Just in time to relieve us from the overexposure of Facebook's problems, Wikipedia gives us this: Secret mailing list rocks Wikipedia, now playing on Digg and TechMeme. If you like your controversy with a soundtrack, try this entertaining version. Betrayal, a secret cabal, and an alien legal code—who needs TV when this on?
I'm not going to try to summmarize things—the Register's article does a nice job of that. What's going on is an argument about politics and arcane processes, wrapped in principle and spiced with murky power structures and secret mailing lists. The volume of opinion is amazing, and it gives a sense of the amount of time people have to spend there.
Awkward adolescence, indeed.
To me, the interesting bit is that the focus of the controversy, the pseudonymous Durova, has been a useful inside source for marketers, with her dark side opinion piece and SEO tips & tactics from a Wikipedia insider, which appeared under her nom de wiki on Search Engine Land. It's interesting to reconsider her advice on how to interact properly with Wikipedia, in light of the current complaints and revelations.
The Animal Farm reference is obvious. In fact, it's already shown up in comments on other posts several times.
More on Wikipedia:
- Crash course on Wikipedia
- HBS case study: Wikipedia
- Items tagged Wikipedia
