A Few Notes For Calacanis
Calacanis has a scorcher of a post up about Jimmy Wales (Co-Founder of Wikipedia) in which he defends Mahalo and lambasts Wikia + Wikipedia.
After Wales dismissed Mahalo as “uninteresting” due to the fact that it is proprietary, Calacanis rightly cites plenty of interesting and valuable proprietary products (Google, films, etc.). However, in the heat of the moment, he dismisses the hybrid economy emerging (and of which Mahalo is a part). Although he asserts that Yochi Benkler’s work is proprietary, it is in fact available for free under a CC license. Wealth of Networks is available here and Benkler has encouraged its remixing.
Further, Calacanis seems to support Nicholar Carr’s view of “digital sharecropping.” Apparently, Wales’s practice of letting anyone choose to be involved in his wikis makes him akin to a freeloader riding the back of the crowd. However, although Calacanis posits that wiki contributors should be compensated, that disregards important research that shows that paying wiki contributors acts as a disincentive. Paying Mahalo Greenhouse contributors is not a counterpoint, though, because there is still a vetting process — not just anyone can edit Mahalo pages.
Anyways, let the flame war begin.