The fact that they can use funds of the Foundation for projects that:
- (a) aren't about keeping the servers/site up, and
- (b) are often times politically biased
shows the grown parasitism that now exists within the Foundation.
Backup however many copies you can. *When* the Foundation collapses in on itself, it'll be because the parasites have drained it of all of its resources, and they'll scurry off to their next host to begin the cycle anew. All that will be left for us is a hollow husk of biased writings & rose-tinted lenses, funded with our tax dollars & well-meaning donations.
I think a collapse is unlikely to happen. Even if "parasitism" is the right mental model, these aren't parasites that kill their host.
What will likely happen is Wikipedia survives, remains extremely prominent, but becomes politically polarized and loses trust of those outside its faction.
> All that will be left for us is a hollow husk of biased writings & rose-tinted lenses, funded with our tax dollars & well-meaning donations.
That will be the view of some, but others will see it as a shining, righteous hammer to beat their opponents with.
The task to respond to that situation is an extremely difficult one 1) create fork that doesn't turn into an opposite-polarization cesspit, 2) burn away Wikipedia's goodwill, which is what makes it valuable to faction you call "parasites."
No doubt the wikipedia is left-tarded as are most institutions but it doesn't appear to me that wikimedia has captured it yet. The two appear to be operating quite independently for the most part. The article talks a lot about wikimedia funding and its pretty clear that its fully left-tarded. But there is no indication other than one editor firing that wikipedia itself is being affected directly.
Its similar to Nature. The editorial pages and blogs are filled with social justice nonsense. But the actual journals are filled with just regular nonsense..they have yet to reach peak nonsense.
Wikipedia is an interesting one because I suspect the culture that drives Wikipedia is a mystery to ousiders. It is to me. It didn't seem to be partisan, it didn't claim to be technocratic, it officially wasn't interested in divining the truth from research. Didn't seem to be religious, didn't seem to be geographically centred. Given the incredible public good the editors are responsible for it'd be impolite to observe many of them are unhinged but the thought does occur.
Anyway; whatever culture it is the retrospective process of watching its successes or failures will be a marvel. The political activists are brutally competitive and I'd expect them to win except I don't understand who the Wikipedia people actually are and whether they will be able to reform around a new project after Wikipedia itself, inevitably, falls to barbarians.
IMHO, a big part if it is actually ideological battle, at least nowadays. Individuals and cliques going about on little crusades to impose their views. If there's a conflict, there's a long, slow bureaucratic battle where, through the selective enforcement of existing policies and setting new ones, one side emerges victorious and gets to impose its view.
The starting point for the selective enforcement was "what side would your typical basement-dwelling geek favor," but that's evolved over time.
The other big part is pedantry.
> Given the incredible public good the editors are responsible for it'd be impolite to observe many of them are unhinged but the thought does occur.
Honestly, I think that's table stakes for playing the Wikipedia game. Anyone else gives up quickly.
