In advance of WikiSym, there is a good extensive interview with three prominent Wikipedians from English, German and Japanese projects.

This article presents an interview with Angela Beesley, Elisabeth Bauer, and Kizu Naoko. All three are leading Wikipedia practitioners in the English, German, and Japanese Wikipedias and related projects. The interview focuses on how Wikipedia works and why these three practitioners believe it will keep working. The interview was conducted via email in preparation of WikiSym 2006, the 2006 International Symposium on Wikis, with the goal of furthering Wikipedia research [1]. Interviewer was Dirk Riehle, the chair of WikiSym 2006. An online version of the article provides simplified access to URLs [2].

Good to see more feedback from the Japanese Wikipedia, which has always been formidable in size and strength, but relatively quiet in terms of dialogue with the rest of the interntional Wikipedia community.