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FamilySearch Wiki:Introduction: Difference between revisions
FamilySearch Wiki:Introduction (view source)
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Many Internet users have heard media stories about a handful of Wikipedia articles in which incorrect information was posted and wasn’t fixed for a long time. These are aberrations. One Nature study showed Wikipedia’s accuracy rivals that of Encyclopedia Britannica. Our managers have tested the Wikipedia community’s ability to correct errors quickly. When they put erroneous information on a Wikipedia page, it lasted only 27 seconds. An IBM study showed the average error in Wikipedia is corrected within five minutes. | Many Internet users have heard media stories about a handful of Wikipedia articles in which incorrect information was posted and wasn’t fixed for a long time. These are aberrations. One Nature study showed Wikipedia’s accuracy rivals that of Encyclopedia Britannica. Our managers have tested the Wikipedia community’s ability to correct errors quickly. When they put erroneous information on a Wikipedia page, it lasted only 27 seconds. An IBM study showed the average error in Wikipedia is corrected within five minutes. | ||
In 2007, at the Information Dynamics Laboratory, a part of Hewlett-Packard Labs, they studied the correlation between [http://www.hpl.hp.com/research/idl/papers/wikipedia/index.html Cooperation and quality in Wikipedia]. Authors Dennis Wilkinson and Bernardo Huberman concluded, after examining all 50 million edits to the 1.5 million English-language Wikipedia articles, "...that article quality is indeed correlated with both number of edits and number of distinct editors, and intensity of cooperative behavior, as compared to other articles of similar visibility and age. This is significant because in other domains, fruitful cooperation has proven to be difficult to sustain as the size of the collaboration increases. Furthermore, in spite of the vagaries of human behavior, we show that Wikipedia articles accrete edits according to a simple stochastic mechanism in which edits beget edits. '''Topics of high interest or relevance are thus naturally brought to the forefront of quality'''." In other words, a highly cooperative Wiki-model can provide information of the highest quality. | In 2007, at the Information Dynamics Laboratory, a part of Hewlett-Packard Labs, they studied the correlation between [http://www.hpl.hp.com/research/idl/papers/wikipedia/index.html Cooperation and quality in Wikipedia]. Authors Dennis Wilkinson and Bernardo Huberman concluded, after examining all 50 million edits to the 1.5 million English-language Wikipedia articles, "...that article quality is indeed correlated with both number of edits and number of distinct editors, and intensity of cooperative behavior, as compared to other articles of similar visibility and age. This is significant because in other domains, fruitful cooperation has proven to be difficult to sustain as the size of the collaboration increases. Furthermore, in spite of the vagaries of human behavior, we show that Wikipedia articles accrete edits according to a simple stochastic mechanism in which edits beget edits. '''Topics of high interest or relevance are thus naturally brought to the forefront of quality'''." In other words, a highly cooperative Wiki-model can provide information of the highest quality. | ||
But to what extent can a community site really offer accurate content? One way to look at this is to remember how Linux and Firefox were developed. Both were built by volunteer communities. Linux is an operating system used by the world’s largest corporations to serve out their Websites. If the site goes down, these companies lose millions. They choose Linux because it’s so stable. Linux is simply superior to operating systems built by some of the world’s best-known software companies. | But to what extent can a community site really offer accurate content? One way to look at this is to remember how Linux and Firefox were developed. Both were built by volunteer communities. Linux is an operating system used by the world’s largest corporations to serve out their Websites. If the site goes down, these companies lose millions. They choose Linux because it’s so stable. Linux is simply superior to operating systems built by some of the world’s best-known software companies. | ||
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Firefox is a Web browser. It, too, was built by a volunteer community. It’s very stable, and its feature set tends to grow much faster than that of commercial browsers. In fact, Microsoft copies Firefox features when they release new versions of its browser, Internet Explorer. | Firefox is a Web browser. It, too, was built by a volunteer community. It’s very stable, and its feature set tends to grow much faster than that of commercial browsers. In fact, Microsoft copies Firefox features when they release new versions of its browser, Internet Explorer. | ||
So how does a volunteer community produce a product whose quality rivals or exceeds that of commercial products? The answer lies in the mantra often heard from Linux developers: “Many eyeballs make any bug shallow.” If enough people invest their time in contributing to a product, they tend to catch bugs early and fix them quickly. Community brings quality. | So how does a volunteer community produce a product whose quality rivals or exceeds that of commercial products? The answer lies in the mantra often heard from Linux developers: “Many eyeballs make any bug shallow.” If enough people invest their time in contributing to a product, they tend to catch bugs early and fix them quickly. Community brings quality. A worldwide community, contributing information for which they are experts, can provide a repository of genealogical excellence and unrivaled information for the entire world. | ||
== One contributor makes a difference == | == One contributor makes a difference == | ||