<$BlogRSDUrl$> Marcus P. Zillman, M.S., A.M.H.A. Author/Speaker/Consultant
Marcus P. Zillman, M.S., A.M.H.A. Author/Speaker/Consultant
Internet Happenings, Events and Sources


Thursday, December 18, 2003  

Virtual Community Makes Open Source Encyclopedia Succeed
http://firstmonday.org/issues/issue8_12/ciffolilli/index.html

An open source encyclopedia seems to defy all logic. Anyone can contribute -- and anyone can change, deface or erase the information it contains. Yet Wikipedia is successful for several reasons. First, it's being constructed by a purpose-built virtual community, whose members share the same goals and passions. Another factor is the low cost associated with IT and virtual communities. In a way, technology has virtually eliminated transaction costs for editing and updating information. This not only stimulates development of the community and the project, it provides a full exploitation of massive collaboration economies. Another secret of Wikipedia's success is its "creative construction" of information, rather than a "creative destruction" of it. Initially, some observers expected an endless war among reliable contributions, as well as graffiti attacks that would deface and delay the development of the Web site. In reality, that hasn't happened. Every change made to every article is stored; unapproved modifications can be undone with a single click. Thus, hackers and graffiti artists waste more of their time and effort trying to litter a page than administrators require to correct it. Through this mechanism of editing and undoing meaningless changes or graffiti, an evolutionary process is fostered. Among other results, that means only the best contributions survive.

posted by Marcus Zillman | 12:16 PM
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