Christian, > etc." as not anyone from the road EFFECTIVELY CAN BE > a contributor...In > most cases there are a first input by an "educated" > person and later > corrections and additions by others. Not true. Academic 'education' no longer has a monopoly on knowledge. Not since around May 1968 ;-) Everyone has at least one subject they know more than you about, everyone. I'm guessing this applies to the relationship between curators and visitors as well, which is where this thread started from. > As I am informed, no single word is set online > before checking by the > administrators. These people I called editorial > board. Why not? I have > nothing against this solution. Wikipedia is no web > anarchy at all, it is > a sophisticated tool. Not true. Go and try it, all changes are instant. Nothing is checked by anyone before it is posted. Wikipedia is no anarchy because the vast majority of the (currently) 912,000 contributors are intelligent individuals who want to help built it, and because the few intent on messing things up find that their changes are reverted so quickly that it really isn't worth the effort. > This does not say anything about the (or some of > the) administrators being paid. Again, administrators are all volunteers, they are not paid. But I should correct myself, as I said previously that Wikipedia's expenses included bandwidth. They don't, bandwidth is all donated. Their main expense is hardware. This is probably not really the right list to discuss Wikipedia culture further however. The really interesting question is whether museums should open up their collections in the same way as Wikipedia, to benefit from all that networked brainpower, and to offload *some* of the work from curators? As a museum Curator, (which I'm not) I guess it must be legitimate to initially fear the great unwashed hoards decending on your neatly manicured records. But think about it the other way around. Those great unwashed hoards potentially include every other museum curator and academic researcher on the planet, amongst others. Do you really want to turn down that sort of assistance? The issue of how to separate the wheat from the chaff is a technical challenge, but Wikipedia seem to manage it OK. Jeremy. > > Administrators are all volunteers, they are not > paid, > and they most certainly cannot be described as an > 'editorial board'. The money to run Wikipedia mostly > goes towards bandwidth, server hosting and hardware. > > As many NPO have paid board members, I simply can > not imagine why such > an institution should be an exemption. As all this > hardware, hosting > etc. is not that expensive, why do they have to > collect millions of > Euros "to survive"? I expect that also quite some > money goes into > IT-specialists, translation and editing. Why not? > > Despite all this, or more likely because of it, > Wikipedia was recently tested by the science journal > Nature, and found to be about as accurate as > Encyclopedia Britannica > http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/4530930.stm > > In part, it depends on the pages. Some of the Wiki > pages really lack > deeper information. But anyway, many of them are > well written und > edited. > > > Christian > > Jeremy. > > > > > > > "Eugene Dillenburg" <[log in to unmask]> > > schrieb: > > Before this discussion strays too far off-topic, I > > think it would be > > good to > > go back to the source. The original post cited > page > > 122 of the January > > 2006 > > issue of Curator (49 / 1). I believe this is the > > passage: > > > > "The channel [MTV] recignizes that it is in > dialogue > > with its viewers; > > they > > form the brand together. The Brooklyn Museum of > Art > > realized the same > > thing. Along with the usual anonymnous labels > > written by curators, its > > 'American Voices' installation also offers > Community > > Voices labels > > written > > by ordinary museumgoers. The National Museum of > the > > American Indian in > > Washington, DC went a step further. Staff not > only > > worked with > > 'community > > curators,' but also identified the author of each > > label, effectively > > undermining the idea of a single, authoritative > > version of truth and > > promoting a more inclusive, provisional one." > > > > (Jason Petrulis, reivew of the books "Branded > > Nation: The Marketing of > > Megachurch, College Inc. and Museumworld" by James > > B. Twitchell, and > > "No > > Logo" by Naomi Klein) > > > > So, just to be clear, from the very beginning we > > have been discussing > > museum-visitor collaborations. The initial post > may > > not have stated > > this > > explicitly, but since it did give the citation, > > there was probably > > little > > need for it to do so. > > > > PS -- I thought the whole point of wikis was that > > they *didn't* have > > large > > editorial boards? I could be mistaken. > > > > Eugene Dillenburg > > Exhibit Developer > > The Science Museum of Minnesota > > > > > ========================================================= > > Important Subscriber Information: > > > > The Museum-L FAQ file is located at > > http://www.finalchapter.com/museum-l-faq/ . You > may > > obtain detailed > > information about the listserv commands by sending > a > > one line e-mail > > message to [log in to unmask] . The body > > of the message > > should > > read "help" (without the quotes). > > > > If you decide to leave Museum-L, please send a one > > line e-mail message > > to [log in to unmask] . The body of the > > message should read > > "Signoff Museum-L" (without the quotes). > > > > > --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- > > Von Panda Platinum 2005 Internet Security > > eingefügter Text:: > > > > Wenn es eine unerwünschte Mail (SPAM) ist, > klicken > > Sie auf den > > folgenden Link um diese neu zu klassifizieren: > > http://127.0.0.1:6083/Panda?ID=pav_3743&SPAM=true > > > --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- > > > > > > > > > > > > > > -- > > Dr. Christian Müller-Straten > > > > Verlag Dr. Christian Müller-Straten / MUSEUMS > > AGENTUR > > Kunzweg 23, 81243 München, T. 089-839 690 43, Fax > > -44 > > Mails werden mit täglich aktualisierter > > PANDA-Software geprüft. > > [log in to unmask] > > Are your institution and exhibition already listed > > > under > > http://www.museum-aktuell.de? > > Last count for January 2006: more than 181,000 > > hits. For 2006, we > > expect 2 million hits. > > > > > ========================================================= > > Important Subscriber Information: > > > > The Museum-L FAQ file is located at > > http://www.finalchapter.com/museum-l-faq/ . You > may > > obtain detailed information about the listserv > > commands by sending a one line e-mail message to > > [log in to unmask] . The body of the > > message should read "help" (without the quotes). > > > > If you decide to leave Museum-L, please send a one > > line e-mail message to > [log in to unmask] > > . The body of the message should read "Signoff > > Museum-L" (without the quotes). > > ========================================================= > Important Subscriber Information: > > The Museum-L FAQ file is located at > http://www.finalchapter.com/museum-l-faq/ . You may > obtain detailed > information about the listserv commands by sending a > one line e-mail > message to [log in to unmask] . The body > of the message should > read "help" (without the quotes). > > If you decide to leave Museum-L, please send a one > line e-mail message > to [log in to unmask] . The body of the > message should read > "Signoff Museum-L" (without the quotes). > > --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- > Von Panda Platinum 2005 Internet Security > eingefügter Text:: > > Wenn es eine unerwünschte Mail (SPAM) ist, klicken > Sie auf den > folgenden Link um diese neu zu klassifizieren: > http://127.0.0.1:6083/Panda?ID=pav_3760&SPAM=true > --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- > > > > > > > -- > Dr. Christian Müller-Straten > > Verlag Dr. Christian Müller-Straten / MUSEUMS > AGENTUR > Kunzweg 23, 81243 München, T. 089-839 690 43, Fax > -44 > Mails werden mit täglich aktualisierter > PANDA-Software geprüft. > [log in to unmask] > Are your institution and exhibition already listed > under > http://www.museum-aktuell.de? > Last count for January 2006: more than 181,000 > hits. For 2006, we > expect 2 million hits. > > ========================================================= > Important Subscriber Information: > > The Museum-L FAQ file is located at > http://www.finalchapter.com/museum-l-faq/ . You may > obtain detailed information about the listserv > commands by sending a one line e-mail message to > [log in to unmask] . The body of the > message should read "help" (without the quotes). > > If you decide to leave Museum-L, please send a one > line e-mail message to [log in to unmask] > . The body of the message should read "Signoff > Museum-L" (without the quotes). ========================================================= Important Subscriber Information: The Museum-L FAQ file is located at http://www.finalchapter.com/museum-l-faq/ . You may obtain detailed information about the listserv commands by sending a one line e-mail message to [log in to unmask] . The body of the message should read "help" (without the quotes). If you decide to leave Museum-L, please send a one line e-mail message to [log in to unmask] . The body of the message should read "Signoff Museum-L" (without the quotes).