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An almost exactly analogous argument could be used to "prove" that Wikipedia would entirely fail [1]. Replace "Great political ideas" by "High-quality encyclop

An almost exactly analogous argument could be used to "prove" that Wikipedia would entirely fail [1]. Replace "Great political ideas" by "High-quality encyclopedia articles" etcetera. I don't personally think much of Republican policies, but I'm glad they're at least giving things like this a go. I could wish, however, that they'd spoken with more people who have real insight into how social websites work. They could have started with the founders of Reddit, and a bunch of other YC folk. [1] Yes, I'm well aware some people claim that Wikipedia has failed. But arguing with people who use "failure" to describe a site with Wikipedia's impact isn't worth the time.

prospero 16y ago
Wikipedia is not a coherent entity, it's a bunch of tinpot dictators ruling over their own little fiefdoms. Wikipedia's success doesn't disprove the above statement, it just shows that the quality of one article is orthogonal to all the others.
amanfredi 16y ago
This isn't a valid comparison. A high quality encyclopedia article is not analogous to a great political idea. Particularly, an encyclopedia article is grounded in fact, while a great political idea may be considered an untested theory.
tsally 16y ago
If only coming up with a great political idea was as easy as writing a high quality encyclopedia article. Quantitatively there are several orders of magnitude more article authors than great political thinkers. If we place all activities on a continuum based on intellectual difficultly, there's a point where crowd sourcing stops working. I think it's pretty clear where political thought stands compared to writing encyclopedia articles.
- jimbokun 16y ago
  "If only coming up with a great political idea was as easy as writing a high quality encyclopedia article." Coming up with a great political idea is probably pretty easy. The difficulty comes in convincing lots of people to make the sacrifices and compromises necessary to implement the great idea. That's why they call it politics, no?
  - stcredzero 16y ago
    What's so "great" about a political idea no one cares about?

prospero 16y ago

Wikipedia is not a coherent entity, it's a bunch of tinpot dictators ruling over their own little fiefdoms. Wikipedia's success doesn't disprove the above statement, it just shows that the quality of one article is orthogonal to all the others.

amanfredi 16y ago

This isn't a valid comparison. A high quality encyclopedia article is not analogous to a great political idea. Particularly, an encyclopedia article is grounded in fact, while a great political idea may be considered an untested theory.

tsally 16y ago

If only coming up with a great political idea was as easy as writing a high quality encyclopedia article. Quantitatively there are several orders of magnitude more article authors than great political thinkers. If we place all activities on a continuum based on intellectual difficultly, there's a point where crowd sourcing stops working. I think it's pretty clear where political thought stands compared to writing encyclopedia articles.

jimbokun 16y ago
"If only coming up with a great political idea was as easy as writing a high quality encyclopedia article." Coming up with a great political idea is probably pretty easy. The difficulty comes in convincing lots of people to make the sacrifices and compromises necessary to implement the great idea. That's why they call it politics, no?
- stcredzero 16y ago
  What's so "great" about a political idea no one cares about?