-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 On 20/06/2010 01:49, Milos Rancic wrote: > * At another faculty we have a teaching assistant among Wikimedians. > After two projects, we've concluded cooperation because students > didn't quite understand work on Wikipedia and started with > confrontation.
That information is key. Why people from the teaching establishment don't understand Wikipedia? Why don't they see, for example, that it's one of the best ideas about protecting and sharing information? Why do they judge it so mediocre when they can participate to make it brilliant? Why people in the education doesn't see or understand this? What are their arguments and their inner barriers? Do they have good counter arguments, is it a prejudice, an incompatibility of personality, or ignorance? Where are the explanations? What IS Wikipedia? What are the structures and consequences of this meme, this slogan: "imagine a world where each human being has access to the entire human knowledge"? Where are they theorized, wordized, schematized? Do the members of this mailing list even agree? Do we know what wp is? Where are the wikimedian efforts converging to? What kind of world are they creating? Have we got tendency towards democracy, consensus, participation, sharing, unanimity, respect, liberty, freedom of expression and of choice, listening, dialoguing, or have we not? Why people, values, projects and actions of betterment (to our eyes) of the world are not listened to, trusted, voted, seconded, motioned, consensually applied, critically applauded, desired, rewarded and understood? I think that we need to make people think by themselves about Wikipedia. Make them see the whole big picture. We should collaborate to express this idea, to make it happen in others' mind, so that people can think clearly about it. What it aims to be. Maybe if you don't know and value citizenship (I mean feeling that you're part of your environment and society), freedom, responsibility and other similar concepts, you can't even think about what wp is doing. Maybe they should be permanently discussed, thought and taught with criticism in the wikimedian community. What about making a film about the role of Wikipedia in possible futuristic societies? Or writing anticipation novels? Or interviews of founders and of historical super admins, points of view of Trustees and Board Members, biographies and current interviews of "Jimbo". Debates, interactivity. One of the possible aims should be to show that something is happening with wp, in the same way that back in the "hippie/young/peace and love movement of the 60-70's, "something was happening". I think something is happening right now with Wikipedia and the wikimedian concepts. Not a democracy, not an ochlocracy, it's something new that is a shared governance about a theme or a resource or an interest. Freedom of the knowledge. Of expression. Of access to information. The traditional model about knowledge rewards better the knowledge holders, it seems? Their position, title, revenue, prestige, respect, dignity, power of decision, authority, all come from the commoditization of the knowledge. Maybe we have to think what the new model has to offer to the ancient roles. Also, there is an obvious convergence of visions with TED, at least partially. Wikipedia is an idea worth spreading and a mean of spreading ideas. TED has a lot of success, apparently, to present ideas as an enormously profitable "market", proving that ideas can change the world. That's the power of knowledge and culture. Wikipedia wants to give this power to everybody downright to the single individual. I think some people here, Board Members, Trustees, Admins and other wikimedians should have a try at the 18 minutes speeches. There is something behind the Wikimedia ideas: a future. There is something between most of the TED ideas. Maybe each one deserves a wikipedian page? > Any idea how to improve their motivation? (yes I'm still answering your letter) I think I already mentioned a technique in other situations to raise awareness and understanding: roleplaying games. Put them in decisional situations with dilemmas about freedom, knowledge, etc. Make it so that each one represents a point of view, one they agree with. What are their political discourse? Are they for or against Wikipedia? Is it a fantastic adventure to better our world or is is just boring. Does knowledge and reflection passionate them or not ? Also, I'm encountering more an more fatalism among educated people. They don't seem to believe that change is possible. Yesterday I just watched "Taking Woodstock", it's an excellent counter-example. Also, is the Serbian chapter complete enough? Do you have at least all the links translated so that you can dive into knowledge, chasing the fleeting tails of elusive concepts, learning about whole new paradigms through dozens of embedded links, glimpsing into what we like, and knowing more about it? Sorry to appear so random, I don't have time to give more structure to my suggestions. I just hope to provoke thoughts. -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1.4.9 (MingW32) Comment: Using GnuPG with Mozilla - http://enigmail.mozdev.org/ iQEcBAEBAgAGBQJMHlyPAAoJEHCAuDvx9Z6L5gAIAOEJAN49+f7FGY0wW+gYvc3b KBGWNrVw98oMqUPO7Mw9SEXxzq9ZRpgxfqAw1gLu3axULoETL41Qmox4KiUCnl3G oWo9ei53bDb8KDq+idaJJ8blmtT0h2YIFEkGup9w8zoQ1cyxMx2G7Mc9NtM5jM9h JZt/Y3Vd39Tw60n68zwok59uFE9C0nZjIaw0QX3CgZ0fUpKqSgFeJhrWAdxu/vxH ADk0FzBFgZtbxklVF+irmQrSD0kIRvPw03PB/hIdaDPQcarfIvQpChcsswIG2N2G ipRoODSszkyps2HxgwKrZvVYY3us8MvaMqGrGdcJP7YKc4UOalN/jO6rbOe2h+s= =lcqQ -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- _______________________________________________ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
