchies and react quickly. I would fully expect Wikipedia to be run by a well-organized group. Otherwise it wouldn't be as consistent as it is. Frankly, it is a bit of a miracle just how high the quality is across the board.

    • Hierarchy is inherently by power over those below, say in taking decisions for them and making them follow those.

      The problem occurs when this is misused and it can always be in a organisation where one party has more control over decisions than others.
      Not just due to difference in interest of two parties, most common misuse is where this extra control is used to increase existing control itself thereby increasing
      power gap further.

  • Meet the 36 People Who Run Wikipedia (Poorly) (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 05, 2014 @05:13PM (#48321325)

    And because nobody pays attention to the stewards, they're not held accountable.

    • And because nobody pays attention to the stewards, they're not held accountable.

      To play devil's advocate: the fact that they're doing their jobs commendably well is possibly the reason nobody pays attention to them. So by that, they ARE held accountable. They just measure up pretty well under that accounting, so nobody complains about them (with the obvious notable exceptions).

      It's kind of like saying "and because nobody pays attention to the janitors at my workplace, they're not held accountable." You'd better bet that if things started going missing or the mess started to build up, people would pay attention pretty quickly.

      • Possibly the reason nobody pays attention to them is that they are good at not being seen, not being acknowledged, and coordinate in private to suppress dissent and present a common front. It's always "wikipedia is against you", not "the steward is against you".

    • Held accountable for what? This total free resource I can use with no strings attached, all the while when these guys have to deal with and moderate with various personalities and entities constantly trying to pervert Wikipedia from its mission.

      To me Wikipedia is a marvel to behold, a shining bastion of how not-to-be Facebook. I’m constantly amazed at the vitriol they endure when one or two contentious pages gets messed up by some self-aggrandizing a**hole. Nobody seems to stop or look at the literally millions of technical pages which get used on an everyday basis to solve real world problems – but instead focus on whether Justin Beber, Ron Paul, the Koch Brothers, or Monsanto are given a fair shake in their writeups.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by ihtoit ( 3393327 )

        not only that... you can also download the entire content for offline use (ENwiki text runs 40GB or so, images runs half a Terabyte not including thumbnails). Incidentally, anyone know how long it'd take to integrate ENwiki on a dual core 1.6 netbook with 1GB of RAM?

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by guises ( 2423402 )
        It's a totally free resource if all you do is read it and don't contribute. If you do contribute then you've helped to pay for it with your time and effort and, in my opinion, have every right to be upset when some scummy admin comes along and reverts your edit because... something. Oftentimes it's that ridiculous "encyclopedic" requirement, other times it's more self-serving [searchenginepeople.com].

        The real marvel of Wikipedia is that it has managed to thrive despite its editors.

      • "Held accountable for what? This total free resource I can use with no strings attached"

        Have you noticed something? Wikia is wikipedia's sister project, but it is for profit, unlike Wikipedia. Wikia has an immensely high google rating. If you make a wiki about a specific topic on your own site, spend a long time building it up, some random person making a wikia wiki with the same name will easily outrank you in google searches.

        If your project started out on wikia, woe to you. You can come in, but you can ne

  • Not what it once was (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward

    Whether it's the inevitability of your contribution being superseded and "overriden" eventually, or your efforts being reverted instantly (on controversial topics where the editor has an existing predisposition), one really should go into it knowing that their addition will likely be discarded one way or another.

    For me personally, that means finding other venues in which to attempt to contribute--Slashdot's historical sister site Everything2, regardless of Wikipedia ultimately "winning" in popularity, actua

  • From TFA:

    So, from the angle of political economy, sociology, or just common sense, Wikimedia shouldnâ(TM)t existâS

    Which Wikimedia/Wikipedia shouldn't exist? The mythical, idealized one - or the actual, real one? The two actually have very little to do with each other.

    • The two actually have very little to do with each other.

      They have in common all that matters for the point being made, which is that it's surprising that unpaid, unorganised contributors can make something worthwhile, even in the face of vandals/trolls, and on a limited budget.

      Wikipedia's imperfections are not relevant here.

      • Wikipedia's imperfections are not relevant here.

        Not only are they not relevant here, but they compare very well to traditionally respected organizations like Encyclopedia Britannica.

        I actually believe you're more likely to find bias and agenda at EB than at Wikipedia, which is rather amazing considering Wiki is free and crowd-sourced.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by ihtoit ( 3393327 )

          my mother still has her copy of the 1972 EB - 32 volumes of it in red hardcover. As a kid I'd sit there and read them cover to cover (don't ask). The *isms just bleeding out of those pages boggles the mind. Volumes 1 and 2 of the New World Children's Encyclopedia (which she also has) is even scarier.

          • As a kid I'd sit there and read them cover to cover (don't ask).

            I knew I couldn't be the only one. I liked the smell of the leather binding. Our set was the revised 14th edition when it was put out by the University of Chicago. It's one of the reasons I knew I wanted to go there even when I was 9 years old. That and because my parents had this cool book about Enrico Fermi (we were an Italian-American household) and I could imagine his nuclear reactor under the Stagg Field bleachers. Those books were lov

            • I knew I couldn't be the only one.

              Count me in as a charter member of the "Weird Kids Club" as well. It's sad that more kids didn't then and don't now have more of a passion for learning just for its own sake.

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by mvdwege ( 243851 )
            The only EB I had access to until now has been the 1911 edition. But that is full of British Imperial bias. Do newer editions finally mention the Raid on the Medway to De Ruyter's biography, for example?

  • Wiki hype (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 05, 2014 @05:46PM (#48321569)

    >"...your foundational value is that 'every single human being can freely share in the sum of all knowledge'"...

    Hah. If I could only count the number of factually correct pages that have disappeared over the years for failure to be "relevant" or "sufficiently important" or whatever metric they use, I'd be counting pretty damn high. Care about a regionally famous indie band from the mid 90's to the point that you'll carefully assemble what little information is out there about them? Too bad, gone in a blink, as if archive.org were complete and searchable for that stuff.

    I've just never understood why something true should be excluded there.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by praxis ( 19962 )

      >"...your foundational value is that 'every single human being can freely share in the sum of all knowledge'"...

      Hah. If I could only count the number of factually correct pages that have disappeared over the years for failure to be "relevant" or "sufficiently important" or whatever metric they use, I'd be counting pretty damn high. Care about a regionally famous indie band from the mid 90's to the point that you'll carefully assemble what little information is out there about them? Too bad, gone in a blink, as if archive.org were complete and searchable for that stuff.

      I've just never understood why something true should be excluded there.

      While it would be nice to have information about everything, those that are paying the bills for storage, replication and transmission have decided that there has to be a line somewhere or the data set gets too large. While I wish there were no line I do understand why one might exist.

      • Re: (Score:3)

        by ihtoit ( 3393327 )

        4.5 million pages, 40GB data set (just text), hell my PHONE has space for that.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by praxis ( 19962 )

          There's more than just text and you forgot to include transmission, replication, off-site backups and updates. I'm not saying it's undoable, but it does take resources and those resources are donated to the public good so limitations are present.

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by ihtoit ( 3393327 )

            I deliberately didn't include anything but the single tier current text dataset because that's all that concerns me at the minute. I'm not bothered with images or any of the other media.

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by praxis ( 19962 )

              Fair enough, but you are but one user of the service and we should probably look at why they have their policy from their perspective rather than one user's.

    • > I've just never understood why something true should be excluded there.

      If anyone can post anything and nothing is excluded, you end up with the internet.
      They are trying to build an encyclopedia, not the internet. Most of the comments on this page are true, but they don't belong in an encyclopedia.

    • All content that is of no political or economic importance, they would rather see on Wikia. Wikia is for profit, they can make money off your work there. That is, in a nutshell, why wikipedia is deletionist.

      On wikipedia proper, the only reward they get is being able to control narratives. Wikipedia policies give plenty of wiggle room to include and exclude certain facts and frame things to one side's benefit, especially if you're an insider in their culture, know how to play their game. Thus, controversial

  • So what does not work? (Score:3)

    by Opportunist ( 166417 ) on Wednesday November 05, 2014 @05:47PM (#48321581)

    Time and again people surface to tell us just how unjust Wikipedia's editing is, how unfair their Stewards are, how biased and whatnot it is... While staying deliberately vague and nonsensical. Point to an article that is biased, unjust and wrong and let's see it for ourselves or STFU!

    • Point to an article that is biased, unjust and wrong and let's see it for ourselves or STFU!

      And even if a biased, unjust and wrong article were to exist, I could find out who the editors were and when revisions were made and watch the behind-the-scenes process in the Talk page.

      I don't really mind the possibility of bias, as long as it's out on the table for discussion and open to correction. I don't recall any other encyclopedia having a Talk page.

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by labnet ( 457441 )

      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B... [wikipedia.org]

      Have a look at the talk page.
      Regardless of what you think of the subject, the article is clearly biased. Read the thread under ''What about these studies then ?''

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by rtb61 ( 674572 )

        Problem with 'Studies' is that PR=B$ agencies manufacture very cheap studies. Get a few corrupt qualified people pretty much at the bottom end of their profession and get them to put their name to a corrupted study where the results and conclusion where well know prior to the cheapest possible study being done or even just pretending to have been done. Stink tanks about full of psychopaths paid to prepare lies to be fed to corporate mass media.

      • Re:So what does not work? (Score:5, Insightful)

        by linuxrocks123 ( 905424 ) on Wednesday November 05, 2014 @07:34PM (#48322233) Homepage Journal

        Wikipedia's "No original research" policy is second in asininity only to its "let's delete articles because we can" policy.

        • Re:So what does not work? (Score:5, Insightful)

          by linuxrocks123 ( 905424 ) on Wednesday November 05, 2014 @07:52PM (#48322345) Homepage Journal

          The thing I hate most is the "consensus" obsession. It leads to -- and I've seen this even though I rarely contribute -- people just making shit up about Wikipedia policies to support their positions and claiming it's "consensus". A lot of it comes down to who has groupthink on their side and, even more troublingly, who can bluff and bluster the best.

          Wikipedia's community is toxic. I'm amazed the results are as good as they are, and it saddens me that the site could probably be so much better if it were better managed.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by ihtoit ( 3393327 )

          I think what they mean by "No original research" is reflected in their mission to be a reference of references - where if something needs to be verified the buck doesn't stop at wikipedia. The citation trail stops elsewhere. This might not appeal to a lot of people who really want just one stop for information (to satisfy their utter laziness) and mistakenly rely on wikipedia to be that one stop, so they vent their frustrations at the wrong people (wikipedia) when they get told on forums such as this that "

          • I can see where it comes from. It was born of good intentions. But see my other comment http://slashdot.org/comments.p... [slashdot.org] for why I think it (along with the effectively sadist-run deletion policy) needs to go.

            Re the deletion BS: I wouldn't even care about that so much now that we have DeletionPedia if they would just TURN OVER ALL THE DELETED PAGES TO DELETIONPEDIA so they can be preserved THERE if Wikipedia doesn't want them. No excuse for not doing this unless they actually want to CENSOR the pages ins

        • Selective enforcement is the name of the game. For just about anything disagreeable, you can find a rule to banish from wikipedia - as long as you know the game and have the clout.

    • That's easy.

      Wikipedia's idiotic "No Trivia" policy.

      As they say "One man's trivia is another man's useless data."

      Just because _you_ don't find the information useful does _not_ imply _no one_ finds the information interesting.

      I _like_ knowing about cultural references, easter eggs, trivia, in movies, games, books, etc.

  • They don't meet notability requirements (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Citations needed.

    • pretty much.That's what shits me about wikipedia.

      When you navigate to a page and there's a header saying that the page is scheduled for deletion. Hello? I found the page useful and anyone else searching for information on the topic may also.

      It's particularly annoying when a wikipedia article references another page. "examples of X are A, B and C". You navigate to B and it may or may not be there if some wiki-editor was in a bad mood.

  • From Wikipedia's Statement of Principles [wikipedia.org]:

    Newcomers are always to be welcomed. There must be no cabal, there must be no elites, there must be no hierarchy or structure which gets in the way of this openness to newcomers.

    Personally, I lost interest in contributing to it a few years ago when the sort of constructive, well intended stuff I had always contributed began to get reverted on a regular basis. I still contribute occasionally, but only things that are still unlikely to be reverted, that is, minor cleanups of articles that nobody (else) reads.

    • From Wikipedia's Statement of Principles:

      Newcomers are always to be welcomed. There must be no cabal, there must be no elites, there must be no hierarchy or structure which gets in the way of this openness to newcomers

      .

      Personally, I lost interest in contributing to it a few years ago when the sort of constructive, well intended stuff I had always contributed began to get reverted on a regular basis. I still contribute occasionally, but only things that are still unlikely to be reverted, that is, minor cleanups of articles that nobody (else) reads.

      The problem with Wikipedia is one we've seen with Communism, repeated over again.

      Or as Animal Farm put it, "All animals are equal, just some are more equal than others".

      We've seen it happen with Wikipedia - the statement you quoted pretty much says "everyone is equal", and we've seen it deteriorate to "everyone is equal, but some are more equal than others".

    • There must be no cabal, there must be no elites, there must be no hierarchy or structure which gets in the way of this openness to newcomers.

      The important part is the "...which gets in the way of this openness to newcomers". They're not saying there will be no hierarchy, just that it won't change the mission.

      Personally, I lost interest in contributing to it a few years ago

      Yes, I noticed a marked improvement in the quality of articles around 2012. Though since you've left there hasn't been a single update

  • There are more than 36 bullies on Wikipedia.

  • ... very few tangible rewards and a fairly weird hierarchy ...

    Sounds like the Roman Catholic Church. Possibly without the sex.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by ihtoit ( 3393327 )

      this is the internet. There is no sex. Unless you count those weird contortionists on Redtube.

  • By Manuel De Landa: http://www.t0.or.at/delanda/me... [t0.or.at]
    "To make things worse, the solution to this is not simply to begin adding meshwork components to the mix. Indeed, one must resist the temptation to make hierarchies into villains and meshworks into heroes, not only because, as I said, they are constantly turning into one another, but because in real life we find only mixtures and hybrids, and the properties of these cannot be established through theory alone but demand concrete experimentation. Certain st

  • What is this? (Score:2, Informative)

    by Curunir_wolf ( 588405 )
    It seems more and more stories on /. are just native advertising. Digging through all the stories to find something interesting is like digging through an email account with no spam filters.

    • Medium is like a crowd-sourced blog with no ads... what's the issue you have with it?

      Of all the BS on Slashdot, this is much more akin to its roots of aggregating less-know tech articles.

      • Medium is like a crowd-sourced blog with no ads... what's the issue you have with it?

        Of all the BS on Slashdot, this is much more akin to its roots of aggregating less-know tech articles.

        Ummm... No. Medium is not really "crowd-sourced". And it certainly has ads, it just doesn't have "obvious" advertising of products, rather the whole thing is to include lots of "native advertising". Or ... "product placement" if you prefer. I signed up for Medium a long time ago. I do like some of the stories - some are informative in that they prompt me to research deeper in some topics. But don't suffer from the illusion that this is some popular, organically grown blog site, with authors submitting

  • No. Not by any logic. By a gut feeling and 'common' sense, then yes.

  • 36.... 36.... 36....

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/T... [wikipedia.org]

    now just drop in a tesla 'mysteries of the 3 6 9' and you've got a winner!

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