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Participative Encyclopedia: Processing specific user feedback
Participative Encyclopedia
Processing Specific User Feedback
How to provide feedback:
Users can respond interactively to the profiles in the various databases
in the following ways:
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send general comments on individual
databases (as indicated on any profile page from a database)
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send specific comments about
individual entries (as indicated on any profile page)
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registered users can supply on-line
feedback on any profile entry through the comment facility
(enabling another users to view those comments immediately from the relevant
profile) :
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comments may be specific to any part of a profile
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comments may be about the entry as a whole
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qualified user-editors can edit
entries on-line (resulting in modified texts that overlay earlier
versions when other users access a given profile)
Clearly the challenge is to find ways to work with this flow of information,
bearing in mind the difficulties of editorial style, quality of content,
quantity, and the constraints on ability to process whatever is received.
A summary of editorial methods and guidelines is presented elsewhere (http://www.uia.org/dyna/guides.htm),
as well as a warning to users.
An extensive commentary on the scope of each database is available from
any profile page or via the Encyclopedia Home Page (http://www.uia.org/homeency.htm).
Obviously the less intervention required to put text into shape, the easier
it is to transfer it from "comment" form into the database profile.
On the other hand the comment facility does allow users to express views
about a text (for other users to see), even if resources are not available
to integrate it into the database. How the facility is opened up to on-line
editing remains to be explored experimentally. In depends a great deal on
the editorial discipline of those who choose to collaborate in this more
constrained mode and how their capacity is demonstrated and assessed.
Considerations before providing feedback
You may want to consider the following before formulating your reply:
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The Encyclopedia is a work in progress: It is the
product of a project which commenced in 1972. Major refinements have been
made, and will continue to be made, to the descriptive text and to the
pattern of cross-references, especially in response to feedback on inadequacies.
In this sense the Encyclopedia is an unfinished product.
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A wide variety of disparate sources has been used:
These include: international organization documents, academic papers
and conference proceedings, periodicals and reviews, newspapers, journals,
books and book lists. In this sense the information may be viewed as factual.
However, such disparate sources reflect many levels of insight and expertise,
as well as many cultures, ideologies, beliefs, priorities and biases.
No attempt has been made to eliminate inconsistencies, although incompatible
items have been treated as separate entries where appropriate. This is
a deliberate editorial policy.
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International bodies and other constituencies around
the world effectively function as editorial partners: The Encyclopedia's
"neutral" information gathering function means that international bodies
and other constituencies around the world effectively function as editorial
partners in progressively refining information relating to their concerns
in every field of activity. The databases are at no time considered complete,
rather they reflect "work in progress" to clarify the complexity of the
international community and its actions. A good deal of the material in
the Encyclopedia has come directly from information provided by international
organizations, particularly extracts from documents of the United Nations
and other intergovernmental agencies. One of the great merits of working
with such sources is that the material is either in the public domain
or that the organizations are pleased to authorize wider use of it. It
is hoped that the new avenues of access to the Encyclopedia made possible
by electronic publication will initiate an even more comprehensive feedback
of information from its users.
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Editorial Policy and Practice: The preparation
of Encyclopedia entries is a true editorial process, ideally accomplished
with minimal intervention. The editorial intent is not to provide a final
"judgement" or "definition" of a world problem, strategy or path of human
development; it is to provide a "description" which allows the arguments
of diverse constituencies, as advocates for a particular initiative, problem,
or approach, to speak for themselves. This involves gleaning material
from different documents and combining elements in a suitable manner.
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The editors are not attempting to present "the objective
truth", by making editorial judgements on what is factual and what is
not: The aim is to present phenomena as they are perceived, from the
framework or "mindset" within which each is experienced as significant,
using whatever "facts" are considered most appropriate by those working
within that framework. This is especially the case with the Claim and
Counter-claim paragraphs. These paragraphs provide a means of reflecting,
most explicitly, the contrast between advocates and detractors of particular
concerns. The existence of such dynamics with the international community
is, of course, implicit in the juxtaposition of strategies and problems,
human values and human awareness; entries which appear at first glance
to be mutually exclusive or irrelevant to each other, may on closer examination
reveal interrelationships which can deepen understandings of the world
"problematique" and "resolutique".
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Limitation of Existing Information: The production
of this ambitious CD-Rom publication has been feasible only because of
an extremely pragmatic approach to the collection and processing of information.
The editors have deliberately set out to "open up" (through hyperlinks)
and to highlight neglected categories of information. The intention has
been to provide as broad a coverage as feasible, fleshing out the content
to the extent possible. By deliberately sacrificing content to structure
at this stage, it is hoped that even where the information supplied is
inadequate, users will still be oriented to new features of the global
system which others stress as meriting their attention -- and be more
stimulated to contribute their own information to remedy deficiencies
in the content of entries.
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Inclusion of information in this publication implies
only that the editors considered the source reflecting the views of an
international constituency: Such logistical restrictions on the comprehensiveness
of research mean that the amount of information given for any entry does
not reflect an editorial evaluation of its importance. Issues commonly
accepted as important may be documented only briefly. This may be because
of resource limitations, because of a profusion of relatively diffuse
material available on them, because they are extremely well-documented
elsewhere, or because they can be more effectively described through their
"narrower" expressions. Little-known problems may be given relatively
extensive coverage precisely because their existence is not well-recognized.
Inclusion of information in this publication implies only that the editors
considered the source from which it derived sensitive to and capable of
reflecting the views of an international constituency, and therefore as
being of significance to a wider audience.
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The quality of descriptions also varies: Some
entries reflect an understanding carefully articulated by an international
organization. Others are based on information assembled from a variety
of sources. However, still others are based on what in intelligence circles
is described as "low grade information". This is because the editorial
bias is towards inclusion (rather than exclusion) of dubious or poor quality
entries in order at least to acknowledge the sensitivity of some constituency
to that issue. Once established in this way, and appropriately indexed,
higher quality information may become available to improve the description.
The editors welcome users of these databases to assist in the provision
of information which can improve both the quantity and quality of existing
individual entries and their relationships, or describe new entries.
Concerns relating to feedback
Issues and procedures relating to user feedback received in response to database
entries and paragraphs within entries:
- Copyright and copyleft (for received and published materials): To
the extent possible, the profiles are based on public domain information,
especially that received from international organizations. Such information
has often been very carefully prepared to filter out particular biases. Extensive
use is made of other sources in weaving new phrases, sentences, or larger
amounts of text into existing problem and strategy profiles. Since no profile
is considered static or definitive, material from many sources will be combined
in the continuing process of developing profiles.
- Interactive editorial participation: An important emphasis of the
editorial process is to transform users in user editors, wherever this is
consistent with improvement of the scope and quality of the material. This
calls for innovation both on the software side as well as in the management
of information flows in relation to resource constraints
- User access and accreditation: These issues will be subject to constant
review and experimentation.
- Editorial delays: The on-line comment facility is one way to reduce
the backlog in making comments. Use of on-line editors will hopefully offer
means of integrating comments into database profiles.
- Excluded materials: This concern will remain one of continuing review
and experimentation.
- Errors of ommission and commission: See disclaimer and warning
to users
- Controversial and defamatory material: This concern will remain
one of continuing review and experimentation. It is to be expected that most
"problem" profiles will be experienced by some as questioning the
validity of the "strategies" they favour. One group's strategy will
always tend to be another constituency's problem. The "counter-claim"
paragraph will continue to be developed to hold such challenges. (See also:
Warning to users).
- Experimental development: It should be emphasized that the whole
project is understood as a developing process rather than a static finished
product.
- Selective display of user comments: The quantity of comments on
some profiles may necessitate more a selective approach to displaying comment
(eg taking account of accreditation of user, date, length).
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