1. Here's yet another condescending fluff piece about Wikipedia. It's interesting that the internet as a whole seems to be accepted now, despite its lack of an editing authority -- responsibility has shifted to users. Is it really such a big leap to expect the same shift with Wikipedia? [via Explananda]
2. Raffi Melkonian defends the president's latest Social Security plan by telling us more about the practical-minded man behind it, Robert Pozen. What Raffi's defense misses is that Social Security's success and longevity has a lot to do with its initial political formulation -- reframing it as a redistributive program, regardless of the policy reality, would be a fundamental (and likely scuttling) change.
3. Lenka of farkleberries isn't happy about the moves to put RFID chips in American passports, although it seems that the State Department is at least somewhat open to implementing a privacy solution.
4. If only you could do this with English muffins!
5. Charles Curran, a prominent Catholic theologian whose critiques of "noninfallible church teaching" led to conflict with John Paul II and Ratzinger, speaks out about the experience and what the new pope means for the church.
6. And here's a great piece on Einstein's annus mirabilis, 100 years ago this year. The article seems especially appropriate in light of this latest discovery. [via 3quarksdaily]
i see the mainstream media's hatred of wiki as functionally equivalent to its loathing of blogs. yes, the net has been legitimized as a place for leisure and commerce: people can go online, buy crap on ebay, download stuff from itunes, chat with their friends, maybe even read news (as long as they do it on the websites of legitimate/established news sources).
but the MSM is also afraid of losing its dominance over current events and information flow. wiki and especially blogs are democratizing these services: more and more people tend to get their news from blogs rather than the times or the post. the MSM feels their authority slipping away and they resent it. so they write bitter, bitchy editorials about how bloggers (or wikis) are irresponsible amateurs, where in contrast the MSM is professional. "we have a responsibility to get it right," they say, "where the blogs and wikis can say whatever they want."
so i'm not surprised in the least that slate is so hostile to wikipedia. i'd honestly be surprised if they weren't. but the hitchhiker's guide analogy is intriguing, anyway.
Post a comment