Not crowds, but feedback, aka, 'wrong rock or right rock'. It
requires a means to remember results and pose alternatives. It
would be interesting to take any topic and watch the evolution
of the 'selectors' and 'selectors of selectors' in a wikipedia
entry system. "Self-selected" and "Selected by selectors" is
a common hierarchy for evolving systems. That may be a pattern
of 'input in a smart way' (see first and second order cybernetic
systems).
The crowd is mass storage and a read/write head. "It" happens
because interested parties have access and edit rights. "It"
fails when they know enough to choose a "medical scalpel" over
a "graphical scalpel" but don't know which grip to apply. So
selection and practice matter. In music, it's a "good instrument plus
chops" and if one has to pick one, "chops" are more important.
Would you let a crowd choose your spouse for you?
I did. It worked. Picking the right crowd was the secret. :-)
len
From: Nathan Young -X (natyoung - Artizen at Cisco)
[mailto:natyoung (AT) cisco (DOT) com]
The scalpel a surgeon uses today is very much the result of "wisdom of the
crowds".
Which points to how thoroughly "wisdom of the crowds" is a misnomer. Does
it capture:
- if you take input in a smart way (more of an art than a science) you can
do better work than you could alone.
- for some problems there are very reliable solutions that involve
analyzing the behavior of a carefully selected group in a very specific way
- there can be working modes that incorporate multiple reviews and
revisions that result in very very good results
All of this begs the question: How does it happen?
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