My two cents on Wikipeda co-founder (and my former ethics professor) Larry Sanger getting back in to the web:
1. It reminds me a lot of Netscape - some backwards thinking in what should be a freely controlled space.
2. I distinctly remember one class in which Sanger said that he left Wikipedia because there was no money in it - I expect this to have more of a business purpose.
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Side Note: Why isn’t anyone talking about Rojo being offline? - Hope it’s back soon, I’m sure it has something to do with the six apart acquisition.
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September 18, 2006 at 12:03 pm
Pingback from OMG…Calacanis commented on my blog! at J.D. Amer
September 17, 2006 at 3:47 pm
Jason
How is Netscape backwards exactly? You know the only control we have is to clean up the system from spam and to check facts…any story can be voted up by the users. In fact, you can see evidence all the time in that any anti-AOL/Jason story goes right to the top of the story list for debate.
BTW: Sanger’s new concept is great… not sure if he will make it work, but I love the idea of forking wikipedia and taking it to the next level with experts and citizens.
best jason
September 17, 2006 at 4:39 pm
J.D. Amer
Jason - thanks for the comment. My problem with Netscape is that it says it’s controlled by the masses, yet mixes in the more powerful editors. The first thing on the page is always the Netscape Anchor’s choice, not the community choice. By giving such a higher ranking you’re telling your users that they’re important but someone else is just a little more important. I think (and you would have to agree) that Digg works well because the users get to be the stars. It’s worked out that Digg has a select group that has more control (note: I am not a blind Digg fan and have often criticized it) but that’s from their effort, if your users can’t ever reach that level, then what’s the point?
Maybe I’m confused about the Netscape service, and I’d appreciate if you’d let me know where my opinions are off base.
Perhaps Sanger’s idea will work because it may be an area that needs experts - but I think we’ve proven that we don’t need Anchors to tell us what news stories are important.