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Beyond Wikipedia

An idea for an activity to take us ...

... beyond Wikipedia ...

... somewhere ...

... together ...

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Co-creating the knowledge commons

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knowledge_commons Wikipedia is a major platform for the knowledge commons, living between the horns of a dilemma• Areas that lack much shared interest:

• Little motivation to engage or correct• Patchy, questionable accuracy

• Areas that many people are passionate about• Likelihood of contradictory views• Potential for edit wars

• Can we grow the sweet spot in between? Maybe also for resources that are not encyclopedic?

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The Five Pillars

Fundamental principles by which the Wikimedia community operates...http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Five_pillars Wikipedia:

1. is an encyclopedia2. is written from a neutral point of view3. is free content that anyone can

edit / use/ modify / share4. editors should respect each other5. does not have any firm rules

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The fourth pillar verbatim

“ Editors should treat each other with respect and civility: Respect your fellow Wikipedians, even when you disagree. Apply Wikipedia etiquette, and don't engage in personal attacks. Seek consensus, avoid edit wars, and never disrupt Wikipedia to illustrate a point. Act in good faith, and assume good faith on the part of others. Be open and welcoming to newcomers. If a conflict arises, discuss it calmly on the nearest talk pages, follow dispute resolution, and remember that there are [very many] articles on the English Wikipedia to work on and discuss.”http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Civility

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Do people do that?

• More? Or less? Why or why not? Are they capable?

• Could we see, in play here, • attitudes and skills • underpinned by knowledge• effectively constituting a governance

“culture”?• Training, or enculturation, to work with a

constructive approach to multiple points of view?

• Imagine we could develop a knowledge commons where we could trust people to behave like that

• Wouldn’t that be an even more valuable resource?

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Your mission

(should you decide to accept it...)• Test your combined imagination by taking one

first step towards being able to constitute this• Governance: effective methods• A course: outline curriculum design• Intended learning outcomes: a framework• A badge: design; specification of evidence• Assessment: • How would you spot these abilities?• How would you test or check them out?

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Where this could go

• Write something down from what emerges• If more than one team, present to each other• Reflect on experience and discuss• Highlights to be fed back to Conference team• Write blogs if you are so moved• Collaborate in setting up courses, etc...

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These slides, “Beyond Wikipedia” by Simon Grant, Cetis, are licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 Licence

Slides and further information may be available at Simon Grant’s Cetis blog, or on Slideshare. Search for “asimong”.

Thanks, Licence and Resources