Question by Robert S: How can a revered reference work moving to a MediaWiki format avoid Wikipedia’s many pitfalls?
I’m talking about reference works that already exist on the Web and their owners want to take advantage of MediaWiki features but don’t want the warring and witch hunts that some wikis have.
Best answer:
Answer by Nihiltres
If you don’t want the social disadvantages (and advantages, though I suspect you don’t care for those) of a wiki, don’t use the wiki software as such. It would be straightforward for a reference work to disable editing of all but user interface settings—preferences and user CSS/JavaScript pages, that is—for non-administrative users and use MediaWiki as a content management system instead of a straight-up wiki. This takes advantage of the interlinking, the ease of modification, the history and version control, etc. that are present in MediaWiki, without using it as a *wiki*.
Looser implementations might be possible depending on how strictly one wishes to avoid “warring and witch hunts”. These social problems aren’t inherent to wikis: they’re merely more visible when the barriers to working on the same material are dropped so far. That’s the reason you can use the metaphors you use: wars and witch hunts are perfect real-world examples of undesirable behaviours that emerge in humans living in shared environments. Seeking ideal human interaction is like herding cats.
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