Citizendium vs Wikipedia
In a post here SJ draws attention to Citizendium's collapsing edit count.
For me the more interesting accusation against Cz is that their policy of depending on expert credentials has not protected them from partisan point of view edittors. I had suspected this might be true but haven’t got the time to do the detailed research on Cz to prove it either way. I suspect Wikipedia’s policy of requiring a reference for any disputed fact (rather than having a previledged class of editor who can just claim “It is so because I say so”) will turn out to be the more effective policy in the long term.
Larry Sanger's response in the comments, worrying about people repeating stuff, is a bit 2-faced after the half truths he spread about wikipedia (and repeats here - Wikipedia does not have “vast porn holdings”) but this whole correspondence does have a little bit of the smell of the academic version of a flame war where cries of “your mother” are replaced by concerned musings about problems with “your methodology”. This is undignified and the two of them should consider if they really want to continue this correspondence in public.
On the other hand - if they should feel the need to continue …
I'll put the popcorn on.
For me the more interesting accusation against Cz is that their policy of depending on expert credentials has not protected them from partisan point of view edittors. I had suspected this might be true but haven’t got the time to do the detailed research on Cz to prove it either way. I suspect Wikipedia’s policy of requiring a reference for any disputed fact (rather than having a previledged class of editor who can just claim “It is so because I say so”) will turn out to be the more effective policy in the long term.
Larry Sanger's response in the comments, worrying about people repeating stuff, is a bit 2-faced after the half truths he spread about wikipedia (and repeats here - Wikipedia does not have “vast porn holdings”) but this whole correspondence does have a little bit of the smell of the academic version of a flame war where cries of “your mother” are replaced by concerned musings about problems with “your methodology”. This is undignified and the two of them should consider if they really want to continue this correspondence in public.
On the other hand - if they should feel the need to continue …
I'll put the popcorn on.