Move your FAQ to Wikipedia?

Mal Booth from the Australian War Memorial (AWM) makes the fascinating suggestion: they should move their entire Encyclopaedia to Wikipedia. Their encyclopaedia seems to function as a fully researched and referenced FAQ with content creation driven by public enquiries, and would probably sit well in Wikipedia.

In Wikipedia and "produsers", Mal says:

"Putting the content up on Wikipedia.org gives it MUCH wider exposure than our website ever can and it therefore has the potential to bring new users to our website that may not even know we exist (via links in to our own web content). With a wikipedia.org user account, we can maintain an appropriate amount of control over the content (more than we have at present over wikipedia content that started as ours, already put up there by others).

Another point is that putting it up on Wikipedia allows us to engage the assistance of various volunteers who'd like to help us, but don't live locally."

He also presents some good suggestions from their web developer, Adam: they should understand and participate in the Wikipedia community, and identify themselves as AWM professionals before importing content. I think they've taken the first step by assessing the suitability of their content for Wikipedia.

It's also an interesting example of an organisation that is willing to 'let go' of their content and allow it to be used and edited outside their institution. Mal's blog is a real find (and I'm not just saying that because it has 'Melbin' (Melbourne) in the title), and I'll be following the progress of their project with interest.

I wonder how issues of trust and authority will play out on their entries: by linking to the relevant Wikipedia entries, the AWM is giving those entries a level of authority they might not otherwise have. They're also placing a great deal of trust in Wikipedia authors.

Mal links to a post by Alex Bruns, Beyond Public Service Broadcasting: Produsage at the ABC and summarises the four preconditions for good user-generated content:

• the replacement of a hierarchy with a more open participatory structure;
• recognising the power of the COMMUNITY to distinguish between constructive and destructive contributions;
• allowing for random (granular, simple) acts of participation (like ratings); and
• the development of shared rather than owned content that is able to be re-used, re-mixed or mashed up.

Adam's post lists key principles that anyone "looking to develop successful and sustainable participatory media environments" should take into account. These points are defined and expanded on in the original post, which is well worth reading:

1. Open Participation, Communal Evaluation
2. Fluid Heterarchy, Ad Hoc Meritocracy
3. Unfinished Artefacts, Continuing Process
4. Common Property, Individual Rewards