| Author | Dan O'Sullivan |
|---|---|
| Publisher | Ashgate Publishing |
| Publication date | 2009 |
| ISBN | 9780754674337 |
The correct title of this article is Misplaced Pages: A New Community of Practice? The substitution of the colon is due to technical restrictions.
Misplaced Pages: A New Community of Practice? is a 2009 book by British historian Dan O'Sullivan, published by Ashgate Publishing. The book takes an academic approach to Misplaced Pages, applying the ideas of theorists like Jürgen Habermas, Michael Warner, and Roland Barthes.
Contents
O'Sullivan begins with an overview of group theory, and explores several groups he sees to be precursors to Misplaced Pages: the Library of Alexandria, the British Royal Society, the French Republic of Letters (focusing on Denis Diderot and the Encyclopédie), the Oxford English Dictionary, and the Left Book Club, a mid-century British communist publishing collective. For each group, O'Sullivan discusses the group's aims; its community and make-up; its costs of doing business (transaction costs); its relations with the public; and its legacy.
The second part of the book applies the group theory approach to Misplaced Pages, devoting a chapter to each aspect. Chapter 10, on the structure of Misplaced Pages, explains the use of "talk pages" and featured articles. Chapter 13, "Misplaced Pages and the Nature of Knowledge," explores the question of expertise. In this chapter O'Sullivan claims a fundamental disagreement between Misplaced Pages's two founders, Jimmy Wales and Larry Sanger. While Wales, an admirer of the economist Friedrich Hayek, believed in the wisdom of crowds and that Misplaced Pages would eventually converge to ideal pages, Sanger believed in the necessity of experts to ensure quality content. O'Sullivan puts Misplaced Pages in the context of philosophical debates about expertise and elitism.
The third and final part of the book explains how to use Misplaced Pages. O'Sullivan includes chapters on browsing and editing, and his longest chapter provides a 10-point schema to assess the value of Misplaced Pages articles. He uses the article on the Great Fire of London as an example, and a significant portion of the chapter reproduces earlier versions of it.
Reviews
The book was reviewed in the academic journals Libraries and the Academy and Library Review, as well as in Misplaced Pages's community-written newspaper The Signpost.
See also
Literature
- Chandler M. Armstrong. Dan O’Sullivan, Misplaced Pages: A New Community of Practice?, Farnham: Ashgate, 2009; 191 pp.: ISBN 9780754674337, £45.00 // International Sociology, Volume: 26, issue: 5, page(s): 652–655, September 1, 2011; doi:10.1177/02685809110260050803.
- Colin Higgins. Book review: Misplaced Pages: A New Community of Practice? Dan O’Sullivan. Farnham, Surrey: Ashgate, 2009. 191pp, £40.00. ISBN 9780754674337 // Journal of Librarianship and Information Science, Vol 42, Issue 4, pp. 279–280; doi:10.1177/0961000610386667.
References
- O'Sullivan, Dan (2009). Misplaced Pages: A New Community of Practice?. Farnham, Surrey: Ashgate. ISBN 9780754674337. OCLC 320696473.
- Nicholas G. Tomaiulo, review of Misplaced Pages: A New Community of Practice? Libraries and the Academy 10.2 (April 2010), 249-250.
- Charles Oppenheim, "Misplaced Pages: A New Community of Practice", Library Review 60.7 (2011), pp.624-5
- Misplaced Pages:Misplaced Pages Signpost/2010-05-10/Book review
