Jimmy Wales "Ford Hall Forum" Boston event 9/11 6:30pm
The Ford Hall Forum has "Jimmy Wales with Christopher Lydon" on Thursday, September 11, 6:30pm-8:00pm.
Free Speech, Free Minds, Free Markets:
Competition and CollaborationAcross the globe we are building, editing, and contributing to a growing body of knowledge and tools at everyone's fingertips. Volunteers in leaderless organizations contribute to online initiatives and articles. Software developers spend their free time collaborating with complete strangers. Amazingly, these efforts are creating products of extraordinary quality, sometimes better than that of large for-profit organizations. Why do we do it? Why does it work? Join us tonight as Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales joins journalist Christopher Lydon to address these questions, where "web 2.0" will take us next, and how Objectivist philosophy guides his vision.
One can see, even from the "Wikipedia founder" description, that this won't exactly be a critical examination of Wikipedia or digital-sharecropping.
Note Christopher Lydon, a very well-respected Boston media person, has long associations with the overall topic. You can read the comment thread on his 2005 radio show episode about Wikipedia for a sense as to what this event is likely to be. The commenter said it, not me:
I also found it a little out of place that Chris was cheerleading a little for Wikipedia, by way of praising it. It's not like I don't agree that Wikipedia is a great idea; it's just that it's off-putting for the referee of a conversation to also be a participant in that way.
See also guest Karen Schneider's Wikipedia show post:
By Seth Finkelstein | posted in wikipedia | on September 07, 2008 11:59 PM (Infothought permalink)Lydon seemed disappointed, after the fact, that "dissers" of Wikipedia were stronger presences on the radio than Wikipedia leader "Jimbo" Wales. Lydon found that the two "dissers" had "weak" arguments, and then remarked that Wikipedia needed a stronger defender to "summon up the appropriate awe for so grand an accomplishment." I'm glad I didn't know going in that the show's host had so thoroughly drunk the KoolAid on one side of an issue he was covering; I said what I believed, well or not, you decide.
Hi,
You got the Larry Sanger link (roleinwp) wrong; it's treating it as a local link rather than as a separate page.
Vipul
Here's the problem. Jimbo's speaking fee is quoted as $100,000 a pop. If an organization is going to hire him for that amount (or even a small "charitable" fraction), they're not going to use the opportunity to rake him over the coals.
And if they were, Jimbo would probably sniff that out and cancel his appearance, anyway. (Didn't Gil Penchina recently bag out on an appearance, about the time Boy Scouts were being spanked and butt-plugged on Wikia?)