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Comment by vfinn | Hacker News Reader

I salute your efforts, but even if you have experience in the field (Wiki, OSM), I'm sorry to say that your arguments are weak and overly specific. I'd be more understanding if you had said working for Wikipedia/OSM isn't worth it, but to extend your "arguments" to all of Open Knowledge Movement is just too much.

I find Wikipedia, the end result, extremely valuable, even though I don't know what's going on in the shadows (probably the usual, petty human affairs as you said).

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> Even though I don't know what's going on in the shadows

Well. Here is my report from the shadows.

Anyway, working for Wikipedia/OSM is totally worth it. As you see it by yourself, the projects are quite successful in delivering quality services to the masses. That's why I'm not advocating people to give up entirely on this "dream". Just take a short pause to ponder why are we starting this movement at the first time.

I'm not alone though, this burnout phenomenon is quite a recurring endemic to any long-time contributors. Some people take a pause [1], and some people left the project entirely [2][3].

[1] : https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikistress

[2] : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WikiProject_Editor_R...

[3] : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Missing_Wikipedians

Thanks. Yeah, I don't doubt that there are problems and that it could get really hostile and difficult. I'm just unsure how unsolvable the conflicts are, and I'm not convinced that there's a fundamental flaw, such as "single definition of truth", in the world of Open Knowledge Movement (as I interpret it).

> I find Wikipedia, the end result, extremely valuable

What if the value is an Illusion?

All things are illusions, all illusions are wrong, but some illusions are useful.

I use Wikipedia for navigation mostly. To take anything at face value is not a good idea, even if most of it were "probably true" / true-ish.

That is not true Well, the math section and such could be beneficial to get an overall idea of the topic until picking up a book

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