Citizendium
The Citizendium (sit-ih-ZEN-dee-um), a "citizens' compendium of everything", is an experimental new wiki project. The project, started by a founder of Wikipedia, aims to improve on that model by adding "gentle expert oversight" and requiring contributors to use their real names.
History
Larry Sanger announced the concept for Citizendium on September 15, 2006 at Berlin's Wizards of OS 4 conference. The project moved on to a pilot phase in October, and formally launched on March 25, 2007.
Founding Principles
The fundamental goal of Citizendium is to create the largest and most reliable encyclopedia in the world. To that end, the project was founded on the following organizational principles:
Open Collaboration
Citizendium is similar to Wikipedia in that it is an open wiki: the public is invited to participate and edit most pages.
Room for Experts
As Sanger has put it, "people who know a great deal about a subject, who are recognized by various societal mechanisms for that knowledge, can add a great of value to Web 2.0 projects, if they are given special roles that recognize their expertise." [1] This principle envisions most edits happening in a bottom-up fashion but certain specific decisions being placed in the hands of subject experts.
A metaphor often cited to describe the project is an extension of Eric S. Raymond's story about The Cathedral and the Bazaar. Sanger suggests that we "Think of editors as the village elders wandering the bazaar and occasionally dispensing advice and reining in the wayward. Their presence is merely a moderating, civilizing influence. They don't stop the bazaar from being a bazaar." [2]
Real Names Policy
Contributors must (and accountability in general) (help foster a culture of professionalism)
Article Approval
Online Republic
Sanger has repeatedly stressed that he envisions Citizendium as a new sort of internet community, one that contains all the elements of a traditional democratic republic: a constitution, inclusive participatory governance, and an executive, legislative, and judicial branch.
Criticism
Citations and Notes
- ↑ Sanger (2006) Why Make Room for Experts in Web 2.0 Keynote delivered at SDForum, San Jose, California, Oct. 24, 2006, retrieved from http://www.citizendium.org/roomforexperts.html on May 7, 2007.
- ↑ Sanger (2006) The Citizendium FAQ, retrieved from http://www.citizendium.org/faq.html#editors on May 7, 2007.