Wikipedia's bad reputation
Wikipedia is shocked and appalled to discover that one of their highly credentialed amateurs is not, in fact, the expert theology professor that he claims to be. They are so shocked that they are planning on putting into place a system to check editors' credentials for cases in which they cite same credentials.
So why such a surprise? People misidentify themselves on the Internet, which after all is part of the game.
Wikipedia is trying to have the best of both worlds--the coolness of the anonymity along with the authoritativeness of professionalism.
IMHO, the future is going to be some kind of reputation-based pseudonymity. Wikipedia is right on the cusp of needing it, although other sites will soon find themselves in the same position. Think about how many web-based business models are reputation based...Ebay and feedback scores? Amazon's reviews? Faceless bloggers everywhere.
Someone will make a lot of money developing reputational technology.
Posted on March 08, 2007
