User:Chriswaterguy/Why I'm enthusiastic about Wikipedia

My masters thesis was on culture and water management in Indonesian cities. One of the conclusions I drew was that the key challenges facing Indonesia were institutional rather than technical.

Following this, I wanted to understand politics, social issues and economics - but these things are much less tangible than engineering, and I started to think about ways of sharing knowledge and improving understanding, while avoiding the kind of polemics and rhetoric that plague social-political discussions both online and offline. I wanted to start a website on the theme of the "Roots of Change" where this kind of informed discussion could take place - but I never figured out where to start, or how to allow collaborative editing.

Then in 2005 I discovered Wikipedia. I quickly realized that this was an answer to the question I'd been asking for years. This is a fantastic way to share information, for people of differing viewpoints to critically assess information, bring differing points of view together, critically yet respectfully. And what's more, I don't have to administer anything. Instead I can contribute to the things that I care about, get distracted, find something else interesting... and it's all good, it's all contributing to an information resource that can potentially change a lot of lives.

NPOV is more important to me than convincing people of my view. Not just in Wikipedia, but as a way of thinking. This way of sharing and developing ideas in Wikipedia is so much more constructive and powerful than arguing on discussion lists.