The Commons and the Wikipedia

Collaborative problem-solving The Wikipedia Workbook

Entries for your attention/collaboration:
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22 Jan 06: Every page here is a working draft. Please comment & help us improve

The Wikipedia is a free-content, collaborative, internet-based encyclopedia, made up of individual (but interconnected) entries. Anyone can create an entry, and anyone else can come along and edit existing entries. The intent is to tap the power of the general internet community's knowledge and the desire to share that knowledge, to build a free, high-quality, comprehensive online encyclopedia. At first blush, it might seem like this could not work, and that the result would be a chaotic mess. But it does work. Hang on just one minute.

Note: This page has been written with multiple Wikipedia links to help familiarize you with the usefulness of this new collaborative tool. Each Wikipedia reference pops up in its own window. (If your monitor is large enough, it's useful to keep both your original window and the WP reference window in front of you at the same time for a rich read.)

Click to go to Land Value Tax entry (own window)
And here for the Value Capture entry (ditto)

(For help on how to edit and amend, please see to your left here.)

Why this is important for us

Because all the various programs under The Commons intended to support the push to sustainability , have from the outset been organized as what we call Self-Organizing Collaborative Networks. (The original term offered by Mikoto Usui at our founding meeting at the Abbaye de Royaumont just north of Paris in 1974 was "invisible college".) The idea is that the accomplishment of each program is thus the result not of the efforts of one person or group in one place bounded by a limited mandate, set of interests, resources and perspectives, but the rich fruits of an entirely open collaborative association, guided only by the shared idea that the world needs something like this, at least in the one bit of the planetary patch we have collectively decided to cultivate together.

Over the years we have sought out and used a growing array of tools to enable this collaborative process, starting out in the mid seventies with all the old media and ways of doing things, but already in 1981 jumping up to email, followed by the first newsgroup in 1986, videoconferencing links in 1993, the first website in 1994, the various group fora and cafes two years later, and this long list goes on. The idea of out now working jointly with the Wikipedia is the next step in this ever-richer group work process; it will not be the last.

But before you actually get involved in this dynamic editing process, we suggest that you give a careful look to their guidelines. A good place to start is with their About page, which is a fast well-organized read. Next, How to edit will just about get you ready to jump in for yourself. You'll see.

Wikipedia and accuracy (Be sure you look under the bed)

Is the Wikipedia just more eye-candy e-junk? There is a lot of it out there so this is an entirely fair suspicion and perfectly reasonable point of departure. But in a recent expert-led investigation carried out by the respected science journal Nature - "Wikipedia vs. Encyclopedia Britannica Internet encyclopaedias go head to head" -- in which the two were tested head to head on a sample of science entries, the Natures team concluded this:

The exercise revealed numerous errors in both encyclopedias, but among 42 entries tested, the difference in accuracy was not particularly great: the average science entry in Wikipedia contained around four inaccuracies; Britannica, about three. The team also surveyed more than 1,000 Nature authors and found that although more than 70% had heard of Wikipedia and 17% of those consulted it on a weekly basis, less than 10% help to update it. The steady trickle of scientists who have contributed to articles describe the experience as rewarding, if occasionally frustrating. Greater involvement by scientists would lead to a "multiplier effect". Most entries are edited by enthusiasts, and the addition of a researcher can boost article quality hugely. "Experts can help write specifics in a nuanced way".

Where does this leave us? Well at the end of the day I don't trust Wikipedia any more than I trust any single source of news or information, including the Encyclopedia Britannica. But I don't trust it less either. We're back to an existential life. In the final analysis it's you, your lonely good judgment and your willingness to cross-check anything from multiple sources that must rule the day. Sound like too much work? No problem. Just relax and let the others do the heavy hauling.

And now if you are still with us, we invite you to check out the status of the entry in the particular focus area that may have brought you to The Commons in the first place.