Haider, Jutta

Sundin, Olof

English

Lund University Publications

LUND UNIVERSITYPO Box 117221 00 Lund+46 46-222 00 00Debating Information Control in Web 2.0: The Case of Wikipedia vs. CitizendiumSundin, Olof; Haider, JuttaPublished in:Proceedings of the ASIS&T Annual Meeting2007Link to publicationCitation for published version (APA):Sundin, O., & Haider, J. (2007). Debating Information Control in Web 2.0: The Case of Wikipedia vs.Citizendium. In A. Grove (Ed.), Proceedings of the ASIS&T Annual Meeting (Vol. 44). 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Oct. 2022Sundin, O. & Haider, J. (2007). Debating Information Control in Web 2.0: The Case of Wikipedia vs. Citizendium. Short paper to ASIS&T 07. Joining Research and Practice: Social Computing and Information Science, October 18-25, Hyatt Regency Milwaukee, Wisconsin.Debating Information Control in Web 2.0:  The Case of Wikipedia vs. CitizendiumOlof Sundin (corresponding author) Swedish School of Library and Information Science, University College of Borås and Göteborg University, SE-50190 Borås, Sweden; olof.sundin@hb.se/Department for Cultural Sciences, Lund University, SwedenJutta HaiderDepartment of Information Science, School of Informatics, City University London, Northampton Square, London, EC1V0HB, United Kingdom; j.haider@soi.city.ac.ukAbstractWikipedia is continually being scrutinised for the quality of its content. The question addressed in this paper concerns which notions of information, of collaborative knowledge creation, of authority and of the role of the expert are drawn on when information control in WP is discussed. This is done by focusing on the arguments made in the debates surrounding the launch of Citizendium, a proposed new collaborative online encyclopaedia. While Wikipedia claims not to attribute special status to any of its contributors, Citizendium intends to assign a decision-making role to subject experts. The empirical material for the present study consists of two online threads available from Slashdot. One, “A Look inside Citizendium”, dates from September, the second one “Co-Founder Forks Wikipedia” from October 2006. The textual analysis of these documents was carried out through close interpretative reading. Five themes, related to different aspects of information control emerged: 1.information types, 2.information responsibility, 3. information perspectives, 4. information organisation, 5. information provenance & creation. Each theme contains a number of different positions. It was found that these positions not necessarily correspond with the different sides of the argument. Instead, at times the fault lines run through the two camps. IntroductionWikipedia  (WP) [1],  arguably  one  of  the  best  known  Web  2.0  projects,  is  continually  being scrutinised for the quality of its content. In particular, its reliability is being questioned repeatedly. This has to be seen in the contemporary context of source criticism on the web that occurs in relation to various kinds of information practices which dominate current debates in a variety of fields,  not  least  education,  libraries,  and  the  information  professions  more  generally.  These debates  commonly  refer  to  a  clutch  of  different  concepts,  such  as  expertise,  authority, trustworthiness, or reliability.  Interest in different aspects of authority, quality and production in Sundin, O. & Haider, J. (2007). Debating Information Control in Web 2.0: The Case of Wikipedia vs. Citizendium. Short paper to ASIS&T 07. Joining Research and Practice: Social Computing and Information Science, October 18-25, Hyatt Regency Milwaukee, Wisconsin.Wikipedia,  closely related to information control,  has been growing and the issue has already found some attention in the research literature (e.g. Duguid, 2006; Emigh & Herring, 2005; Lih, 2004; Viégas, Wattenberg & Dave, 2004).The question  addressed in  this  paper  concerns  which  notions  of  information,  of  collaborative knowledge creation, of  authority and of the role of  the expert  are drawn on when information control in WP is discussed. This is considered from a perspective which takes account of the fact that individuals in contemporary society have to be reflexive in their  judgements in relation to expert knowledge (Giddens, 1991), in terms of how to seek, critically evaluate, and use information taken  from  abstract  systems,  such  as  WP.  The  outcomes  have  bearing  on  how  information practices are perceived and carried out, for example in relation to information literacy and source criticism. One  way  of  approaching  this  is  by  focusing  on  those  who  challenge  WP’s  approach  and specifically on the arguments and counter-arguments made in the debates. When in September 2006 Larry Sanger, co-creator of WP, announced the launch of Citizendium (CZ) [2] as a fork of WP,  the  discussion  surrounding  the  free  online  encyclopaedia’s  authoritativeness  gained  new momentum.  According  to  the  press  release CZ “is  an  experimental  new wiki  project  /.../  that combines public participation with  gentle expert guidance”  (CZ 2007, italics the authors’),  thus addressing what is often considered to be the major weakness of WP, that is its lack of vetted reliability. While WP claims not to attribute special status to any of its contributors, CZ, according to the introductory text on its website, intends to assign a decision-making role to subject experts. It is not CZ’s intention to change the collaborative approach, yet here contributors have to register and write under their real name. Also, there are meant to be different categories of users which differ in terms of their expert status. In contrast, in WP anyone can add a subject entry or edit an existing one anonymously. This way, an entry develops over time and it can change significantly from one moment to the next. In a certain way, knowledge is supposed to “grow” from the masses. Disputes are  ideally  resolved  through  discussions  leading  to  consensus,  whereas  records  of  these discussions are equally openly accessible on WP's so-called talk pages. Empirical Material & MethodThe empirical material consists of two online debates available from Slashdot [3]. Slashdot, a well known news forum, is one of the earliest online fora where, according to its own description, users Sundin, O. & Haider, J. (2007). Debating Information Control in Web 2.0: The Case of Wikipedia vs. Citizendium. Short paper to ASIS&T 07. Joining Research and Practice: Social Computing and Information Science, October 18-25, Hyatt Regency Milwaukee, Wisconsin.post and comment on “news for nerds” or stories on mostly, but not exclusively, technology related new developments. The two discussion threads were posted one month apart; one called 'A Look inside Citizendium' in September 2006 (153 postings), the day CZ was announced, and the other one called 'Co-Founder Forks Wikipedia' in October (382 postings). The textual analysis of these documents was carried out through a close interpretative reading. The analysis is contextualised by considering a number of policy documents, available from WP’s and CZ’s websites, including the FAQ pages, mission statements, and press releases. The results are presented in the form of analytical summaries of the themes together with short quotations, primarily from the Slashdot threads. Results & DiscussionFive content themes were established and related to different positions towards information control in WP and CZ. These can be related to contemporary discourses surrounding Web 2.0 and similar phenomena.Information typesOne constantly re-emerging theme is based upon a distinction between different types of information,  each  requiring  a  different  degree  of  reliability,  thus  implicitly  introducing  a hierarchy of information and of needs for reliability. Not infrequently this is discussed by comparing the virtues of WP and CZ, or by debating possibilities for tighter editorial control in WP, depending on the type of information sought. The following quote captures this quite neatly: “We’ve got the traditional encyclopaedias on one end, and the Wikipedia on the other.  Now we can go a bit  in the middle and see what comes of it.”  WP is related to concepts such as “common-knowledge”, “pop-culture”, “subcultural phenomena”, but also “trivial bits”, and it is praised for its coverage of issues “that would be excluded from a paper encyclopaedia”. This stands in contrast to CZ, and also possible controlled versions of WP, which are talked about in terms of their relevance as a “stable source of information” and for “critical subjects”. Frequently this is illustrated with reference to the natural sciences, and most commonly physics. Information responsibilityThe question of whether the responsibility for the reliability of information in WP lies with the user or  the producer is  another  recurring theme. One line of  thought firmly locates the responsibility  for  checking the correctness of  information with  the author  of  a particular Sundin, O. & Haider, J. (2007). Debating Information Control in Web 2.0: The Case of Wikipedia vs. Citizendium. Short paper to ASIS&T 07. Joining Research and Practice: Social Computing and Information Science, October 18-25, Hyatt Regency Milwaukee, Wisconsin.entry.  This  is  for  example  expressed  followingly:  “/…/  Wikipedia  would  be  useless  if everyone needed to check every single entry they consulted against other sources”. The ordinary user,  who treats  information  “as  absolute  fact”,  has  to  be  able  to  trust  in  the reliability of the information, not having to question each statement. In contrast, others shift the responsibility of verifying the reliability of information from the producer to the user. One way  of  facilitating  the  user’s  responsibility  is  by  allowing “transparency  in  contrast  to authority”.  Here  reference is  made to  the way in  which WP allows users  to  follow the changes made to an entry and to take part in the discussion surrounding the creation of an entry. By underlining the “opinionated” nature of information, the responsibility is transferred to the individual, who, in order to take on this duty, has to be able to see the multiple voices at play. Information perspectivesOne central theme is the question of neutrality of information. The 'Neutral Point of View' principle (NPOV), regarded as a fundamental principle for all editing in WP, states that the contributors “should  fairly represent all sides of a dispute” (WP 2007). The suggested CZ policy  of  not  allowing  anonymous authors  is  often,  yet  not  always,  applauded with  the argument for a need for accountability. Another line of reasoning refers to the difficulties of representing certain topics in a way that considers all perspectives and that this issue will not be easier just because, as in CZ, experts are given a higher status than in WP. The power/knowledge link in relation to (academic) expertise is here emphasised and at one point hegemonic practices are even referred to as “academic colonization”. It is argued that, in contrast to “monolithic article[s]” of experts, a “contentious issue requires that you give each of the different view points a separate space in which to express their argument, and then read them each in context.” Another, yet similar, argument is present in expressing the need for an alternative to WP. Information organisationAnother,  less  prominent,  yet  still  recurring  theme  relates  to  the  wider  problems  of bibliographic  control,  taxonomy,  and issues  of  categorisation.  Frequently  the  discussion evolves around software properties and features which are not only seen as limited, but also as limiting. Complaining about WP’s policy to prefer common over scientific terms for its entry labels, one person posts: “It makes it all that much more difficult to organize. The usual complaint is that the average visitor would be confused, but I don't see this has to be a problem if redirects are made for the common names [...] Instead their's [sic] no reasoning Sundin, O. & Haider, J. (2007). Debating Information Control in Web 2.0: The Case of Wikipedia vs. Citizendium. Short paper to ASIS&T 07. Joining Research and Practice: Social Computing and Information Science, October 18-25, Hyatt Regency Milwaukee, Wisconsin.with them. Would they listen to a taxonomist? No way! At Wikipedia everybody seems to be an  expert  on  this  subject”.  Here,  the  question  of  expertise  and  the  need  for  quality assurance and information control is expanded to include issues of information organisation in addition to those of content.Information provenance & creationClosely  interlinked  are  issues  relating  to  the  provenance  of  information  and  those  of information creation. Three sub-themes can be distinguished: (1) Collaborative knowledge creation, the masses, organic growth of knowledge, and “hive-mind  consensus”:  This  is  either  portrayed  as  an  ideal  of  democratic  and egalitarian cooperation, as a “swamp”, or also, in a pragmatic way, as something that, in the case of WP, simply works.(2)  The figure of  the expert  is  central  to  the second sub-theme. Here images of authority,  academia,  strict  hierarchical  control,  but  also  of  reliability  and trustworthiness  abound.  The  following  quotation,  taken  from the  CZ  FAQ (2007) pages,  illustrates  the  ambiguity  with  which  figure  and  position  of  the  expert  is burdened in the context of Web 2.0 debates: “Think of editors as the village elders wandering  the  bazaar  and  occasionally  dispensing  advice  and  reining  in  the wayward”.(3) Finally, a strong tendency to transfer authority from the (individual) expert,  i.e. from the  person,  to  sources  and  references  can  be  made  out.  The  question  of provenance is here not treated as “a case of ‘It’s true because I am an Expert’, but ‘Here is a reliable source which says that’”. While here sometimes a strong element of distrust in expertise and thus the authority of people exists, these doubts are not extended to include materials with an approved stamp of reliability. Concluding remarksIt is obvious that Web 2.0 environments in general and the Wiki platform in particular open up an important  discussion on information control  and its  bearing on the blurred distinction between consumers, mediators and producers of information. Analysing the debates surrounding the launch of CZ enabled us to discern five themes of information control in this environment, each containing a  number  of  different  positions.  Interestingly,  it  emerged  that  these  different  positions  not Sundin, O. & Haider, J. (2007). Debating Information Control in Web 2.0: The Case of Wikipedia vs. Citizendium. Short paper to ASIS&T 07. Joining Research and Practice: Social Computing and Information Science, October 18-25, Hyatt Regency Milwaukee, Wisconsin.necessarily correspond with the different sides of the argument, that is those favouring WP and those favouring CZ. Instead, at times, the fault lines, delineating the positions, run through the two camps;  with Wikipedians, for instance, not necessarily less prone to hierarchical structures than Citizendians. Furthermore, by bringing out the multi-faceted nature of information control in Web 2.0,  or  more  specifically  of  its  perception,  the  present  analysis  also  highlights  some  of  the challenges individuals are faced with in their different roles in contemporary online environments; challenges arising from the unstable nature of  abstract knowledge systems and a consequent need  for  increased  reflexivity.  Inevitably,  it  seems  to  us,  this  also  has  bearings  on  how  we understand the ways in which people in current and future online environments create trust and reflect upon authority, an issue that requires further deliberation in future research. AcknowledgementsThis  paper  constitutes  a  first  report  on  a  research  project  on  cognitive  authority  in  Web 2.0 environments. Olof Sundin is funded by the Linnaeus Centre for Research on Learning, Interaction and Mediated Communication in Contemporary Society (LinCS) at Göteborg University and The University  College of  Borås.  Jutta  Haider  is  in  receipt  of  funding by  the  Arts  and Humanities Research Council, UK.Notes[1] http://www.wikipedia.org[2] http://www.citizendium.org[3] http://www.slashdot.orgReferencesCZ (2007). Citizendium Press Release 2. Retrieved February 13, 2007, from http://www.citizendium.org/release_002.html CZ FAQ (2007). Citizendium FAQ pages. Retrieved February 13, 2007, from http://www.citizendium.org/faq.htmlDuguid, P. (2006). Limits of Self-Organization: Peer Production and “Laws of Quality”. First  Monday (Online), 11(10).Emigh, W. & Herring, S.C. (2005). Collaborative Authoring on the Web: A Genre Analysis of Online Encyclopedias.  Proceedings of the Thirty-Eighth Hawaii International Conference on System Sundin, O. & Haider, J. (2007). Debating Information Control in Web 2.0: The Case of Wikipedia vs. Citizendium. Short paper to ASIS&T 07. Joining Research and Practice: Social Computing and Information Science, October 18-25, Hyatt Regency Milwaukee, Wisconsin.Sciences, January 3-6 2005 (HICSS-38). Los Alamitos: IEEE Press. (CD-ROM), (10 pages). Retrieved February 22, 2007, from http://ella.slis.indiana.edu/~herring/wiki.pdfGiddens, A. (1991). The Consequences of Modernity. Cambridge: Polity.Lih, A. (2004). Wikipedia as Participatory Journalism: Reliable Sources? Metrics for Evaluating Collaborative Media as a News Resource. Paper presented at 5th International Symposium for Online Journalism, April 16-17, 2004, Austin, Texas. Retrieved January 17, 2007, from http://jmsc.hku.hk/faculty/alih/publications/utaustin-2004-wikipedia-rc2.pdf SD (2006-09). Slashdot thread: A Look inside Citizendium. Retrieved January 22, 2007, from http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/10/12/235202 SD (2006-10). Slashdot thread: Co-Founder Forks Wikipedia. Retrieved January 22, 2007, from http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/09/16/1421226 Viégas, F. B., Wattenberg, M. & Dave, K. (2004). Studying Cooperation and Conflict between Authors with history flow Visualizations. In Proceedings of the SIGCHI conference on Human factors in computing systems. New York: ACM Press, 575-582. Also retrieved February 22, 2007, from http://alumni.media.mit.edu/~fviegas/papers/history_flow.pdf WP (2007). Wikipedia: Neutral Point of ViewNPOV policy. Retrieved February 9, 2007, from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Neutral_point_of_view 

Debating Information Control in Web 2.0: The Case of Wikipedia vs. Citizendium

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Debating Information Control in Web 2.0: The Case of Wikipedia vs. Citizendium

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