Talk:WikiEducator

Concerns over article as of 28 Oct 2008

As a Wikieducator User, I feel very unsettled by the layout and highlighting of particular aspects of information in this article. Primarily because it presents information non standard to most other Wikipedia entries, and secondly because it distorts the significance of some aspects of the project. In particular:

1. the celebration of an individual above all else (rather than simply in the history),
2. its strong references to COL, UNESCO and Hewlet Foundation (above other partners who can show a far greater contribution to the project than any of those),
3. and its quotation of that perplexing, even frightening line that SOME (one) wikieducator Users choose to use, to the detriment of the project: "...working collaboratively with the free culture movement towards a free version of the education curriculum."

I have raised my concerns on the Wikieducator email list regarding the claim to be creating a free version of the curriculum. It is a fact that this very line is used on many communications about the project, and until now I have not bothered to take issue with it - thinking that the author of it would have worked to correct the impression that the line gives. I would hope (as a User) that we are not talking about developing a single curriculum but supporting diversity in free to access and reuse curricula.

As for the reference to central bodies like COL, UNESCO, A "free culture movement" and Hewlet Foundation, I think these should not be included in an graphical box heading the article, and should merely be listed along with all other contributing organisations, as is consistant with other Wikipedia articles for similar projects like Wikiversity. I would include in that the relocation of information pertaining to Wayne Mackintosh - credited as founding Wikieducator. This information should be historical.

--Leighblackall (talk) 04:11, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

I agree with Leigh Blackall, the previous version of this article looked odd and out of place, so I have reverted to a more appropriatte version which I believe to have more of a NPOV. Chrismo (talk) 07:29, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

Hi friend, don't you believe in discussions? ….in a hasty decision the article was left even without a proper introduction. User:Apletters (talk) 08:34, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

Of course I believe in discussions, I think the entry on Wikiversity would be a good template for this article.Chrismo (talk) 13:56, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

Ok then let us start by giving due reference to the founder. User:Apletters (talk) 16:11, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

Due reference to the founder was never removed, its bizarre how you find this important to be the first and most important part of this article, when you look at the article for wikipedia, digg.com etc, other big well known web sites, they all start with a discription of the site and then some info about the creator/founder. If you look at the style of other articles on wikipedia they dont start with a section called "introduction", they go straight into the article. I think this shows your bias and doesn't represent good NPOV on this article.Chrismo (talk) 14:14, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

being educators we never start without an introduction <smile>...and if you are speaking about the title words Introduction you may remove it, titles are most often used for the convenience of getting auto TOC and individual sections separately for editing, this feature will be very useful once the length of the article is increased considerably. User:Apletters (talk) 04:39, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Re:Concerns over article as of 28 Oct 2008

Hi friend,

There is nothing wrong in mentioning the founder in the very beginning of the topic. Nothing that is man-made happens in the world without a sparkling thought in somebody's mind who has the initiative to trigger action for making it a reality. It is such initiators who become founders. Let us accept this fact and deliver the beauty and worth of mutual trust, recognition and consideration that are the crux of the very existence of human societies. More over we are trying to write the running history of the project.

And you are right founders can bring in very big institutions into the project. Neither it prevent any one from placing a photo of the founder at the beginning of the article nor it any way reduces the importance of organizational partners.

I agree with you about the listing of all institutional partners. I would like to propose a subsection for that.

Thanx for your comments, please continue to contribute.

Let us continue discussions here keeping the original version for the time being, and make changes in accordance with aspects where the participants arrive at consensus - in a true wiki way <smile>.

User:Apletters (talk) 06:40, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

I am not apposed to mentioning Wayne as the founder - nor including reference to COL, UNESCO and HF. I was apposed to the significance those pieces of information have over and at the expense of any other information about the project. I do have concerns as to the accuracy of the idea that Wayne was single handedly the "founder" to Wikieducator, as I do know of other people involved in those early stages who remain unmentioned in the history, but who I can't rightly add here because I can neither be sure of all the details, or reference anything about it. BTW, I think the info box to the right looks much better at least --Leighblackall (talk) 19:25, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

Revise to use Template:Infobox website

I suggest that the article page be revised to use Template:Infobox website in place of the current Template:Infobox project. In particular, I like the use of slogan rather than mission (I suggest using "turning the digital divide into digital dividends using free content and open networks"), launched rather an established, and the inclusion of content license, registration requirement, and alexa ranking. The infobox would no longer list funding (which I think is probably a good thing -- see earlier comments), and location (again a good thing because it is more distributed than is currently indicated).

Any other thoughts on this change? Is there another info box type that should be considered?

ASnieckus (talk) 02:27, 26 August 2010 (UTC)

That sounds like a good idea to me. I would go with it. I doubt there is a better infobox since there doesn't seem to be one for wiki-based websites in particular. Novaseminary (talk) 03:15, 26 August 2010 (UTC)

Thanks. I'll go ahead with the change. ASnieckus (talk) 18:10, 26 August 2010 (UTC)