20090430 -- The World of Wikis (2)

Conversation B

Beth: What about people who write offensive content or insert false information?
Adam: Actually a study conducted by MIT found that obscenities in articles are usually removed within 1.7 minutes. False information is usually quickly deleted too.

Beth: Well, that does strengthen your argument. But what about times when people don't agree on the information?

Adam: That's called an "edit war." It happens the most when there are several different points of view on the topic. Most of the time, the people who disagree eventually reach a consensus.

Beth: But how long does that take? If you can't trust the accuracy of the information, what can you use if for?

Adam: There are plenty of uses! A travel wiki can be an ingenious way to read about or discuss places of interest. Some offices even have wikis for company information or policies.

Beth: Why should we trust the infomation on even those wikis? The authors may still lack expertise.

Adam: Not necessarily. Since anyone can help write a wiki, experts can share information too. Besides, a big group of people will always have more knowledge than just one expert.

Beth: Perhaps that is true, but I'm not convinced yet.



obscenity n. 猥褻
eg: The mother covered her young child's ears after hearing obscenities on the TV show.

delete v. 刪除
de- 分離/除去
eg: Make sure you don't accidentally delete that important file from your computer.
eg: I deleted some old e-mails so I can have more space for incoming mails.
eg: The last part of the interview was deleted due to space limitation.

consensus n. 共識(多半用單數形或是不可數的型態)
-> reach some sort of agreement
con- 共同
-sens 感覺
eg: The consensus of the organization was that they should elect John to be their president.
eg: reach a consensus on something 在某件事上達成共識
eg: We finally reached a consensus on our annual goals.


expertise n. 專門知識或技術
expert n. 專家
expertise in something
eg: My history professor's expertise is World War II.
eg: Her expertise in cooking really impressed us.
eg: I have no expertise in sports.

MIT[Massachusetts Institute of Technology] n. 麻省理工學院

edit war n.筆戰

offensive adj. 討厭的/令人作嘔的


//== Chat room ==//
There's power in numbers.
-> The more people you have to contribute something, the more successful it will be.

There's power in numbers.
= Two heads are better than one. 三個臭皮匠勝個一個諸葛亮

Many hands make light work. 人多好辦事

Too many cooks spoil the broth.
太多的廚師會把湯煮壞
-> 人多反而把事搞砸