JD Lasica is one of my favorite online journalists–he’s so smart. JD’s been working on a new book called Darknet, about the digital media revolution and the conflicts between Hollywood and tech folks.
He’s just posted the first few chapters on a wiki and is inviting folks to read and edit.
He’s also chosen to spread the word by sending a note to nineteen bloggers–so hey, pass this meme along if you are so moved and let’s see how many editors JD can have (and what they say….this could be a very interesting social experiment)
More: JD also posted a note to the online news list with some useful explanations. Here’s an excerpt of his explanation about editing the book on a wiki:
” A handful of other writers, such as Dan Gillmor, have recently begun publishing draft chapters of their upcoming books on their weblogs.
Wikis go a step further by inviting readers to not just post comments but to actually dive in and make whatever edits they’d like: make line edits, add
passages or background, add a notation about an overlooked angle or anecdote, etc. It’s not completely democratic, however; the author still retains the
ability to revert back to a previous version, and to accept or reject changes for the final manuscript. And, yes, an editor at the publishing house will make
a final edit as well (the old-fashioned way).”