Wednesday, August 9, 2006

Wikimania -- you didn't have to be there ... not when Harvard's multi-blogging news librarian, j, was there taking notes and linking to David Weinberger's keynote address, the news stories about the event, and other librarians who were taking even more notes. Hey, wait a minute. Aren't the people who take notes "journalists," while the "librarians" are people who hand you books and show you where to click? I think those two roles are merging, with journalists saying "click here," and librarians explaining where your clicks are going to take you. Of course Wikimania had its own site, but sometimes I'd rather just call a professional and save a bunch of bookmarks... It's not as if I (or anyone?) has time to read all of this stuff. If you do have time to read, but prefer a more traditional narrative to clicking around a bunch of links, try The New Yorker's article about Wikipedia. However, since Wikimania segued into a Citizen Journalism Unconference, I'll add that link as a reminder to come back and grab some podcasts whenever I have a spare hour or two and a broadband connection. Oops, temptation got the best of me and I browsed far enough to see that Lisa Williams, founder of http://H2Otown.info, has a name for sites like hers -- and, I guess, KnoxViews -- "Placeblogs." Addendumb: (Yes, dumb.) Speaking of new terms, Steven Colbert of Comedy Central has coined the term "wikiality" in satirical tribute to the fact that anyone can edit a Wikipedia page and, he says, thereby change reality. See http://theinternetispeople.com for background and a video link, which may be temporary. Wikipedia apparently had to lock up its page about elephants after Colbert suggested that viewers jump in and vandalize (vandaledit?) the page to say elephants aren't endangered after all. Wikipedia's discussion of the problem even has its own warning about "trolls": http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Elephant/Colbert In passing, Colbert also mentioned that the Wikipedia entry on truthiness (another coinage of his) is longer than the one on Lutheranism. 9:03:58 AM    comment []

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