What makes them think that the library of Alexandria did it any other way? Nerds have existed long before the internet…
Nerds were invented by Charles Nerd, when in 1948, separated from the Poindexters and the eggheads after disagreement.
You can only call then Nerds if they're from the Nerdeaux region of France. Otherwise they're just sparkling smartasses
umm ackshually this is false, the concept of nerd originates from a viking ship that docked at Lübeck in 873, whereupon the crew got into an extended argument about the precise value of their cargo, leading to the Lübeck merchants exclaiming "Fücking Nörds!" and that quickly caught on and eventually the term started generally referring to anyone that was annoyingly pedantic but technically correct.
That's literally what the library of Alexandria was all about.
They told all of the nerds that the best nerd paper would get into their nerd building, and nerds traveled there from around the world and dedicated their lives to correcting and one-upping the other nerds.
I love the fallibility of humans and our consistency, it makes me much more comfortable to live in a world that seems comprehensible, because I know underneath all of it are like three dumb existential complacencies that any human part of the species can't deny.
Just ignore the 150M a year they spend managing finances, contributors, tech, moderation, etc. Takes a lot to maintain an accurate library.
i dont think anyone is ignoring that. the meme is talking about how it was built, not how it's currently maintained. it definitely didn't start off spending that much. all that spending is a consequence of it's popularity, not the reason for it.
150m a year doesn't seem that much, honestly. I know people think "oh, it's just a website" but it takes a lot of work and money in salaries and infrastructure hosting to keep a web application as popular as Wikipedia up and running.
I used to work for them. It was weird and wonderful and I miss it and I don't. Lots of mission driven folks working hard to keep things going getting very little respect. But a lot of respect. But sometimes none.
Iirc a lot of their budget is spent doing charity stuff. Encouraging contributions for tiny languages. Trying not to cave to Russia or the US or France. Trying to make it less of a boys club. Trying to get local organizations going.
I remember once they sent an email that said "if the French government asks you to delete this page please just delete it. It's not worth going to jail. Someone outside of France will revert the delete."
I wasn't qualified for the work. No one was. But it was honest work.
150m a year for one of the most trafficked websites on the internet is a bargin
Dammit he correctly used the apostrophe.
"The best way to get a correct answer online is not to post a question. It is to post the wrong answer."
I've done it at times. It works!
Ackchyually it's Wikipedia.
All human advancement was created by nerds. Spears were invented by weaklings too slow to kill with their bare hands. Fire was tamed by the people who were scared of the dark
I think fire was tamed because the food poisoning killed those without it. We are supposed to just sleep at night.
Assuming primitive people would make the connection between gross food and people dying.
https://ebookslib.org/sf/12898-eurema-s-dam.html
Fun little story that makes my point.
I think the post makes a point important in modern capitalism: people will create "value" for free because they can, they care, they want to, it's a challenge. Capital and/or the threat of starvation is not actually always necessary for people to be "productive". Ego, boredom, altruism, adventure, these are also traits of humanity besides survival and greed.
And still, even with a do-over, somehow failed to call it "M'akshually". 🤷🏼♂️
it better not get burned down again
What I find amazing is that some people are so dedicated to Wikipedia that they literally and consider vandals for how much information they put in.
The other day I used the term weaponized a*t*sm in a positive way, and I got site banned for a day for ableism.
I'm on the spectrum. I'm also the one that ended up going into weaponizrd detail in that thread.
Semi-related, only because if you used the title you actually wanted to, you probably would have been banned too.
Mods are weaponized.
I realize autistic people often have trouble with tone and having people interpret things the way they meant it to come across -- lord knows it took me took long enough to develop that skill -- but good grief. I'm on the spectrum, and if I were a mod who had just read the comment in your screenshot, I'd've banned you too.
Now that you've explained you meant it in a positive way, I completely understand what you meant, but nothing in the comment you wrote makes it clear that you think of autism in a positive way or, in fact, as anything besides "lol nerd emoji". The fact that you had just finished going on a seven paragraph infodump (I'm guessing) unfortunately does nothing to prove otherwise: an unfortunate number of undiagnosed autistic people spend their days getting into online fights, writing said seven paragraph comments, and calling anyone who disagrees with them autistic because they want to feel superior and "autistic" is a handy epithet. I don't think anyone would argue these people should be welcome in our communities just because of autism they themselves don't know about.
To be clear, I'm not saying that last statement applies to you. I'm saying if I didn't know anything about you except that you had written the comment in that screenshot, I would have assumed it did and not given it a second thought. I can almost guarantee that's what that mod did.
While that term is slowly but surely being reclaimed, and I'm glad that it is, at present, it still holds the status of "insult unless explicitly stated otherwise." Now that you've told me what you meant, I can see where you were coming from, but as that comment was written, "spread some weaponized autism" implies you're prepared to call anyone who disagrees with you a slur. Your comment seems to be saying "only an idiot autistic person would miss the sarcasm in this comment and bother to respond." It's not what you meant, but it's how I (and no doubt plenty of other people) probably read it.
Please learn to use qualifiers and/or tone indicators, for the sake of your own reputation. If you'd said "Can't wait for all my autistic friends to chime in with a seven paragraph sales pitch for their niche chat platform of choice" or even just replaced "weaponized autism" with "weaponized autism (affectionate)" and left the rest of the comment as is, I guarantee you'd have been fine.
I feel you,i had to learn to feel context (vibe) too, however, from my own experience i can tell that no qualifiers and explanations would prevent previous me from getting everything wrong
I get that you're trying to use it in a positive way, but in my country that first word you used is a slur that has not even attempted to be reclaimed, so it instantly makes me start reading your comment with an ableist tone.
Now that I know you're trying to frame it in a positive way, I can force myself to read your comment in a positive tone. But it's difficult because the language chosen still makes me read it like you're annoyed that autistic people will miss the sarcasm and take it too seriously.
You didn't use it in a "positive way" at all.
That's what it should've been. In reality anything even remotely political on it is heavily biased towards imperial core and NATO countries, and against their geopolitical rivals.
This happens partly because most of these "nerds" are also westerners and rate their own outlets as more reliable, thus enforcing western propaganda.
You bring up an interesting point. There are opposing opinions on everything if you go deep enough into the topic, even in STEM fields too.
It'd be interesting to see a Wikipedia that provides pages on the same topic that present each opinion. So the base/overview page on the topic states the summaries of each opinion with a link for further reading. Each opinion page states there are many opinions on the topic and it just presents one. Each page then suggests for further reading, view the base/overview page where the user can read about other opinions on the topic.
Sur-fucking-prise.
lemmy.world user
Sur-fucking-prise lol
Wikipedia was founded by a self-admitted ancap who supported "israel's" bombing of Gaza in 2018, and its most prolific editor (edited an entire 1/3 of wikipedia articles) is a fascist. The vast majority of its editors are indeed westerners with an extreme pro-imperial core bias, particularly the US and UK.
Hell, the current CEO literally attended a US state department briefing in 2017 with a former CIA/NSA director and is currently on the advisory board for the CIA offshoot OTF.
