On Mon, Jan 23, 2012 at 8:16 AM, MZMcBride <[email protected]> wrote: > Yao Ziyuan wrote: >> This merit is even more evident when the topic is very specialized, >> e.g. [[Phonological history of English low back vowels]]. I bet there >> isn't a forum on the Web dedicated to this very specialized topic, and >> even if there is one, it can be very hard to find it with Google >> (because it may use a slightly different term to describe this topic). >> However, if every Wikipedia article has a corresponding comment >> section (actually a forum), people with this special interest >> ("phonological history of English low back vowels") will know where to >> go to find each other, forming a "special interest group" (SIG). > > I think it's an interesting idea for an outside group to take on. It'd be > trivial to re-use Wikimedia's content (page titles or page titles + page > text) to create a discussion forum for all kinds of neat articles. But given > the cost-benefit analysis for the Wikimedia Foundation getting involved, I > don't see it as a very good idea. Lots of costs (implementation and > development of the software, monitoring comments, page load increase, etc.) > and not many benefits (see below).
That outside group could be Google (Google Groups in particular). > > While I appreciate your optimistic view of comments on the Internet, I'm > generally of the view that the Web needs fewer comment sections, not more. > Has anyone ever found (for example) a YouTube comment insightful or useful? > Ever? Occasionally a news site with some kind of noise filter (up-votes or > the like) can produce an occasional comment that's not completely awful and > useless. Most comment sections are filled with vile language (if people are > paying viewing the content) or spam (if people aren't). > > It's certainly a reasonable idea for a MediaWiki extension, if such an > extension doesn't exist already. Many MediaWiki extensions already do this. As said in my original message: There are many MediaWiki extensions that can add a comment section to every Wikipedia article. Just go to http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Extension_Matrix/AllExtensions and search for "comment" or "discussion". > > MZMcBride > > > > _______________________________________________ > foundation-l mailing list > [email protected] > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l _______________________________________________ foundation-l mailing list [email protected] Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
