CZ:We aren't Wikipedia

How is the Citizendium similar to Wikipedia?

1. We aim to create a giant free general encyclopedia.
2. We use MediaWiki software.
3. We use wiki methods of collaboration, and we encourage everybody to work on articles in their area of interest and expertise.
4. No particular qualifications are needed to participate as an Author.
5. We rely on "soft security" to a great extent. We work on the basis of trust.
6. We are committed to an objective, unbiased presentation of information.
7. We have similar naming conventions, and some other style guidelines in common. See CZ:Manual of Style for the differences.
8. The community and project was organized originally by one of the people who originally organized Wikipedia, Larry Sanger.

How do we differ?

1. OBJECTIVITY: Citizendium applies objectivity differently than Wikipedia. The "neutrality policy" of Wikipedia, as applied nowadays by its leading editors, is that Wikipedia is based solely on "reliable" sources. If there's a consensus of those, then Wikipedia asserts that as unquestioned fact in its own voice, and other points of view, no matter how widely held, may not even be mentioned. This differs rather widely from Citizendium's concept, which is that if there are important points of view that "the scientific community" or some such rejects, one just says so. Unlike Wikipedia, Citizendium discourages the loaded language which dismisses certain people and ideas in the first sentence of an article by use of labeling them immediately as "pseudo-scientific" or "fads". As an example, look at Citizendium's treatment of Graham Hancock, as compared with Wikipedia's article on him with it's multiple uses of the label "pseudo-".
2. CONTRIBUTORS: Citizendium contributors use their own names and identities. This wiki requires people to sign in, to use their real names and to fill out a publicly readable biography. This policy prevents vandalism and promotes civil discussion of article content. Citizendium goes to some lengths to verify contributor identities. Its user pages are for brief, helpful biographies and are not intended as vanity pages. Contributors are not allowed to promote their own resumes or business endeavors via this wiki.
3. POLICIES Citizendium is a community defined by shared principles expressed in its policies. Citizendium managers have a low tolerance for disruption. Its management team has some firm rules that require professionalism. There are rules against personal attacks and blatant violations of the objectify guidelines, usually enforced first by warnings delivered privately if possible. The Citizendium community of contributors settles policies by discussion and (where necessary) votes by the community. The management team is supported, behind the scenes, by a private advisory group with long-term experience in wiki use and management.
4. CONTENT: Citizendium's aim is to craft compelling introductory narratives, not mere collections of data. Citizendium provides sources because doing so helps the reader. We usually do not cite sources to settle internal disputes, or to "prove" a point to contributors. Citizendium has its own unique content policy that differs from Wikipedia's idea of notability. Works on Citizendium use the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported (CC-by-sa) license.
5. SUBPAGES: Attached to every article is a set of "subpages" of supplementary information. These may include the standard tabs for related articles, bibliographies, and external articles, but also can be customized to include galleries, tables, timelines, tutorials, and signed introductory articles by experts.
6. LIVING PERSONS Citizendium takes defamation seriously. This is why it has a Policy on Topic Informants and a Topic Informant Workgroup.
7. WORKGROUPS: Citizendium normally does not use categories on articles themselves. Instead, we classify them broadly into different workgroups.
8. FEW ACRONYMS: Citizendium discourages the use of excessive acronyms. Using a lot of acronyms for every small point of policy creates a sort of in-group that makes the community insular and unintelligible.
9. VESTIGES OF OLD POLICY: Citizendium formerly had experts in certain fields who were called Editors, and every Editor was also an Author; it also once had a method for producing citable articles that depended on the judgment of experts. These feature are currently inactive. Now, every contributor is considered equal in authority, and a few of Citizendium's experienced Authors tend to help arbitrate editorial decisions via discussions on Talk pages or in the Forum.

See also

• Introduction to CZ for Wikipedians
• How to convert Wikipedia articles to Citizendium articles
• Citizendium Blog post (Feb. 28, 2008): Who's more command-and-control, Wikipedia or CZ?

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