The Board
The biggest online thing has been dealing with the endless drama factory that is the Wikipedia Sucks! message board, which was originally a visual parody of WO-MB (Wikipediocracy's board), but is now black to their grey. There were three, sometimes four, players: Graaf Statler and CrowsNest against Kumioko, with CN going after Abd for good measure. It should be said Statler is one of the great ranters in the Dutch language - why he has not taken all that verbose anger and converted it into a series of rant-y books is beyond me. CrowsNest is just furious - angry at Kumioko, angry at Wikipedia, contemptuous of Abd. I challenge anybody reading this to go to the board and look at some of these threads.....a new-ish member changed their handle to JuiceBeetle and began "modding" the living hell out of the board, shutting down these fights constantly. It should be said that some boardies formed a Discord room/space/squat that I have never been in, and they type like mad and don't use Discord's VoIP ("Voice over Internet Protocol") feature, otherwise they would be screaming at each other in some channel. JuiceBeetle recently was forced to give Graaf Statler the boot. What I hate is the loss of people who had been involved with the previous ProBoards version of the board - FlipFlopped, Rome Viharo, Mutineer. They followed us to the new board, then dropped out before the drama began. It's very hard to keep people interested in Wikipedia, even if those people are ex-Wikipedians burned by Jimbo's website or David "Assisted-Living Dracula" Gerard's RationalWiki. This whole situation is crying out for a book to be written on it.
Wikipedia Isn't Collapsing Fast Enough
en.Wikipedia has caused reams of agony, and yet it still stands there because the average Internet "user" still thinks the site is an online encyclopedia and not a weird sort of social media website for picky, picky people who still get the facts wrong. The trick is that, unlike the #metoo movement, people have not stood up and said "I was harassed off of Wikipedia" thanks to how ridiculous Internet bullying of adults sounds. Even though everybody now knows it exists. Eric Barbour has a chart somewhere of extrapolations he sketched out in 2012 of editor loss, and from my memory the bottom either dropped out this year or it will by 2025. There are probably around 450 active editors on Wikipedia now, and the rest of it are 'bots. These people are the truest die-hard fanatics or the shell-shocked survivors, I can't tell. Unless the real world wakes up to what a mess the place is (and if you've looked at the recent book on Reddit titled We Are the Nerds, being harshly critical of monster social websites seems to be beyond journalists/researchers because there usually is a sane small core everybody praises), the scam that is Wikipedia will never be stopped.
Drama in the Wider "Wikipedia Criticism 'Community'"
I put "community" in triple quotes up there because it really doesn't exist. There are blogs and boards but they (the boards mostly) don't get along. We had a lot of drama when Auggie/Emperor was exposed as a white guy in medicine by BoredBird on a private dare from Eric Barbour, and the board gets criticism from Gender Desk, especially during the last board crash and the aftermath. I tried to sneak back into Wikipediocracy, but they aren't accepting new members, or the leadership is quietly squabbling, or something else. Wikipedia Review is still up, but there are no major changes. The dysfunction helps the WMF.
We aren't done, not by a long shot.....
Well, what is beyond me is why you American guys not keep your Anglo defecate in your own country and spread it in my country to the wall. And I think, can't speak for him, for Crow is that the same.
ReplyDeleteAnd well, what to say about your new "moderation" team JuiceBeetle and Abd. I think that is also beyond me.
Happy New Year!
Graaf Statler
There is a book, Strelnikov, put together by Eric Barbour and friends, and the supporting documents are being reviewed and sources secured, page by page, on https:wikitop.cc. That is a wiki for articles relating to wikis and wiki critique. One step at a time, we go far.
ReplyDeleteGraaf Statler has a special channel ("Free Speech") on what was the WPO discord server, now called the Wiki Tree House, but he is confined to it, as he complains scatologically, bitterly, and at great length with oft-repeated deceptions about what actually happened on Sucks and Discord and what others supposedly believe.
Mostly, the Discord server is a friendly community, and very tolerant. You would certainly be welcome.
As said, abdism and Abd proxi moderation is far beyond me because it seems Abd is just a servant of it. (Not "it", Abd has corrected me.) He doesn't moderate but it he has told us. So both Dysk and I could not a other conclude it (not "it") must be metaphysica in one of the tree house discussion. So in that way, yes, the Discord server is a friendly community, and very, very or better extreem tolerant.
ReplyDeleteI have in the same discussion suggested to change moderated by Abd on Sucks in moderated by it. (Not "it") So congrads with the first metaphysical critical board Steln.
Graaf Statler