Web of words challenges traditional encyclopedias
If you thought open source was only about software, think again. The English-language version of Wikipedia, an online encyclopedia produced by a worldwide community of volunteers, has reached 300,000 articles - three times as many as the Encyclopedia Britannica.
At the present rate the project should reach 1m articles in 50 languages, from Arabic to Gaelic, in the next few months.
Each article is written by an enthusiast in the relevant field, for no pay, and edited by fellow volunteers. Wikipedia is part of a series of websites to which anyone can contribute without having to learn special programming skills. Internet users can access all the content free.
The Wikipedia.org website registered an average of 8.7m daily hits in June, making it more popular than Britannica.com, which charges a subscription of $60 (?50) a year.
But can Wikipedia's part-timers hope to match the authority of traditional encyclopedias? Encyclopedia Britannica said: "Wikipedia can cover a lot of ground but you have to wonder about its accuracy and objectivity. We have quality control mechanisms that give us a competitive advantage."
Yet the success of Linux, the free computer operating system developed by volunteers, underlines that open-source products do not always need to be as good as proprietary alternatives. If they are free, and "good enough" to satisfy the needs of alarge proportion of users, they can succeed.
The name Wikipedia comes from a way of creating web pages collaboratively that was invented in the mid-1990s by Ward Cunningham, a US computer programmer. He named his invention "Wiki-Wiki" after the shuttle buses at Honolulu airport.
The idealism that guides the development of open-source software inspires many Wikipedians, as regular contributors are known. Jimmy Wales, a former futures and options trader who started the project three years ago, said: "A big part of our motivation is getting this knowledge out to everyone on the planet."
As president of the non-profit Wikimedia Foundation, Mr Wales describes his role as that of "benevolent dictator" - rather like that of Linus Torvalds, inventor of Linux and a figurehead of the open-source movement.
Unlike a conventional editor-in-chief, Mr Wales has no staff. Wikipedia relies on its users to correct errors and spot copyright infringements. New contributions and changes are monitored by an inner circle of about 1,200 volunteer editors.
While acts of vandalism tend to be corrected quickly, the system is far from foolproof. This year a spoof history of Chesapeake, Virginia claimed it was a big importer of cow dung until "it collapsed in one tremendous heap", leaving residents without water or electricity. The article remained on Wikipedia for a month.
Some internet sites also point to genuine errors - not hoaxes - that users have found in Wikipedia. Wikipedians respond by citing errors they have found in Encyclopedia Britannica.
Wikipedians concede that Britannica's 100 full-time editors and network of paid contributors give it an edge. Wikipedia.org said: "There can be no question that at the current stage, EB [Encyclopedia Britannica] is vastly more complete and accurate than Wikipedia."
Mr Wales believes that as the project grows it will become more comprehensive and accurate. He quotes what is known as Linus's law: "Given enough eyeballs, all bugs are shallow." In other words, errors will be weeded out by the sheer number of people editing the site.
There is also talk of putting more formal management methods in place to ensure the quality of content. For example, committees of experts may be given final authority to approve articles.
While anyone would be free to contribute new articles or amendments, these would be incorporated into the "master" version of Wikipedia only after being reviewed.
Encyclopedia publishers are not alone in facing the wiki challenge. Another Wikimedia Foundation project is Wikibooks, aimed at producing low-cost textbooks going much deeper than the short articles of encyclopedias. Online texts being prepared range from "Introduction to Philosophy" to "Mesopotamian Marshlands", each produced by self-professed experts and enthusiasts.
Mr Wales hopes that publishers will be willing to distribute low-cost printed versions that could be used by educational institutions in developing countries.
On this score, however, even fans of open-source production methods are sceptical. Steve Weber, professor of political science at the University of California, Berkeley and author of a recent book on the success of open source, said: "As a teacher I would never use such a thing. I am a great fan of quality control."
老百科遇到新挑战
如果你认为“开放源”(open source)只是关于软件，你得再想想。全球志愿者共同编写的网上百科全书“维基百科”(Wikipedia）英文版，已经收入了30万条目，是《大英百科全书》（Encyclopedia Britannica）的三倍。
按照目前的发展速度，维基百科所收入的条目在未来数月将达到100万篇，所用文字多达50种，从阿拉伯语一直到盖尔语。
每篇内容都由某相关领域的热心人士撰写，没有稿酬，编辑者也同样是志愿人士。Wikipedia是一套系列网站之一，任何人都可以向网站供稿，无需特别的编程技能。互联网用户可免费调阅网站的全部内容。
6月份，Wikipedia.org网站的点击率为平均每天870万，超过了收取60美元年费的《大英百科全书》网站Britannica.com。
但是，维基百科的兼职撰稿人和编辑们，是否有望赶上传统百科全书的权威呢？《大英百科全书》说：“维基百科确实能包括不少内容，但是大家或许会怀疑它的准确性和客观性。我们有质量控制机制，这是我们的优势。”
然而，免费电脑操作系统Linux也是志愿者开发的，它就很成功。这说明开放源产品不一定比专有产品差。如果它既免费，又“质量过得去”，能满足很大一部分用户的需要，那么它就能取得成功。
“维基”的名字，起源于90年代中期美国电脑程序员沃德?坎宁安（Ward Cunningham）发明的一种协作式网页创建方法。他用檀香山飞机场巴士的名字“维基-维基”来命名自己的发明。
开放源软件的开发多受理想主义的指引，这种理想主义也激励着很多经常性供稿的“维客”们(Wikipedians)。原期货和期权经纪人吉米?威尔士（Jimmy Wales）在3年前发起维基百科项目。他说：“我们的主要动机，是向地球上所有人传播知识。”
作为非赢利的维基百科基金会主席，威尔士先生表示，他扮演的角色是“仁慈的独裁者”，一如李纳斯?托沃兹(Linus Torvalds)。托沃兹是Linux的发明人，也是开放源运动的精神领袖。
和传统的总编辑不同，威尔士先生手下并无一兵一卒。维基百科主要依靠用户来纠正错误，并发现版权侵权行为。由大约1200名志愿编辑组成的核心编辑班子，负责对新的供稿和更正进行监督。
破坏行为固然大多及时得到纠正，但整个系统并非万无一失。今年就有人编造了一条关于维吉尼亚州切萨皮克（Chesapeake, Virginia）的假历史，说该城市是牛粪进口大户，直到“牛粪堆积成山，整个城市由此跨掉”，令居民缺水断电。这一条目在维基百科上放了一个月之久。
有些网站指出了一些用户在维基百科上发现的真正错误(而非恶作剧)。而维客们则指出他们从《大英百科全书》上发现的错误作为回应。
维客们承认，《大英百科全书》有上百位全职编辑，有付酬供稿者的网络，这确实是优势。Wikipedia.org说：“毫无疑问，在目前阶段，《大英百科全书》要比维基百科完备得多，准确得多。”
威尔士先生相信，随着项目的发展，它将越来越完整，越来越准确。他援引了所谓“Linux法则”：“众目之下，害虫难逃。”换言之，编辑该网站的人之多，使错误很难不被根除。
也有人说，应该有更正规化的管理方法，确保内容的质量。例如，可以设置专家委员会，对条目内容掌握最终审批权。
尽管人人都可以编写新条目，增加补充内容，这些内容应该经审阅后才被纳入“母版”。
受到维基百科冲击的还不止是百科全书的出版商。维基百科基金会的另一个项目是维基图书(Wikibooks)，其目的是生产低成本的教材，其内容要比百科全书上的概略介绍深入许多。正在编撰的网上教材从“哲学入门”到“美索不达米亚沼泽地”不等，都是自封的专家和热心人士编写的。
威尔士先生希望出版商愿意发行低成本的印刷版教材，供发展中国家的教育机构使用。
但在这一点上，即便是开放源制作方法的爱好者也有所怀疑。加州大学伯克利分校（University of California, Berkeley）政治学教授史蒂夫?韦伯（Steve Weber）最近出了一本关于开放源方法获得成功的书。他说：“作为一名教师，我是不会使用这种教材的。我非常热衷于质量控制。”
