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TMFEditorsDesk (< 20)

Is Crowdsourcing a Dying Idea?

Recs

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November 23, 2009 – Comments (9)

The Wall Street Journal (Sub may be required) had an article this morning on Wikipedia rapidly losing the volunteers who edit and contribute to its content.

“Volunteers have been departing the project that bills itself as "the free encyclopedia that anyone can edit" faster than new ones have been joining, and the net losses have accelerated over the past year. In the first three months of 2009, the English-language Wikipedia suffered a net loss of more than 49,000 editors, compared to a net loss of 4,900 during the same period a year earlier…

Wikipedia's struggles raise questions about the evolution of "crowdsourcing," one of the Internet era's most cherished principles. Crowdsourcing posits that there is wisdom in aggregating independent contributions from multitudes of Web users.”

Since the Fool has our own crowdsourcing initiatives (CAPS and our Wiki), this generated a lot of discussion around the company. Specifically whether internet users are evolving away from crowdsourcing initiatives as some of the excitement and initial “wow” factor wears off and increasingly gravitating toward spending time on other platforms such as social media.

Is this just a blip on the radar and more indicative of Wikipedia not incentivizing users (not necessarily through monetary gains, but through other methods) properly, or do you think this is part of a larger trend? We’d love to hear some community feedback on your own experiences. Also, if you have any feedback for either CAPS or the Fool Wiki, we’ll be watching for that also.

 

-Eric Bleeker (TMFRhino) 

9 Comments – Post Your Own

#1) On November 23, 2009 at 12:12 PM, galtline (57.26) wrote:

I would say that with peer production applications, there has to be some incentive (recognition or interest in what they're producing for free).  Wikipedia doesn't strike me as something that would continue to keep a person's interest.

With CAPS, you do feel as if you're getting something back - advise and opinions of others.  Your contributions gain recognition through TMF articles (when you're mentioned) and Recs.  What it comes down to though is whether it is something you enjoy.

 

 

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#2) On November 23, 2009 at 12:48 PM, chk999 (99.99) wrote:

I think the not incentivizing users is the big problem. You can put really a lot of effort into a well written article and you get no recognition for doing so. Then some troll can deface it with tinfoil hat level conspiracy theory and you can't do much. It gets frustrating after awhile and you look for better places to spend your heartbeats.

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#3) On November 23, 2009 at 12:49 PM, TMFJake (94.75) wrote:

My theory:  There's a direct correlation between rising unemployment and a decrease in crowsourcing.  Once employment turns around Wikipedia will do just fine. :)

Fool On!

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#4) On November 23, 2009 at 4:05 PM, TMFEditorsDesk (< 20) wrote:

@TMFJake,

Hmm, interesting...is the argument that more prosperity leads to more time spent doing hobbies? I could also see people making the opposite argument that people have more time if they're unemployed...but that time is probably spent networking, resume-dropping, and worrying...

The question for me is "how many editors do they need at steady state?" I tend to buy the theory that there needed to be more editors initially as they built the wiki...but now it's about updating and chasing the long tail...which is less editor-intensive.  

-Anand (TMFBomb)

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#5) On November 23, 2009 at 4:24 PM, Tastylunch (99.46) wrote:

I think it shows how critical culture is to a group effort.

Wikipedia has lately become a war between deleters and adders  as well as experts vs the everyman.

Lately the deleters/experts are winning and of course that kills interest for the everyman to participate. 

PLus wikipedia itself is getting closer to being finished, if you know what I mean. The easystuff, broadly knwonw stuff is already in there and the real specific knowledge A) very few people know and B) runs the risk of being deleted by an expert stepping outside their field not realizing the relevance.

CAPS OTOH will likely always work to some degree becasue it's competitive. We don't have to get along, like wikipedia editors due to some degree. There doesn't even need to be polite disagreement.

The incentives are completely different, you really need to believe you are part of a nobel effort to contribute to wikipedia. for CAPS that attitidude is fine but you can also be a complete anti-social a-hole an get what you want out of the game.

Plus other players can't mess with your profile or picks. Huge difference

In CAPS players are driven by self interest, in wikipedia and the Foolsaurus people are not. So perhpas it is a lesson for the Fool wiki. like chk999 said nothing is more frustrating than working two hours on article for somoen to correct it incorrectly.

This is a sidenote to why I think CAPS blogs needs to be re-examined. CAPS blogs is currently unintentionally underserving some of the game's best powerusers and smartest minds. The CAPS ratings get considerably dumber when top investing Fools bail if they aren't replaced.

I think the blogs are becoming a victim to their own popularity.

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#6) On November 23, 2009 at 5:37 PM, TMFJake (94.75) wrote:

@TMFBomb:  I was largely kidding. :) The argument is that the more people are fully employed the more time they have for editing Wikipedia.  What else is there to do at work?? :)

 @TastyLunch:  Hear you on the blogs.  We're very interested in your proposals...

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#7) On November 23, 2009 at 11:57 PM, truthisntstupid (65.53) wrote:

This is off subject and I'm sorry.  I posted a comment in the comment section following the article, "The Undoing Of The Great American Economy"  probably an hour ago my time.  It appears almost immediately in the "What Fools Are Saying"  section of the homepage.  But when I go back to that article the comment still hasn't posted around an hour later.  What's up with that? 

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#8) On November 24, 2009 at 12:11 AM, truthisntstupid (65.53) wrote:

I hate to complain about something that is a free service, but this problem kills any ongoing back-and-forth debate between commenters.  I was at least an hour before my last comment showed up.  We have to wait an hour to find out what the other person has to say.  It's like trying to communicate with someone in a spacecraft circling Jupiter.

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#9) On November 24, 2009 at 10:02 AM, JakilaTheHun (99.95) wrote:

The problems with Wikipedia's structure are fairly numerous.  If I'm not mistaken, it's not all the Wikipedia sites --- rather it's the American Wikipedia where most the problems are coming.  And the problem comes precisely from the fact that they refuse to set any reasonable guidelines on who can contribute and edit articles, so you are basically fighting off trolls at all times. 

They could take steps to easily remedy these issues, but there's an ideological undercurrent that seems to prevent them from being pragmatic enough to do so.  I know I briefly edited articles there, before getting frustrated by the fact that they wouldn't even require users to register an account to edit. 

They keep claiming that 'disallowing anonymous contributions' would harm Wikipedia, but they wouldn't have to 'disallow anonymous contributions'.  They'd simply have to require anonymous users to create an account --- in which they'd still be anonymous. 


Wikipedia would benefit by requiring some level of competence and expertise from users.  It wouldn't even be that difficult to implement.

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