Web 2.0: Amateur Hour or Mass-ive Knowledge? A debate with Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales and author Andrew Keen.
In today's self-broadcasting culture, where amateurism is celebrated and anyone with an opinion can post a video on YouTube, change an entry on Wikipedia or publish reviews on Yelp, we increasingly turn to the collective intelligence of large numbers of people.
Should we rely on the "wisdom of the crowds," trusting that they are smarter than the expert few? Or is Web 2.0 weakening traditional media to the point where we only have opinion and chaos?- The Commonwealth Club of California
Bio
David Ewing Duncan
David Ewing Duncan is an award-winning, best-selling author of six books and numerous essays, articles and short stories, and a television, radio and film producer and correspondent. He is the co-host of NPR's Biotech Nation.
Duncan's most recent book is Experimental Man: What one man’s body reveals about his future, your health, and our toxic world (John Wiley). His last book was Masterminds: Genius, DNA and the Quest to Rewrite Life (Harper Perennial). He also wrote the international bestseller Calendar: Humanity's Epic Struggle to Determine a True and Accurate Year (Harper-Collins/Avon), published in 19 languages, and a bestseller in 14 countries.
Duncan is a Contributing Editor to Wired, and Discover, and a science columnist for the San Francisco Chronicle, a commentator for NPR's Morning Edition and co-host of BioTech Nation on NPR. He has been a special correspondent and producer for ABC's Nightline and 20/20, and a producer for Discovery Television. He is a correspondent for NOVA's ScienceNow!. He is a regular contributor to National Geographic, Fortune and MIT Technology Review, and was a longtime correspondent for Life.
He also writes for Harper's, Atlantic Monthly, Smithsonian, Outside, The Telegraph, The Guardian, The Washington Post Book World, and The New York Times, among others. He contributes to the Dialogues column for Discover.
Andrew Keen
Andrew Keen is a Silicon Valley author, broadcaster and entrepreneur whose provocative book Cult of the Amateur: How the Internet is killing our culture was recently acclaimed by The New York Times' Michiko Kakutani as "shrewdly argued" and written "with acuity and passion."
Keen is a prominent media personality who has appeared on the Colbert Report, McNeil-Lehrer Newsnight show, The Today Show, Fox News, CNN International, NPR's Weekend Edition, BBC Newsnight and many other television and radio shows in America and overseas. He has written for The Los Angeles Times, the Wall Street Journal, the London Guardian, The San Francisco Chronicle, Forbes, The Weekly Standard, Fast Company and Entertainment Weekly and has been featured in numerous publications including Time Magazine, The New York Times, US News and World Report, BusinessWeek, Wired, the Financial Times, the Wall Street Journal, the Sunday Times, the Independent & MSNBC.
Keen is also a Silicon Valley media entrepreneur, having founded Audiocafe.com in 1995 and built it into a well known first generation Internet music company. He was educated at the universities of London and California.
Jimmy Wales
Jimmy Wales is an American Internet entrepreneur best known as the founder of the Wikimedia Foundation, the charity which operates Wikipedia.org, and as the co-founder of Wikia.com.
Wales received his Bachelor's degree in finance from Auburn University and his Master's in finance from University of Alabama. He was appointed a fellow of the Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard Law School in 2005 and in 2006, he joined the Board of Directors of the non-profit organization Creative Commons.
In January of 2001, Wales started Wikipedia.org, the online encyclopedia that anyone can edit, and today Wikipedia and its sister projects are among the top-five most visited sites on the web. In mid-2003, Wales set up the Wikimedia Foundation, a non-profit organization based in St. Petersburg, Florida, to support Wikipedia.org. The Foundation, now based in downtown San Francisco, boasts a staff of close to thirty focusing on fundraising, technology, and programming relating to the expansion of Wikipedia. Wales now sits on the board of trustees of the Wikimedia Foundation, and as founder continues to act as a key spokesperson.
In 2004, Wales co-founded Wikia.com, a completely separate company that enables groups of people to share information and opinions that fall outside the scope of an encyclopedia. Wikia's community-created wikis range from video games and movies to finance and environmental issues. Wikia's network is now ranked in the top 75 of all websites according to Quantcast.com, and strong growth continues.
Wales has received a Pioneer Award, the Gottlieb Duttweiler Prize in 2011, the Monaco Media Prize, the 2009 Nokia Foundation annual award, the Business Process Award at the 7th Annual Innovation Awards and Summit by The Economist, The 2008 Global Brand Icon of the Year Award,and on behalf of the Wikimedia project the Quadriga award of Werkstatt Deutschland for A Mission of Enlightenment. In 2007, The World Economic Forum recognized Wales as one of the 'Young Global Leaders.' This prestigious award acknowledges the top 250 young leaders for their professional accomplishments, their commitment to society and their potential to contribute to shaping the future of the world. In addition, Wales received the 'Time 100 Award' in 2006, as he was named one of the world's most influential people in the 'Scientists & Thinkers' category.
heybd, I have to disagree. It seems that you equate information with knowledge, and they are not the same (as well, knowledge and wisdom are not the same). Also, if I go to get information from a source, I want it to be an authoritative source, not an unreliable one like Wikipedia. Keen is not suggesting that we get rid of Wikipedia, but should stop looking to it for "knowledge" because of its fundamental unreliability.
From my point of view the only reasonable stance that Andrew Keen made was on the point of media literacy and the negative effects that manifest from the use of wikipedia by teens and youths alike. Although this point does not counter Wales at all it is a valid examination of the fact that media discernment is not taught well enough in public institutions if at all. This is a fault of society and education not of wikipedia, nor should wiki be held responsible for individual users in that respect.
Any attempt at a hierarchy of knowledge is going to become complicated very quickly. We have no simple definition of knowledge. We have no cause-and-effect types or classes to guide us in understanding hierarchies.
Many may use Wikipedia simply to acquire context.
The thing about Wikipedia is that most of the information is traceable to original sources. At the bottom of each article they list the references, and some of the entries are very thoroughly cited. So if a New York Times reporter were to go to Wikipedia for some information, they could then trace it back to the original source and use that as their citation.
Which is exactly why net-literate people are able to use Wikipedia as a launching pad for accessing facts as defined by the true gatekeepers of knowledge. I believe most people critique Wikipedia because they really just don't get it - plain and simple.
Wales frames it well while discussing the mass/general critique of Wikipedia - the perception that Wikipedia entries are piecemealed together by thousands and thousands of anonymous users contributing a sentence to each entry (the same argument Keen attempts to deploy). This is simply not the case.
Again, 1,000 core editors maintain Wikipedia. If used correctly, Wikipedia is the most powerful tool on the Interweb.
I would respectfully contest the statement that from Heybd above “I don't think you can say knowing one thing is better or worse than knowing another.” I will use an example from music to hopefully make my point. Stevie Wonder has written hundreds of truly brilliant songs. They have been sampled many times to the point that the samplers get tacit credit for the themes that Mr. Wonder wrote. You could argue that he gets money from ASCAP so no harm is being done. (I am note sure that he actually does receive a royalty) But I would argue that as his musical library becomes buried under the music of those who sample his work. In the future it may be very difficult to find his work under such a burden of borrowers. I would say knowing who Stevie Wonder is a much better thing than knowing one of his copiers. He is the origial source and his music is truly transformative as millions would agree.
I don't think that music is the best analogy in this case. First, it is subjective as not everyone likes the same music and some may value the derivative works more than the originals. Also, music is proprietary and recognizable. Knowledge is about facts. Truth is not attributable to any one person, it just is. No one owns it. Someone may receive credit for uncovering/discovering something, but I don't think it's so important that any time someone talks about inertia they mention Isaac Newton.
Quote:
Originally Posted by michael cronan
I am in favor of everyone having access to the information they find interesting; I’d like to in some way know the information is accurate, truthful or at least traceable to an original source.
The thing about Wikipedia is that most of the information is traceable to original sources. At the bottom of each article they list the references, and some of the entries are very thoroughly cited. So if a New York Times reporter were to go to Wikipedia for some information, they could then trace it back to the original source and use that as their citation.
I think there is a real point of view difference that is evident in this debate. There are important reasons to have information authored by ‘knowable’ sources. The fact that the New York Times reporters cannot cite Wikipedia is a perfect example of why it is important to know the sources. (Jimmy makes a point that you can know who the editors are but they are only relatively easy to find on the site, not listed in context.)
I also think that we are now entering a time where we maybe in danger of loosing an academic tradition that is important to the history of knowledge. Additionally the age of the Internet has radically changed the context in which information exists. This is problematic for a culture that does not remember the authors or the academic traditions from the past.
I would respectfully contest the statement that from Heybd above “I don't think you can say knowing one thing is better or worse than knowing another.” I will use an example from music to hopefully make my point. Stevie Wonder has written hundreds of truly brilliant songs. They have been sampled many times to the point that the samplers get tacit credit for the themes that Mr. Wonder wrote. You could argue that he gets money from ASCAP so no harm is being done. (I am note sure that he actually does receive a royalty) But I would argue that as his musical library becomes buried under the music of those who sample his work. In the future it may be very difficult to find his work under such a burden of borrowers. I would say knowing who Stevie Wonder is a much better thing than knowing one of his copiers. He is the origial source and his music is truly transformative as millions would agree.
We live in a time where information is everywhere and knowledge is more important than ever. I am in favor of everyone having access to the information they find interesting; I’d like to in some way know the information is accurate, truthful or at least traceable to an original source.
I’ll close with the most elegant and popular quotation on the subject I could find.
"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it."
George Santayana, The Life of Reason, Volume 1, 1905
Andrew Keen is off the mark with his hierarchy of knowledge idea. I don't think you can say knowing one thing is better or worse than knowing another. People tend to learn things that are relevant to their lives. For instance, until watching this, I had no idea who Hannah Arendt was, but I do know who Pamela Anderson is. Does that make me a cretinous idiot? (I may be one, but that's not the reason.) The more information you can collect in one easy to access place, the better we are. I think individuals can decide for themselves what is most important for them, and obviously the topics that appertain to more people are going to have entries that are more fleshed out and detailed. So that's what I know, and now I'm off to go look up Hannah Arendt on wikipedia.
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