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> The fact is that we can’t rely on any single website to hold the whole world’s knowledge, because it can be corrupted sooner or later. The only solution is a

> The fact is that we can’t rely on any single website to hold the whole world’s knowledge, because it can be corrupted sooner or later. The only solution is a distributed architecture, with many smaller websites connecting with each other and sharing information. This article doesn't even try to explain or convincingly make this argument, it just takes it as given.

edgyquant 3y ago
I mean, it is a given…
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
fsckboy 3y ago
sort of like you didn't even try to explain or make any argument why it might not be true? Humans are selfish, fallible, lazy, unreliable, etc. what is every Shakespeare play about? what is the bible about? What is Greek mythology about? What are Aesop's fables about?
theamk 3y ago
There is a non-zero amount of people who are unhappy with wikipedia's policy. The "rot in wikipedia" link gives some examples: "fields as diverse as Complementary and Alternative Medicine and progressive politics" I am afraid that the new clone would be mostly full of pages about "Curing Cancer using Magic Healing Crystals", because people writing amount more conventional knowledge would prefer traditional wikipedia.
- arp242 3y ago
  That article is upset alternative "medicine" quackery isn't taken serious. In particular it seems upset that it calls Gary "you can cure AIDS with a diet" Null's fraudulent bullshit exact that. It calls Stephen Barrett from quackwatch "a discredited former psychiatrist", which is a blatant brazen lie. That article is the classic "Wikipedia criticism": butthurt they can't spread their favourite flavour of shit on Wikipedia without criticism. I'm not saying Wikipedia is perfect or doesn't have problems, but that is definitely not a good description of anything.
  - BizarroLand 3y ago
    That article (http://helenofdestroy.com/index.php/exposing-wikipedia/49-wikipedia-rotten-to-the-core http://helenofdestroy.com/index.php/exposing-wikipedia/49-wi...) is a perfect example of radicalizing material. It starts off gentle, "OMG guys, look at the sketchy things this person who is typically portrayed as "One of the good ones" has been doing!" And then it ramps up, "they claim to have 100,000 editors, but it actually only has 30,000. What is up with that?" Insert picture of Wikipedia icon colored red with devil horns, pitchfork and tail. Then: Big Oil has been paying people to edit its articles! There are companies who exist to edit Wikipedia articles and they work for the bag guys! Wikipedia makes millions of dollars a year! The CIA edits Wikipedia! BIG PHARMA! And another bad guy ALSO PAID TO HAVE WIKIPEDIA EDITED OMG! (trust me, here's a reference number to a link below that we all know you will definitely read and verify the authenticity of ;) ) Then Washington! The "Phillip Cross Affair"! Dictators! And once you are sufficiently outraged, also, here's this poor little guy, just a little guy, an everyman, just like you, being picked on by the big bad evil wikipedia editors because he's right and they're wrong and they don't like that. How can you tolerate this injustice!?! ___________________________________________________________________________ And it all makes sense, inside of its bubble. Outside of verification, this is terrible. But then you look at the rest of the website: http://helenofdestroy.com http://helenofdestroy.com (no ssl certificate because?) And the rest of the webpage is pure distilled "covid, conspiracies, bill gates, commoncore, newspeak, prince andrew, coronapocalypse, biden, New world order, China blah blah blah blah" insanity. And you see exactly where being radicalized leads you. Desperately searching for the truth at the core of every lie, ultimately burying yourself under a mountain of bullshit in hopes of finding a pearl. You're not gonna find a pearl. At best, it's going to be an undigested piece of corn. Caveat Emptor, don't buy the bullshit.
    - shuntress 3y ago
      > no ssl certificate because? This is way beside the point but there is nothing inherently wrong with unsecured plain http traffic if you aren't accepting user information over that connection (such as a name/password, auth token or whatever).
shuntress 3y ago
I would also add that the proposed solution here to the supposed "rot in Wikipedia" amounts essentially to "What if websites? and ... links?".
ljm 3y ago
Taxonomy is also quite a complex problem and Wikipedia has put a hell of a lot of work into that, and disambiguation. The proposed alternative here is to basically distribute the taxonomy? Anybody who's touched microservices for even a minute will know how hilariously difficult it is to co-ordinate not just the services itself but the teams around them, including both the tech and people level ICP.
tootie 3y ago
To me, Wikipedia is the canonical answer for how centralization and content moderation should be done. They have solved the hard problems as well as anyone. Federated solutions basically sidestep the real problems by rendering them completely unsolvable.
rglullis 3y ago
"Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely". Find me one example of institution that managed to go for any significant amount of time (say, longer than a decade) without facing corruption. I double-dare you.
- dghlsakjg 3y ago
  Decentralized organizations (institutions?) are not at all immune to corruption and malevolent inside actors. One look at the world of decentralized crypto-currency more than proves that corruption is not limited to institutions. Corruption seems inherent to humans, the difference is that institutions are well aware of this, and frequently set up controls and systems to balance power and fight the most obvious forms of corruption.
  - rglullis 3y ago
    No one (reasonable) ever said that decentralization makes us immune to corruption. The argument is that decentralization reduces concentration of power and the potential damage that inevitably will occur when anyone in a position of power fails or tries to abuse the power they have.
    - dghlsakjg 3y ago
      Again, look at crypto-currency, there have been more than ample examples that prove that a single person can aggregate power and wield it in self-interested ways.
      - rglullis 3y ago
        It's the opposite: despite all the scams that have occurred in cryptocurrency, the overall system still continues to work. Rug-pulls are inevitable, what matters is whether people are left with power to move on or if they are trapped into the corrupt system. How many people managed to leave the banking system after the crash of 2008? See also: Reddit. Despite all the protests, the absolute majority of people went back to it and accepted the conditions.

edgyquant 3y ago

I mean, it is a given…

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

fsckboy 3y ago

sort of like you didn't even try to explain or make any argument why it might not be true? Humans are selfish, fallible, lazy, unreliable, etc. what is every Shakespeare play about? what is the bible about? What is Greek mythology about? What are Aesop's fables about?

theamk 3y ago

There is a non-zero amount of people who are unhappy with wikipedia's policy. The "rot in wikipedia" link gives some examples: "fields as diverse as Complementary and Alternative Medicine and progressive politics" I am afraid that the new clone would be mostly full of pages about "Curing Cancer using Magic Healing Crystals", because people writing amount more conventional knowledge would prefer traditional wikipedia.

arp242 3y ago
That article is upset alternative "medicine" quackery isn't taken serious. In particular it seems upset that it calls Gary "you can cure AIDS with a diet" Null's fraudulent bullshit exact that. It calls Stephen Barrett from quackwatch "a discredited former psychiatrist", which is a blatant brazen lie. That article is the classic "Wikipedia criticism": butthurt they can't spread their favourite flavour of shit on Wikipedia without criticism. I'm not saying Wikipedia is perfect or doesn't have problems, but that is definitely not a good description of anything.
- BizarroLand 3y ago
  That article (http://helenofdestroy.com/index.php/exposing-wikipedia/49-wikipedia-rotten-to-the-core http://helenofdestroy.com/index.php/exposing-wikipedia/49-wi...) is a perfect example of radicalizing material. It starts off gentle, "OMG guys, look at the sketchy things this person who is typically portrayed as "One of the good ones" has been doing!" And then it ramps up, "they claim to have 100,000 editors, but it actually only has 30,000. What is up with that?" Insert picture of Wikipedia icon colored red with devil horns, pitchfork and tail. Then: Big Oil has been paying people to edit its articles! There are companies who exist to edit Wikipedia articles and they work for the bag guys! Wikipedia makes millions of dollars a year! The CIA edits Wikipedia! BIG PHARMA! And another bad guy ALSO PAID TO HAVE WIKIPEDIA EDITED OMG! (trust me, here's a reference number to a link below that we all know you will definitely read and verify the authenticity of ;) ) Then Washington! The "Phillip Cross Affair"! Dictators! And once you are sufficiently outraged, also, here's this poor little guy, just a little guy, an everyman, just like you, being picked on by the big bad evil wikipedia editors because he's right and they're wrong and they don't like that. How can you tolerate this injustice!?! ___________________________________________________________________________ And it all makes sense, inside of its bubble. Outside of verification, this is terrible. But then you look at the rest of the website: http://helenofdestroy.com http://helenofdestroy.com (no ssl certificate because?) And the rest of the webpage is pure distilled "covid, conspiracies, bill gates, commoncore, newspeak, prince andrew, coronapocalypse, biden, New world order, China blah blah blah blah" insanity. And you see exactly where being radicalized leads you. Desperately searching for the truth at the core of every lie, ultimately burying yourself under a mountain of bullshit in hopes of finding a pearl. You're not gonna find a pearl. At best, it's going to be an undigested piece of corn. Caveat Emptor, don't buy the bullshit.
  - shuntress 3y ago
    > no ssl certificate because? This is way beside the point but there is nothing inherently wrong with unsecured plain http traffic if you aren't accepting user information over that connection (such as a name/password, auth token or whatever).

shuntress 3y ago

I would also add that the proposed solution here to the supposed "rot in Wikipedia" amounts essentially to "What if websites? and ... links?".

ljm 3y ago

Taxonomy is also quite a complex problem and Wikipedia has put a hell of a lot of work into that, and disambiguation. The proposed alternative here is to basically distribute the taxonomy? Anybody who's touched microservices for even a minute will know how hilariously difficult it is to co-ordinate not just the services itself but the teams around them, including both the tech and people level ICP.

tootie 3y ago

To me, Wikipedia is the canonical answer for how centralization and content moderation should be done. They have solved the hard problems as well as anyone. Federated solutions basically sidestep the real problems by rendering them completely unsolvable.

rglullis 3y ago

"Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely". Find me one example of institution that managed to go for any significant amount of time (say, longer than a decade) without facing corruption. I double-dare you.

dghlsakjg 3y ago
Decentralized organizations (institutions?) are not at all immune to corruption and malevolent inside actors. One look at the world of decentralized crypto-currency more than proves that corruption is not limited to institutions. Corruption seems inherent to humans, the difference is that institutions are well aware of this, and frequently set up controls and systems to balance power and fight the most obvious forms of corruption.
- rglullis 3y ago
  No one (reasonable) ever said that decentralization makes us immune to corruption. The argument is that decentralization reduces concentration of power and the potential damage that inevitably will occur when anyone in a position of power fails or tries to abuse the power they have.
  - dghlsakjg 3y ago
    Again, look at crypto-currency, there have been more than ample examples that prove that a single person can aggregate power and wield it in self-interested ways.
    - rglullis 3y ago
      It's the opposite: despite all the scams that have occurred in cryptocurrency, the overall system still continues to work. Rug-pulls are inevitable, what matters is whether people are left with power to move on or if they are trapped into the corrupt system. How many people managed to leave the banking system after the crash of 2008? See also: Reddit. Despite all the protests, the absolute majority of people went back to it and accepted the conditions.