Tuesday, December 13, 2005

Wiki Letter to the Marin IJ

It was suggested by a reader that we write our own letter to the editor of the Marin IJ. I think that is a very good idea.

I have created a wiki (a web service where members can collaborate on a document). The beginnings of the wiki letter can be found here. If you would like to contribute to the letter, please send me an email saying that you want to contribute and I will have the wiki service send you an email inviting you to join in on the fun. If you accept the invitation you should be able to edit the letter at will. A lot of excellent points were raised in the comment section of the previous post and I'd like to see them show up in the letter.

Some things to note:
  1. Other wiki members might be able to see your email address. I am not sure if that will be the case and if it is I don't think it should be a big deal to anyone, but just be aware of it.
  2. I do not want the letter to be defamatory, just a reasoned critique and/or commentary regarding what has been published (e.g., ad hominems, fallacious arguments (e.g., that gas station owner argument...like how many gas station owners say things like "you better buy gas now before you are priced out of the gas market", "they aren't making any more petroleum", etc.)).
  3. I'll moderate the process and will contribute some, but I'd rather this be a community effort; I'm still too worked up about this whole thing. Let's take this opportunity to demonstrate the power of the Internet.
  4. If this little experiment works, we should plan to have the letter finished in a few days.
  5. I doubt the letter will actually get published in the IJ without at least one person using their real name and mailing address but we can try anyway. At the very least we can publish the letter here on this blog for all the world to see.
  6. Be sure to "sign" the letter however you want.

4 comments:

marine_explorer said...

I suspect most visitors to this blog already know what's going on, but this letter may help sway others to consider our admitedly contrarian, yet moderate and informed position. The IJ may ignore the letter entirely, but it's worth a try. I'll draft up some thoughts tonight on the wiki page; please add your comments.

Anonymous said...

I think this is a good idea. We should collaborate and write a letter expressing some of our concerns and opinions. Otherwise, our voice will just be lost and ignored.

Anonymous said...

Food for thought from the following quote:

""Warren Buffett recently made headlines by saying America is more likely to turn into a "sharecroppers' society" than an "ownership society." But I think the right term is a "debt peonage" society - after the system, prevalent in the post-Civil War South, in which debtors were forced to work for their creditors."
Paul Krugman, New York Times

Anonymous said...

Sorry. I posted the above quote to the wrong place.