Gentiana crinita: DIFFERENCES between WIKIVERSITY and World University & School, Joseph Reagle's New Book on Wikipedia's Culture (MIT), Nesson & Wiki

Dear Joseph,

Thanks for your reply and question, and thanks again for a fascinating Harvard talk (http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/events/luncheon/2010/10/reagle). Your new book - "Good Faith Collaboration: The Culture of Wikipedia," also partly available here in free dissertation form http://reagle.org/joseph/blog/social/wikipedia/annc-in-good-faith - on the culture of Wikipedia looks fascinating, and very relevant to WUaS ahead. Here are a few, main differences between Wikiversity (which like Wikipedia, is part of the Wikimedia project) and World University and School.

Here's Wikiversity's Wikipedia page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikiversity. Its primary goals are to

* "Create and host a range of free-content, multilingual learning materials/resources, for all age groups in all languages.
* Host scholarly/learning projects and communities that support these materials.

The Wikiversity e-Learning model places emphasis on "learning groups" and "learning by doing"
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikiversity)."


World University & School is different from Wikiversity (http://en.wikiversity.org/wiki/Wikiversity:Main_Page) in the following ways, as far as I know:

World University & School is planning to offer free, online degrees for some matriculating classes in 2014 - B.A. Law, M.D. and Ph.D. degrees. This can occur in video, and interactively in virtual worlds like Second Life, where WUaS becomes a kind of meta-directory. To do this, WUaS is planning to collaborate with Berkeley Webcast, MIT OCW and other great open course ware for academic standards. In January, WUaS will offer, concurrently with U.C. Berkeley, a Biological Anthropology course for WUaS credit, but not yet for degrees. WUaS already links a free, on-the-ground Harvard doctoral degree in education for 25 students in 2011 and 2012 - http://worlduniversity.wikia.com/wiki/Courses#Free_Ph.D.s .

World University & School also facilitates free, people-to-people teaching and learning. If you, for example, want to teach a course to your web camera, or in a virtual world, post it to a video-hosting site, and add it here: http://worlduniversity.wikia.com/wiki/Courses#Individual_courses . So on the first, main page (*http://worlduniversity.wikia.com/wiki/Courses), WUaS is course-centric, unlike Wikiversity.

World University & School already has many open, free teaching and learning resources which are quite different from Wikiversity current content, that I have seen. Unlike Wikiversity, World University and School's main pages are focused in specific ways; here are the main pages:

*http://worlduniversity.wikia.com/wiki/World_University
*http://worlduniversity.wikia.com/wiki/Courses
*http://worlduniversity.wikia.com/wiki/Subjects
*http://worlduniversity.wikia.com/wiki/Languages
*http://worlduniversity.wikia.com/wiki/Library_Resources
*http://worlduniversity.wikia.com/wiki/Nation_States
*http://worlduniversity.wikia.com/wiki/You_at_World_University
*http://worlduniversity.wikia.com/wiki/Educational_Software
*http://worlduniversity.wikia.com/wiki/Museums
*http://worlduniversity.wikia.com/wiki/Research
*http://worlduniversity.wikia.com/wiki/Hardware_Resource_Possibilities
*http://worlduniversity.wikia.com/wiki/World_University_Foundation

*http://worlduniversity.wikia.com/wiki/SUBJECT_TEMPLATE

The openness of the WUaS Subject Template, where one creates a new subject at WUaS, allows individuals to develop a new interdisciplinary subject in ANYTHING. The Subject Template is also key to understanding WUaS. MIT OCW, Berkeley Webcast, Yale OYC and Stanford Engineering Everywhere, for example, are anchors for WUaS' academic focus at the Subject Template, and ANY subject is possible. The Subject Template will become a basis for Musical Instruments (http://worlduniversity.wikia.com/wiki/World_University_Music_School) and Languages.

WUaS would like to list links to all open, free libraries (http://worlduniversity.wikia.com/wiki/Library_Resources) and musems in the world (http://worlduniversity.wikia.com/wiki/Museums) as teaching and learning resources. And World Univ. & Sch is generating a great list of free, open Educational Software (http://worlduniversity.wikia.com/wiki/Educational_Software), none of which Wikiversity has that I know of. World University and School also has a main Research page: http://worlduniversity.wikia.com/wiki/Research

In addition, World University & School is planning to be in all 3,000-8,000 languages, unlike Wikiversity, which is in just a few. Wikipedia, by way of comparison, is in around 272. And World Univ & Sch would like to plan for and develop a Universal Translator building on Google Translate, starting with the current Wikipedia languages.

World University and School lists Wikiversity and a variety of other open educational resources here: http://worlduniversity.wikia.com/wiki/Courses#Course_listings.27_aggregates.

World University and School, for its academic side, focuses on these great universities' open course ware: http://worlduniversity.wikia.com/wiki/Courses#University_course_listings but it's open to all great university content. World University and School aspires to come into conversation with great universities.

While like Wikiversity, WUaS will link all levels (elementary, middle school, high school, etc.), of great, open, free, course ware, its main focus is on the University level, with a further focus, again, on great universities' open course ware, as well as networking with these, for web cameras in classrooms.

These are just a few differences between Wikiversity and WUaS.

As an expert on Wikipedia, I'm curious about some of your thoughts about this, and WUaS.

Thanks again for a fascinating presentation on your book at Harvard.

Sincerely,
Scott


http://scottmacleod.com



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Here's Harvard Law Professor Charlie Nesson's blog post about Reagle's "On Good Faith Collaboration" - http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/nesson/2010/10/19/community-of-good-faith/










(http://scott-macleod.blogspot.com/2010/10/gentiana-crinita-differences-between.html - October 20, 2010)