Wikipedia is in the vanguard of a whole wave of wikis built on that idea. A wiki is a deceptively simple piece of software (little more than five lines of computer code) that you can download for free and use to make a website that can be edited by anyone you like. Need to solve a thorny business problem overnight and all members of your team are in different time zones? Start a wiki. In Silicon Valley, at least, wiki culture has already taken root.
Inspired by Wikipedia, a Silicon Valley start-up called Socialtext has helped set up wikis at a hundred companies, including Nokia and Kodak. Business wikis are being used for project management, mission statements and cross-company collaborations. Instead of e-mailing a vital Word document to your co-workers—and creating confusion about which version is the most up-to-date—you can now literally all be on the same page: as a wiki Web page, the document automatically reflects all changes by team members. Socialtext CEO Ross Mayfield claims that accelerates project cycles 25%. “A lot of people are afraid because they have to give up control over information,” he says. “But in the end, wikis foster trust.”
21. Why do many people think that Wikipedia has a “major security flaw”?
［A］ It has lots of bugs.
［B］ Because they don’t understand the concept of a wiki.
［C］ Because Jimmy Wales is not a computer expert.
［D］ Because a wiki is a simple computer code.
22. Why are many academics unhappy with the idea of a Wikipedia?
［A］ Because they don’t trust online encyclopaedias.
［B］ Because all information in Wikipedia is inherently unreliable.
［C］ Because they believe that certain information should not be available on the internet.
［D］ Because anyone can add or change the information in it.
23. Which of the following is NOT given as an advantage of a wiki?
［A］ You can choose who edits it.
［B］ Wiki software is free.
［C］ Any bugs in the code can be changed easily.
［D］ It’s easy to use.
24. Why do “wikis foster trust”?
［A］ Because the people who use it need to trust the information other users post on it.
［B］ Because they are used in business contexts.
［C］ Because they can be used in a wide variety of situations.
［D］ Because only trustworthy people use them.
25. What kind of reader is the article aimed at?
［A］ Computer specialists.
［B］ Academics who don’t like wikis.
［C］ Computer science students.
［D］ The general reader with an interest in computing.
Text 2
What to do with the jerk at work, the person who is so disliked by their colleagues that no one wants to work with them? The traditional answer is to tolerate them if they are at least half competent—on the grounds that competent jerks can be trained to be otherwise, while much loved bunglers cannot.
A recent study suggests that such an approach seriously underestimates the value of being liked. In a study of over 10,000 work relationships at five very different organisations, Tiziana Casciaro and Miguel Sousa Lobo, academics at Harvard Business School and the Fuqua School of Business respectively, found that (given the choice) people consistently and overwhelmingly prefer to work with a “lovable fool” than with a competent jerk.
The authors suggest that as well as training jerks to be more charming—although “sadly there are people who are disliked because they are socially incompetent, and probably never will be truly charming”—companies should also “leverage the likeable”. Amiable folk should be turned into “affective hubs”, people who can bridge gaps “between diverse groups that might not otherwise interact”.
Re-evaluating jolly types who spend long hours hanging round water coolers is currently fashionable. Ronald Burt, a sociologist at the University of Chicago and a leading proponent of “social capital”—an explanation of “how people do better because they are somehow better connected with other people”—has written a book (“Brokerage and Closure”) in which he describes the “clusters” and “bridges” that are typical of organisations’ informal networks. Mr Burt calls the people who form bridges between clusters “brokers”; they resemble Ms Casciaro’s and Mr Sousa Lobo’s affective hubs. In practice, Mr Burt has found that brokers do better than people without the social skills to cross the spaces between clusters.
A book published in English this week, but already a cause célèbre in France, portrays most employees as fools—lovable or otherwise. Corinne Maier’s “Bonjour Laziness” is a worm’s eye view of a corporate world where only three creatures exist: sheep (“weak and inoffensive”); pests (“poisoning the general atmosphere”); and loafers (“their only aim is to do as little as possible”). In the view of Ms Maier, a practising psychoanalyst, pests (ie, jerks) rule the corporate world. (So does being a jerk give you the skills needed to get to the top? And only in France?) The rest can only hope to lie low and await their pension. But, assuming you are lovable, far better, surely, to follow the Burt route: head straight for the water cooler.
26. According to paragraph 1, what has been the traditional attitude to jerks at work?
［A］ Fire them, even if they are good workers.
［B］ Fire them, because they are not good workers.
［C］ Accept them, if they are good workers.