Category: Publishing
-
Nature Agreed to Publish My Wikipedia Letter—Then Ghosted Me
Earlier this year, leading scientific journal Nature published an editorial lavishing effusive praise on Wikipedia, writing that it is “an antidote to an increasingly poisoned information ecosystem.” Naturally (no pun intended), as co-founder, I had to respond, knowing that Wikipedia is increasingly “poisoned” itself. (I call myself ex-founder; I have been called the Emmanuel Goldstein…
-
Plan for a Public Notebook
Some background My strange career began with academia and a little college teaching, and then a series of knowledge and education startups and consulting stints. I have rarely been short of interesting opportunities, from which I have been able to choose what I think is most worthwhile. The most worthwhile, on my view, were not…
-
Grokipedia: a first look
To begin with my credentials for those who arrive here not knowing who I am: I’ve started, or helped start, five encyclopedias and meta-encyclopedia projects, including Wikipedia. So I know a thing or two about launching digital encyclopedia projects. 1. How we got here But, being a former academic, I also know writing good encyclopedia…
-
How Big Pharma uses Wikipedia to push health propaganda
Guest post by Sharyl Attkisson. I don’t often host writings of other people on this blog, but I’ll make an exception for Sharyl, whose book, Follow the Science: How Big Pharma Misleads, Obscures, and Prevails, was released just last Tuesday. She’s had me on her program a couple times to talk about Wikipedia and my…
-
Free Information of the Third Kind
The Generative AI Threat to Freedom, and How You Can Help to Stop It LarrySanger.org has relaunched with a new design I made all by myself. As I am now long gone from Facebook and no longer have a blue check on Twitter, please share this far and wide. Also, feel free to comment at…
-
Why Neutrality
I drafted this article for Ballotpedia.org, where it first appeared December 2015. I since published a slightly updated version (not the one below) in Essays on Free Knowledge. As a teenager, I habitually scanned encyclopedias, newspapers, and textbooks—angrily. I was on the lookout for bias. I had discovered, to my frequent irritation, that writers of authoritative…
-
Social Media Meets RSS, v2
What Is Minifeed? YOU want to control your social media feed. You want to own your follower lists. You don’t want to have to please the poor, pitiful moderators at some giant, cynical Silicon Valley behemoth. Just like on your blog, nobody should be able to shut you up—though, to be sure, they can shut…
-
A first attempt at using WordPress for microblogging
Here is the brand spanking new Larry Sanger Microblog, which lives at a domain I had sitting around doing nothing: http://StartThis.org. As you’ll see, it looks a little like a social media feed. I simply downloaded a theme, then spent the day fixing it up so it looked more or less right like a microblog.…
-
The Era of Centralized Social Media Is Over
For too long, we have made what has amounted to a Faustian bargain. If you post your comments, your pictures, your videos, your essays, your reviews—your content—on Big Tech’s enormous centralized platforms, then Big Tech will give you free hosting, an audience if you compete well, and some content development tools. It seemed fair. At…
-
My new book is launched in paperback: Here are some quotes
I am now announcing that my new book is now available on Amazon in paperback. Please show your appreciation for this blog (and my other attempts to enlighten the world) by buying it!
