User talk:Pizzabot/Citizendium/Archive2

Reuben sandwich
Not sure this should be listed as an article failure or, indeed, a CZ failure - this sort of idiocy is, after all, a frequently-observed emergent effect of putting a bunch of nerds on a wiki and telling them to write an encyclopedia. The forum discussion about it, however, is car-crash in all directions. Also, everyone who's left CZ is just a whiner, particularly if they show up here. But it's okay! The charter will cure this sort of thing! - David Gerard (talk) 14:48, 4 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Love this:This is like 10 years ago when I had a nice girlfriend from Beijing for a while. Every morning she would stand on one side of the bed and I would stand on the other and together we would make it: with nice taut sheets, the blankets pulled neatly into place and smoothed out, the sheet and blanket tucked in, the cover pulled into place and tucked neatly over the four pillows, the edges of the cover just barely touching the floor on each side of the bed, the end-pieces, whatever they're called, of the cover tucked into the end side bars, and the two ornamental pillows with the same material on them as the cover arranged neatly against the other pillows. About once a week Hong would complain that I was making her waste her time by pulling the cover over another inch, or shifting a pillow a inch here or there.  "How come we can't just do it 99% right?" she demanded.  "Because if we're doing it all, we can take another five seconds and do it 100% right," I'd reply.  "Otherwise, why bother in the first place?"

My GOD! if I met that guy I'd feel very much like smashing his face in. Him (talk) 15:01, 4 August 2010 (UTC)


 * Your comment demonstrates that RW editors are VIOLENT THUGS who are out to DESTROY ENCYCLOPEDIA PROJECTS and also you are DOING MY BIDDING to SABOTAGE CZ for MY MASTERS AT WIKIPEDIA and JIMBO WALES. Deny this and lose all credibility - David Gerard (talk) 15:12, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

Ref links
The links in the references seem borked and not working... but seems to only be in the references, rather than in the body text, where they're fine. We're not using dpl on this page are we? 22:06, 4 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Tried a couple - the're working for me. Him (talk) 22:18, 4 August 2010 (UTC)
 * The links work, but the formatting is broken. This is because the MediaWiki parser is a box of pure unadulterated evil - David Gerard (talk) 22:24, 4 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Should be fixed - if we're talking about the same thing. One link was missing a closing "]". --Sid (talk) 22:44, 4 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Well spotted, have a cookie. 23:10, 4 August 2010 (UTC)
 * * nom nom nom* :) --Sid (talk) 23:35, 4 August 2010 (UTC)

Quality and reference check
This article is getting outside attention, and claims from the CZ forum that there's "an error on almost every line". The text looks mostly okay to me. But could you please turn a cynical eye to it, check the refs say what they do and litter with fact tags as appropriate? And that refs are of usable quality - the Terryeo reference is Encyclopedia Dramatica, and if someone wants to check what this article says then filling their browser with porn may be less than ideal - David Gerard (talk) 20:45, 6 August 2010 (UTC)
 * As a note, that forum thread is a full year old. Edit to add: I'm all for people doing a critical once-over, but the "error on almost every line" claim likely doesn't apply anymore, I hope. --Sid (talk) 01:23, 8 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Some of the "pseudoscience hits" are borderline. Best to stick with the most glaring examples. The factual information is good overall though I have not gone over everything with a fine tooth comb. But saying there is an error on almost every line is hyperbole.
 * Apart from this the article does too much editorializing. We don't need to tell the reader that the project is a failure and moribund and so on. Just lay out the facts of declining participation and the reader will see for himself. "Show, don't tell" as all good writers know. If the reader is too dumb to draw the obvious conclusion they're not worth trying to reach. Doctor Dark (talk) 18:52, 8 August 2010 (UTC)

Overbroadened expertise
Quote:


 * An editor who is a civil engineer with experience in road building would also have authority over articles on artificial hearts, which fall under biomedical engineering – it's all "engineering" to Citizendium. Likewise, a music editor would have authority over everything from plainchant to hip-hop.

This looks hypothetical. Are there real, referenceable examples? - David Gerard (talk) 14:08, 10 August 2010 (UTC)

The sleep of the Dark Knights
I don't know much about the user groups at Citizendium, I just made a table of the (former) members of groups with special rights and put it here.

An overview:

The titles are quite fleshy, but the group members don't seem to be interested that much in editing: only two of the ten bureaucrats (none of the dark knights) made an edit over the last three months... 17:25, 12 August 2010 (UTC)


 * Can this be correlated with forum participation? - David Gerard (talk) 17:34, 12 August 2010 (UTC)


 * WTH does all this stuff mean? Wikieditor, bot, and sysop are obvious enough, but "Dark Knight" and "Linnaeus"? Doctor Dark (talk) 06:41, 13 August 2010 (UTC)


 * Knights are honorable people, the ones at citizendium are not. FreeThought (talk) 09:59, 13 August 2010 (UTC)


 * Bitter much? Got a story? - David Gerard (talk) 08:05, 20 August 2010 (UTC)


 * Dark Knights had the "nukerevision" power, which was the homegrown version of "oversight" (and has, I believe, been replaced by oversight). Linnaeus is the power to rename users, and nothing else. Chris Key has a plan to make the rights and their names make sense q- David Gerard (talk) 08:05, 20 August 2010 (UTC)

Pseudoscience reputation?
I just removed:


 * Citizendium has gained a reputation for friendliness not just to alternative medicine but to pseudoscience and fringe theories in general.

I'm not sure it does have a reputation, even if this article demonstrates its clearly visible susceptibility and IMO reasonable theories as to how this happened. Do we have something citable from the outside world? Last I recall was the comments of the THE article, and that's not really sufficient to say this - David Gerard (talk) 19:50, 15 August 2010 (UTC)


 * Well there is quiet a bit of blog buzz that has emerged over time, but its almost all over the homeopathy article and Dana Ullman being and editor with approval rights. tmtoulouse 19:56, 15 August 2010 (UTC)


 * I think I wrote that. Their forum has plenty of posts bemoaning their reputation for fringe, so I figured if they themselves think they have such a reputation there's likely something to it. There also are some outside mentions such as the HaeB presentation and his Wikipedia Signpost comments. But if you want to soften or omit it that's OK by me. Doctor Dark (talk) 20:37, 15 August 2010 (UTC)


 * Yeah, I'm not sure their forums or Wikimedians (who have a strong interest in CZ anyway) count as the wider world. Also, I'm trying to slim the intro down by any reasonable means ;-) Mind you, check the refs I just added. - David Gerard (talk) 21:05, 15 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I agree that the article is too long. The section under "Sanger's role" could be slimmed down, especially the quotes. Doctor Dark (talk) 13:58, 16 August 2010 (UTC)
 * The long quote from Slashdot is important - that essay basically sets out precisely how Citizendium would work, a year and a half before it was launched. The quote shows why he stopped listening to anyone else and felt he needed to assert his authoritah - David Gerard (talk) 15:32, 16 August 2010 (UTC)


 * I've reviewed the listed awful pseudoscience articles, per Ro Thorpe's objection above that many aren't that bad now, with the period of awfulness noted. "Global warming" in particular is much better now, but it did attract negative attention from real-life experts, so in it goes. Etc - David Gerard (talk) 16:06, 16 August 2010 (UTC)

self-proclaimed
I thought there was a lot of, um, controversy about his role in WP and he is the one running around claiming to be the co-founder. I remember several long screeds about why wont people call me this and you all suck. tmtoulouse


 * Yes, Larry's obnoxious screeching makes it hard to give him credit even if deserved. But there are tons of sources that call him "co-founder," like the NY Times and BBC. My recollection is that when I started on Wikipedia he was acknowledged as co-founder even on-site, and that it's only been in the past couple of years or so that Wales and his followers have tried to airbrush him out of the picture. So even though the guy turns me off as best I can tell he really was co-founder. Doctor Dark (talk) 03:54, 20 August 2010 (UTC)


 * Well its not an article on Larry Sanger so I withdraw my objection if it was Wales white washing that did it. tmtoulouse 04:11, 20 August 2010 (UTC)


 * It gets better. I did a little digging and found that numerous early press releases from Wikipedia itself described Sanger as co-founder with Wales (early example). Even Wales called himself "co-founder" in the years before Sanger was declared an Unperson. I had thought that it was just a silly tiff between a couple of oversized egos, but it does look like Wales and crew are attempting some serious historical revisionism. Doctor Dark (talk) 04:21, 20 August 2010 (UTC)


 * I joined WP in early 2004 at which time Larry was officially a respected fading memory and unofficially a dick everyone was glad to see gone, though they didn't go on about it unless provoked. I'd suggest the people glad to see him gone probably wanted to forget his existence too and considered he'd been a net negative to the project.
 * That said, the generally-accepted factoid is "co-founder" (you can footnote it to "It says so in Wikipedia!") and asserting otherwise would take citations. That Larry is a dick who writes long screeds about "why won't people call me this and you all suck" doesn't make him wrong per se - David Gerard (talk) 08:36, 20 August 2010 (UTC)

never had an actual job in academia
Apparently Sanger held some sort of position at Ohio State University for a while in the early 2000s. According to MIT Technology Review (cited in his WP bio) as of 2005 he "lectures in the philosophy department at Ohio State University, his alma mater." Presumably this means a "lecturer" position. "Lecturer" in the U.S. generally means a non-tenure eligible position that often (but not always) is part time and/or temporary, and does not carry privileges related to participation in faculty governance. Here the current table of faculty ranks at OSU though it may have been different when Sanger was there. (Note to DG, this differs from the UK system where as I understand it "lecturer" is more of a faculty line rank, with the distinction from "reader" being that it is primarily a teaching position.)

Cutting to the chase, I've changed "never held an actual job in academia" to "never had a position as professor or the equivalent." A couple of sources have called him a "former professor" (e.g., here) but that's highly doutbful. His Citizendium bio makes no mention of it, and it seems likely that he'd let everyone know if he had ever held a tenure-track position.

It's important for the facts to be scrupulously correct in this article. First and most importantly, it's the right and honest thing to do. Second, the article is critical of CZ and Sanger, and any errors will undermine our discussion of the problems with CZ. I've pieced the story together from bits and pieces but if anyone has a clearer picture please say your bit.

I really wish CZ -- or something like it -- had succeeded. Wikipedia sucks in so many ways but at the moment there's no viable alternative. Doctor Dark (talk) 03:19, 22 August 2010 (UTC)


 * Absolutely, this is a sorrowful post-mortem. I don't expect the remaining Citizens to like it, but CZ died some time ago. I do think its failure was intrinsic in its formation; e.g. Shirky wasn't entirely right, and certainly didn't predict the bit where credentialism leading to a infestation of cranks, but he was on the right track. Sanger working out his entire plan for CZ in detail well in advance and then trying to fit human enthusiasm into it was a miserable failure at volunteer herding and Web 2.0 in general, and then at dealing with people who had much greater academic status than he did. Etc - David Gerard (talk) 07:02, 22 August 2010 (UTC)

Cover synopsis (feel free to edit)
Citizendium Citizendium is a pretender to the throne of Wikipedia as a free internet-based encyclopedia project, founded by Wikipedia co-founder Larry Sanger. Citizendium intended to boost its reliability by having articles vetted by experts and requiring real names for contributions. Articles are divided into "workgroups", including one on "healing arts", Citizendium's term for alternative medicine. Alternative medicine practitioners ended up managing these articles largely on their own terms, removing criticism and cherry picking references. This led to the first sign of serious problems, when a ludicrous puff piece on homeopathy was featured on the main page. The project has been plagued with pseudoscience. Many of the original academic experts have also left, driven away by the site's administrators. Despite lofty ambitions and a hugely publicized launch, participation has declined to about 20 regulars and only 80 people editing in any month. Citizendium is a cautionary tale of top-down management of volunteer projects and the dangers of credentialism.


 * I copyedited a bit, and the result of my work stupends me. I approve the golding ;) Thanks for the rough draft, Dave.  02:54, 1 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Did more to try to shorten. 02:58, 1 September 2010 (UTC)


 * I was working to a 1000 rendered characters limit (which I think is a good idea). I've just changed Sanger's description in the intro to something that doesn't need a footnote (as the article has). I've also finally put cover at the top of this page, since it's being assumed ;-) Human, feel free to edit the five or six or whatever pages it takes to coverfy this - David Gerard (talk) 13:20, 1 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Done. The only thing I couldn't remember where it is is that file that shows all the synopsis texts in one place.  Need to add that to the instructions when I find it again.  23:11, 1 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Apparently the version that is actually rotated for the cover is here. I've edited it to harmonize with the version above. If I screwed up you know what to do. Doctor Dark (talk) 06:14, 2 September 2010 (UTC)

Undoing this
This article gets edited so much it's never a really stable "gold" article IMO. Silver, sure, but not cover-worthy. Example reason: "He also told participants who expressed a preference for scientific evidence other parts of the "whole dialectical landscape" that they were "not welcome" at Citizendium". Sure, I could try to fix it, but if people keep editing it in a way that needs constant repair and attention, it ain't "gold". It may be precious, but it's not 24k. 03:06, 20 April 2011 (UTC)