On Sat, Feb 27, 2016 at 8:44 PM, Anna Stillwell <astillw...@wikimedia.org> wrote:
> Jimmy, > > I have a ridiculous amount of respect for you and what you have > accomplished. I have watched from afar (I was living a lot in other > countries) as this radical experiment in trust *exploded* on to the world. > It blew my mind. And some of the early rules that were set were nothing > short of genius (e.g. NPOV, AGF and due weight come to mind). It was an > ideal experiment: an open frontier with simple, limited rule sets. And the > icing on the cake is that "citation needed" ended up not just influencing > how I thought about an encyclopedic text, but how I thought about > discussing ideas. > Anna, Hold on just a moment. :) It's important to understand that Jimmy Wales didn't accomplish the things you speak of alone. First of all, the person who originally had the idea for Wikipedia was Larry Sanger.[1] Jimmy Wales reportedly thought at the time people would find the idea of an encyclopedia anyone can edit "objectionable".[2] But he let Sanger try it. That it "took off" was a surprise to everyone at the time! Sanger coined the name "Wikipedia"[3] and invited the first contributors.[4] Sanger wrote Nupedia's Non-bias policy, the precursor to NPOV, but Jimmy Wales made important input to the NPOV policy later on, in particular the "due weight" principle.[5] Sanger was Wikipedia's editor-in-chief in its early days, and had far more hands-on involvement in guiding the development of the project in its childhood. (Jimmy Wales made just 21 edits to Wikipedia in the year 2002, according to his edit history, while Sanger made hundreds.) "Assume good faith" was created by Morwen in March 2004. I'm not aware that Jimmy Wales had any role in its creation (he was hardly around on-wiki in the months prior to March 2004). So let's not forget that Wikipedia has always been the work of many people. :) That includes its fundamental policies. > So it is from that genuine respect base that I disagree with you on this > particular point: > > "> I would love to know whether you supported Lila Tretikov's departure. It > is > > clear that she did not up and resign on her own, and I would like to know > > if you were one of the folks who thought her departure would be > beneficial, > > or if you preferred she "weather the storm," so to speak. > > I supported it with sadness. The whole thing is a sad train wreck." > > I do not think this is a train wreck. I think this is one of the hottest > moments since this genius encyclopedia exploded onto the world. > > People are engaged. > Here I wholeheartedly agree with you. :) One of the best things to have come out of this is that there are bonds between volunteers and staff that have never been there before. These are exciting times. Best, Andreas [1] https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikipedia-l/2001-October/000671.html [2] http://web.archive.org/web/20030414014355/http://www.nupedia.com/pipermail/nupedia-l/2001-January/000676.html [3] http://web.archive.org/web/20030414021138/http://www.nupedia.com/pipermail/nupedia-l/2001-January/000680.html [4] http://web.archive.org/web/20010506042824/www.nupedia.com/pipermail/nupedia-l/2001-January/000684.html [5] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Neutral_point_of_view#History _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, <mailto:wikimedia-l-requ...@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe>
