Recent Changes Is Not The Wiki

RecentChanges is not the Wiki; it's just one window into it.

Monitoring RecentChanges is like watching how sausage is made.

If you don't like the quality of the articles and edits in RecentChanges, then don't look. Use the StartingPoints or RoadMaps to find solid, high-quality content that has been around for a while.

During flamewars, monitoring RecentChanges will give a particularly poor view of the wiki. During such times, it is better for most wikizens to spend their time reading and refactoring stable pages rather than trying to comment upon or "fix" the warriors' rapid-fire edits and counter-edits.

You might also use FindPage and LikePages, or even click on the page title for BackLinks.

RandomPages is a good spot check on the overall quality of this site.

However,

Although it is true that RecentChanges is not the Wiki, it remains a very important part of Wiki. It is one of our primary methods of quality control through PeerReview. See RoleOfRecentChanges.

Or, to reword it: The miracle of self-repair is possible by the grace of RecentChanges and the RecentChangesJunkies who are around to take their shot of Wiki-ism.

What would happen if one month out of the year Ward disabled RecentChanges and QuickChanges? How would people use Wiki differently? Perhaps one of the dangers of reliance on RecentChanges and QuickChanges is that by emphasizing the relation of pages to those few pages, they de-emphasize the relation of those pages to other pages.

That would be interesting! Perhaps instead, Ward should just throw occasional RandomPages into RecentChanges (and QuickChanges), to remind us RecentChangesJunkies that they exist. -- TomAnderson

That's what spammers are for!

Hmm. It's interesting to note that, as of 2010, I almost never hit an instance of RandomPages where I have not touched at least one page on the list. Hmph. Maybe that's just diarrhea of the keyboard cropping up, but I think it more likely that I've been involved in this Wiki for so long that the main points of interest have all flowed across my screens at one time or another.

I appreciate RecentChanges because there is new blood being injected into the C2 all the time. Cool new takes on old concepts crop up and force all of us to reconsider old, well-worn views on certain subject matter. Even the occasional bickering helps to clarify one's position on a matter that hasn't changed over the years.

Even allowing for some Unmentionable People on this Wiki I find the interaction and community spirit bolstered and not hindered by knowing the ThingsOnWikisMind. Keeps me sharp, too.

-- MartySchrader

Of all the StartingPoints recommended, I find RoadMaps the most useful. -- LionKimbro

See: RecentChangesJunkie, RecentChangesDiscussion, TooManyRecentChanges, RecentChangesConsideredHarmful

CategoryWiki