<nettime> RE: nupedia encyclopaedia

[flw <flw@khm.de>]

osfavelados wrote:

   Hi, this is a recent-comer to nettime
   I read  with interest the message sent by Peter Lunenfeld about the
   Nupedia-encyclopedia project.

   However, i was wondering if everybody believes in the possibility of
   "unbiased" contributions?

i also read peter lunenfelds message with interest, and i also doubt the
idea of
an "unbiased encyclopaedia", more interesting to me is the open content
idea of the whole.
but why does it still have to be labeled as an encyclopaedia? for me
(and i think for alot of other people) the idea of an
encyclopyedia got kinda obsolete, and it might have been before things
like www.
read dŽalambert preface to the great encyclopaedia of 1751-1780 and
diderots articles about "encyclopaedia" in the same
publication: they were aware of the potential impossibility of the
encyclopaedic idea (they produced THE encyclopaedia the
following years, though).
or take the ENCYCLOPAEDIA DA COSTA  (reprinted at arkhive press) of
french writers and surrealists (michel leiris,
georges bataille, marcel duchamp et.al.) in the 1940s for a (creative)
critique and a (late) example for reflecting the very
problematic constitution of an "encyclopaedic idea", which is
interpreted as an highly ideological one and showing the
impossibility of the whole concept.

i wonder why there are no no indices about critical reflections about
this encyclopaedic idea (which includes the believe of
completeness and objective knowledge distribution, as well as the
distribution of knowledge is another important topic not
explicitly rerflected with the concept of an encyclopaedia) in peter
lunenfelds introduction of their project?

   the web should allow for a more plural, less
   hierarchical approach, without so many editors, staff, supervisors,
   phd's and so on, a new kind of rizhomatic knowledge-archive.

and yes, i agree with you, jose, why is it the same old story with
well-qualified writers, editors, and peer reviewers (...)  about three
dozen Ph.D.'s, M.D.'s, and otherhighly-trained
professionals who will produce this knowledge container?

this were just some brief thougts about my problems reading about such a
encyclopaedia concept
in 2000. please excuse my broken english...

best wishes, marc


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