Wikipedia: The Cunctator/How to destroy Wikipedia

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Be in Charge and Be a Dick

Delete Entries

Deleting entries or content from entries is just a bad fucking idea 99% of the time. Appeals to NPOV are used as a club for deleting content. Most of the time it's just censorship. And censorship on Wikipedia leads to arms races.

There is a 1% when it's a good idea, but the abusers of the NPOV believe it's more like 80%.

On your Own, Totally Redesign the Wikipedia Software, and Implement it Without Testing

Or, Act Like Microsoft

Magnus Manske is a great person, and he's put immense amounts of effort into designing new Wikipedia software. And he's loaded it with so many new features and capabilities that noone has any idea how it will affect Wikipedia.

Since there's essentially no documentation, mission plan, or any other standard practice for quality software engineering, it's guaranteed to be a monster.

And the only one who will have any idea how to deal with it will be Manske, in part since he's using the lesser-known PHP (but that is a minor concern compared to the individuality of the code).

The current UseModWiki code is hard to understand, but it's deliberately very, very limited in its capabilities. That puts more power in the users and less in the technology.

He's wielding great power without any checks. Those who have power should be forced to justify their actions. Those with great power need to be assiduous in doing so. Manske essentially has infinite power right now.

For anyone who isn't worried about this, just think for a second about Microsoft products.

Make big plans on the Mailing List

The mailing list is the semi-secret repository for the behind-the-scenes scheming to change Wikipedia. The intentions are good, but the technology necessarily engenders the secrecy, which inevitably leads to the "We shall act for the Good of the People" mentality that is very dangerous without strong checks and balances.

Set up a Cabal

Setting up hierarchies is always a temptation, and is why anarchism never works.

Wikipedia is a noble attempt at a limited anarchistic society, but there are now people clamoring to destroy it.

Cabals (and secrecy) are why Dmoz is a horrible, infighting, arbitrary mess, which ultimately reflects its corporate-megalith ownership.

They're why Usenet is a big pain in the ass, filled with loud-mouthed pricks without any humility.

They're why people join Slashdot, karma whore, and then leave.

The proponents of the Cabal see only the benefits of setting up a cabal, and none of the dangers. The benefits are efficiency through the concentration of power. They use the classic arguments states have always used to take away freedoms--the dangerous, mythical insidious lawbreaker (aka the crypto-Communist, the terrorist, etc. See the movie Brazil).

Choice quotation: [1]

: If someone vandalises "the Snakehandling Foursquare Gospel Church of

 Upper Appalachia", chances are few people will have seen it before it

gets fixed. But you can do subtle damage in "Religion" that could be much more long-lasting, not even maliciously, just out of ignorance.

Proponents of the Cabal:

From the main source of Wikipedia cabalism so far, the Wikipedia-L:

[Jimmy Wales makes a model proposal]

[Michel Clasquin proposes a preliminary cabal]

[Mark Christensen "I generally think this is a good idea", proposing taking away Wikipedian freedoms]

1 Karma Point (KP) for signing up with a username
2 KP for each day in which you've edited an existing article
3 KP for each day you add a new article.
At 60 KP, you have basic privileges (Editing the home page and the like).
100 KP you can block an IP address, user ID#, or user alias temporarily (24 hours)
200+ KP you can mark an article for deletion (see the reference for details)

etc. I'll continue this later.

Hi. Dave Doolin here. aka DMD sometimes, but usually prefer to hide behind my ip address. Not so much that I care who knows my name... it's emotional self preservation! I wrote on Manning's home page a while back that wikipedia is fun as long as one strictly observes 2 rules, without exception:

: 1. Do not *ever* write an article on a subject for which you are an academic or professional expert, as recognized by your peers.

: 2. Never, ever, ever write anything on a subject for which you have more than the slightest emotional attachement.

Following these rules, I am able to check into wikipedia a few times a week, read some cool stuff, occasionally to contribute material I find interesting, and, if I'm lucky, maybe poke fun at Larry a little bit, because he takes everything so seriously.

I do have a suggestion about the format and "rules". Back in white trash country where I came of age, we had a saying: "If it ain't broke, don't fix it." The only "rule" I would add, if I were the wikipope, is limiting participation for everyone to some finite number of edits per day.