I was flicking through the latest edition of British Archaeology recently (number 88) (I need to at least pretend I am keeping up with my field) and an article caught my eye. It was in the new(ish) column on “On The Web”, which always feels a little crammed and tacked on, but I’m not the editor, so there’s nothing I can do about it. Also, I would rather they were talking just a little bit about the topic than not at all. Each issue they look at an issue/website and try to get a page-long article out of it.

This time it was the role of internet sites as resources. This is good. The Web rates a big Yay! in my book, but the Web is underused as a resource, one of the main reasons cited for which, is that students don’t know where to start looking – a statement I have no problem with. Time and again, I get into discussions with people who say “but I just don’t know where to begin“.

So when a respected entry level journal such as British Archaeology lists some good portal sites, you listen. B.A. has the potential to reach thousands of new students and interested amateurs, and to shape their online researching habits for ever more, so a recommendation from them is a huge thing.

Which is why I was a little concerned that Wikipedia was mentioned as a great starting point. Don’t get me wrong, it is a great starting point, but a lot/most users don’t realise the very shaky factual foundations it stands upon. A straw poll of the users in the lab back when I was doing the Thesis showed that, whilst most of my colleagues would use Wikipedia regularly to check facts, the majority of them weren’t aware there was no official refereeing or verification methods in place. They were unaware that anyone could, and frequently did, submit articles and edit extant work. I myself was not aware till I started doing research into wikis in general.

Web-savy users know to treat most Internet sources slightly dubiously till we can verify them. If we can’t pin down an author and/or source for a fact, we tend to run for the hills. Or at least do some more digging. Most readers of B.A., I would hazzard a guess, are not that Web-savy. It is hard to teach people to be critical about everything we read – we are taught from an early age to respect and revere the written word. It goes against the grain to question something we see on the screen. For so long, there have been gatekeepers to publication – editors; peer review; the Church; money; education – that we assume it still holds true in this day and age when anyone with even an iota of inclination can get their words online and give them a veneer of authority. When you are greeted by an edifice such as Wikipedia, with its hundreds upon thousands of articles, it is almost unbelievable that such a thing could be allowed to exist if it wasn’t true.

To be published in a recognised journal (both print and many online) you go through the process of peer review. You have to prove that what you have written is repeatable and true. Yes, mistakes get made, but very few. With Wikipedia, whilst you still have to run the gamut of all the millions of other users, and the semi-god-like Editors, I imagine if you act enough like an authority then your word will become accepted as true. Studies have shown that Wikipedia has similar numbers of errors to established encyclopaedias such as the Encyclopaedia Britannica, but the nature of those errors is different. Wikipedia, when it stumbles, tends to get things wrong to a much greater degree. Also, encyclopaedias are never presented to students as good places to look for information. Starting points, yes. Finishing points? Not so much.

And then there is the treatment of those who are genuine experts in their field. danah experienced this first hand when she came face to face with her own bio on Wikipedia. Not only was there debate about whether she should even have an entry (and why shouldn’t she?) it was culturally inappropriate to edit her own page to correct information she knew (who better?) to be factually inaccurate. You have to question the veracity of any entry in Wikipedia when you are made aware of such glaring problems with particular entries. If an expert in a field is not considered the appropriate authority to talk about her own life, what about experts in other fields? There is a subtle but pervasive anti-establishment tone throughout Wikipedia. Yes, you might not like that professors and such are more knowledgeable in a given sphere than you are, but in many cases they are more knowledgeable. Listen to them. Learn from them.

I digress ever so slightly from my initial point, which was this: I worry that Wikipedia is being set up in as a site that can dispense gospel truth, and that it is being sold as such to the people who are the most vulnerable.

I am at a mental impasse. I want total freedom of knowledge. I want everyone to be able to get at all information. I want everyone to be able to add to that body of information without having to jump through hoops.
At the same time, I want that information to be checked and to be correct. However much I might wish for a total democratization of information, there needs to be mechanisms in place where the genuine authorities on a given subject are able to step in and correct mistakes.

I am not for locking away knowledge for the privileged few, nor am I advocating keeping the less knowledgeable away from information. I would, however, recommend caution. For the majority of people, small inaccuracies in Wikipedia and sources like it will have no affect on their lives. They have no desire, or need, to know more. There are, however, people who want more in-depth knowledge and it might be better (for example) if they were first presented with the archaeological facts as we have them, before being introduced to theories about how the pyramids served as landing platforms for aliens.

I agree Wikipedia is a wonderful resource and a great place to act as a jump-point to more in-depth knowledge. I frequently use it as such myself. But I am hesitant to place such an onus on it as British Archaeology does, naming in the same paragraph as some respected, established, and verified portals and sties. I could argue that archaeology (and other disciplines) need to descend en masse on Wikipedia and correct/verify all the information pertaining to our fields that we can find. But such a plan is sure to backfire and mire us all in allegations of Ivory Tower-dom and academic elitism. The alternative of starting our own Wikipedia for archaeology is also doomed – you’re just never gonna get the consensus or collaboration across the discipline on the scale that is required.

My solution? Urge caution. Use Wikipedia, sure, but use other sources as well. Be skeptical. If you find a problem with Wikipedia, edit it. If you find another good site, tell people about it. But most importantly, never stop questioning what is put on the page or screen in front of you. Use the brain that whatever deity you see fit to believe in, put between your ears.

EDIT/UPDATE:
It pays to read your archives before you publish a long rant. I had a sneaking feeling I’ve touched on this topic a time or two before, and sure enough I have. Ah well, now you can enjoy that article too 🙂

wikipedia, british archaeology, democratisation of information, ivory tower, academia, archaeology, elitism

So I promised a full review of my decision to submit Bright Meadow to 9rules, and I will do my best.

RSS subscribers, or avid readers of the blog, might have already noticed a Mini-Meadow post saying that I have bitten the bullet and submitted Bright Meadow for the latest round of 9rules submissions.

I did say when I heard that they were accepting admissions again that I wasn’t sure if it was for me or not – my reservations are a matter of record and, whilst it will probably bork any chance I have of acceptance, I stand by them. I am still not totally convinced that Bright Meadow needs to be in a network, if it would benefit from being in one, or even if 9rules is the right network for me.

So what made me submit if I still have reservations?

Time, first of all, for a little history. Soon after I started using the blog format back in April 2005 I noticed sites with this little leaf symbol proclaiming themselves as proud members of something called “9rules”. I can’t say I really paid much more attention than that at the time, other than noting in passing that as a rule these sites were a cut above the rest. As the blogging bug bit (around the time I was starting to avoid the Thesis actually), I was spending more and more time surfing for interesting blogs. Time and again, I would find myself passing through 9rules blogs, and I started to trust the logo. If I was in doubt about a site, and I saw the leaves, I would give it the benefit of the doubt. I must admit I was rarely let down.

I found myself wanting to join this little group of people. I wanted more traffic for the blog (readers, preciousssss readersss!) and all the hype about 9rules told me it was the place to be. Anyone who wanted to be someone was (it seemed) a member of 9rules. That it was a select group appealed to me at the same time it repelled me. More on that later.

Finally, a round opened up in November 2005, and I submitted Bright Meadow. This was back in the Blogger days, so I knew my chances were real slim, but at the same time I just wasn’t in the position to move away from a free, hosted service. Domain name registration and hosting might be inexpensive these days, but it’s still a non-trivial cost for someone whose budget was end-of-four-years-of-study small. As I subscribe to the philosophy “I’m gonna make a fool of myself regardless of what I do, so I might as well go for things I want – I can hardly make things worse”, and submission was just filling in a four-field form, I could see no reason NOT to submit. Seeing as how I’ve just resubmitted the blog, you would be safe to assume I didn’t get into 9rules that time around.

It would be silly to say this alone prompted me to change how I look at Bright Meadow, but it certainly gave me reason to stop and think what I really wanted from this blog/website. It is a little mind boggling to think about it, but that November was the first time I had really sat down and tried to define what I was doing in a single paragraph. The act of submitting made me evaluate what I was doing – what was I proud of? What did I enjoy doing the most? What was a waste of mine, and my readers, time? Where did I want Bright Meadow to be in a year, two years, time?

All these were questions that, coincidentally, I was trying to answer for my own life. New Years 2006 marked a big turning point for me on a lot of fronts, both personally, professionally, and blogging-ly.

Rejection of any kind makes you rock back on your heels. Yes, I had the petty knee-jerk reaction of pulling all 9rules sites from my RSS reader. I’m not proud of it, and most were restored when I had regained my equanimity and realised I how silly it was to have a temper tantrum over a website. Once I had recovered enough to laugh at myself, I realised how stupid it was to ask for admittance to a group that prides itself on its content when I couldn’t even define my own content. It’s an age old maxim that you need to love yourself before others can love you, but in this case it holds true. I had an ambivalent attitude to my blog at that point – I liked it, but I wasn’t sure why I was doing it, and I knew it wasn’t what I wanted it to be – and clearly this showed. Seeing as how 9rules don’t tell failed sites why they failed, I going on guess work and gut instinct here, but my gastro-intestinal tract tells me I needed to get my shit together. Badly.

In the space of that month and a half after submitting the first time, I shifted domains, moved to wordpress, and paid more attention to what I was writing about. Out went (the majority) of the daily “here’s what I did today” posts. Hello to posts that used day-to-day occurrences merely as jumping off points. Hola! posts that talked about what interested me (social computing), looking at them in a way I felt was under represented on the blogs I had come into contact with: non-specialist enthusiast. I’m more tech-literate than most of the ‘average’ computer users out there, thanks to the benefit of education and inclination, but I still couldn’t code my way out of a paper bag. I just like taking what other people have written, and playing with it some, seeing how I can apply it to my ordinary life. And I like sharing what I have learnt with other people. I like connecting, I like learning new things, and blogging is becoming a brilliant way of doing these things.

Something has finally clicked with regards my blogging – I feel I have finally found a tone I am comfortable using, I am talking about things I want to talk about, and I am starting to collect a diverse range of readers and commenters. I feel, and it is possible I am just talking out of my hat here and it’s not how people perceive things at all, but I feel that I am starting to develop a voice. I would like to think my words stick around in peoples brains and make them think. If nothing else, my scatter-shot approach to punctuation must make me memorable!

When the time came round and 9rules announced that they were opening the dread-portals once more, I realised that I was no longer so sure I wanted to become a member. I was a bit more aware of the downsides to being in a network. I’d seen the upheaval that happens when you don’t fit – Liz visited a fair few ponds before she settled down at b5. On top of that, 9rules themselves were very reticent to describe the benefits and/or drawbacks to being a member of their group. Yes, you can be guaranteed all your neighbour sites are top-notch. Yes, you are gonna get a helluva bump to your traffic. Yes, there’s this great community of people that you are welcomed into when you join. But an outsider has to ask herself “where is the catch?” Am I gonna be signing over my first born?

(I don’t seriously think that Scrivs and co are into black market babies, but… Where’s the frelling catch! Everything has a downside. Something you suck up because the benefits are so great. I’m just waiting for the other penny to drop).

On top of that, I have an innate distrust of elite groups and cliques. Closed circles of people remind me far too much of the “in crowd” at school. The in crowd weren’t very nice to me. It’s taken me many years to be comfortable with the fact I am not mainstream, but echoes come back to me, and I still see them round that one bench in the courtyard at lunch, talking and giggling together, imperiously ignoring everyone else as beneath contempt. Even worse, I remember their gaze on me and the feeling “are they laughing at me?”

This, again, isn’t to say that the 9rules community is like this. I am sure they aren’t – the few 9rulers I have had the privilege to cross paths with were certainly all lovely welcoming people – but it is a genuine concern of mine all the same.

On top of this, I have spent much time researching groups and how to get people interacting, and am a firm believer in inclusivity as opposed to exclusivity. Break down the barriers, not build more. We will probably always have an A-List, as it seems to be hardwired into the human psyche that we revere and put on pedestals certain members of our society, and this A-List invariably seems to depend on who you know, but that doesn’t mean I have to like the A-List. 9rules sites, while not necessarily the ultimate A-List in the blogging community, are definitely the A-List as far as a certain sub-group are concerned. In my mind I liken it to the modern music scene – there are the celebrity pop artists you might like (and deride loudly to your friends, but you know all the lyrics) who are the ultimate A-Listers, and there are the cool indy artists who you respect as well as like. You listen to their music because it challenges you at the same time as giving enjoyment. In my mind, that’s what a 9rules site deserves – my respect. I go there not just because it’s fun, but because it will force me to think about something. Still, there’s an aloofness I can’t help but notice. They’ve got a well deserved reputation for greatness, and…

I find myself torn.

I want to be a part of this elite group I respect, because to become a member would say my peers also respected my work. Who wouldn’t want such recognition? I am deeply proud of all that I’ve accomplished here at Bright Meadow and if I could reach more people by joining 9rules, then I see no reason why I shouldn’t try to join.

At the same time, my own distrust of the “cool gang” is rearing it’s ugly head. Why do I need to join a group? Surely I can do just as well on my own? Any network runs the risk of becoming insular and inward looking, and excluding people is anathema to me. And there’s my own particular brand of contrary minded stubbornness. I never got picked for the teams at school, I was never in the cool group, so why should I want to join one now? I never pretended my reasons would make much sense, but they are my reasons.

As I said, I am torn. I still am. So why did I submit?

Once again, it was a case of nothing ventured, nothing gained. I’d always be wondering “what if?” and few things are sadder in this life than regrets. I love that some posts have 40 and more comments on them. I am proud of my Blog Minions, and even more honoured that people want to become Blog Minions. I actually enjoy going back and reading through my archives now – they are my words, I worked hard on them, and it shows. I want to share Bright Meadow with the world, and if 9rules could help me do that, who am I to look down my nose at them?

You’ve got to admit, being picked out from the 699 other sites that also submitted would be one hell of an ego boost.

This entire post is, of course, going to stand testament to how much time I spend thinking about blogging. And is probably frelling over whatever slim chance I had in the first place, but I stand by all I’ve said.

I would just love to be proven wrong 😉

(And if you can work out the link between the title and the post, you’ll get yourself a cookie. Hint – it’s a song lyric)