W4. Discuss Reagle's Chapters 1-2. ByoungHyun Chun(천병헌)

W4. Discuss Reagle's Chapters 1-2.

Information sociology

2015048986 천병헌

1. Summary

  Chapter 1 introduces the encyclopedia and its vision of culture and collaboration.
Wikipedia is not just an online multilingual encyclopedia. 
While Web sites are useful, popular, and allow almost everyone to contribute,
the site is only the most visible artifact of the active community.
Wikipedia is to realize the historical pursuit of a universal encyclopedia
that pursues a vision that is based on technology that increases access to information
with even greater human consent, even if it is faulty. 
  Wikipedia does not currently share all wikis, but it has many features. We will see a link explaining how to sign in to the page of interest
and display or edit the favorite links. We can also use page history to show all changes about the page. We can easily compare different versions.
  Wikipedia has more than 75,000 active contributors. Given its size, it is not trivial to understand what Wikipedia actually contains. It takes a lot of work to make Wikipedia consistently high-quality reference work.
  There are three core policies that are central to understanding Wikipedia. The POV policy recognizes a number of views and provides an epistemological position. Two other policies of "NO Original Research" and "Verifiability" relate to attributes that mean "all material on Wikipedia must be attributable to a trusted and published source."

  Chapter 2 describes the pursuit of a universal encyclopedia. This chapter 2 explains the value of the technology associated with information accessibility needed to create Wikipedia. This chapter 2 tells about the technological development of each country and can tell what kind of atmosphere it has before the emergence of Wikipedia. Describe the origins of Wikipedia through the achievements of Otlet and Wells. On the one hand, the development of bibliography is similar to the Wikipedia classification of knowledge. T
he classification method of Otlet is similar to Wikipedia's classification and creed.
Wells believed that "Encyclopedias efficiently store knowledge and ultimately the world can be integrated." Also, Wells' "world brain" concept is very similar to the Wikipedia view.
Projects discussed in 'Project Xanadu, Project Gutenberg, Interpedia, Nupedia, and GNUPedia / GNE' are attempts to realize a universal vision of new directions through the development of technology. As a result of various discussions and projects, Wikipedia has become a useful encyclopedia. It was not an ideal form, but it became an encyclopedia of free form. There are failures and mispredictions, but over the years people have been trying to compensate for the shortcomings.

2. Interesting Point

  I have largely focused on the minority and the majority. The place of Wikipedia is a huge space.
People fill a variety of information in different languages ​​in the space. And Many people communicate in real time.
This place is a representative space of collective intellect, but I have tried to think about this book.
 In the book, Jimmy Wales said, "half the edits by logged in users belong to just 2.5% of logged in users". It was interesting that only 2.5% of the people performed a fairly large number of edits. At first, I thought it was a lot of people involved. However, it was interesting that a few number of people are modifying various information in detail and gradually. However, in order to support a few number of Wikipedia editors, a large number of spectators or people with little participation are needed. They may make various criticisms of their information. It is also possible to participate in editing Wikipedia information at any time. Ironically, in the book, Wikipedia made it easier for people to access by making a way to modify web pages. Of course, easy access is possible, but as mentioned above, a few number of editors produce a lot of information. It is possible that misinformation may be introduced by a minority of editors, and that it may incite people by uploading biased information or political writings. I think it is a vulnerable part of the collective intelligence that is characteristic of the place of Wikipedia.
 

3. Discussion Point

  I would also like to discuss the students about 'the minorities and the majority'. 
Many people participate in Wikipedia. However, it was found that only 2.5% of the editors were actually active editors.
There is a possibility that some of these editors may incite people by posting wrong or biased information. So, I want to ask the following questions.
How important is the attitude of the passive participants to Wikipedia? Rather, Will not many passive observers play a more important role in Wikipedia than a few active editors?