[thomasahle]

> commits and corrections are submitted to alter the books

I think this is good idea fro books, and I wish more scholars would contribute to Wikipedia and other peer editable overviews.

I'm not sure quite how it would work for new results though, for which it is still not quite clear how they fit into the current knowledge, or if they are worthwhile at all.

People also tend to feel really strongly about their own original ideas, and may try to push them forward when they should rather be forgotten.

I don't know how to prevent something like that, other than having a BDFL or individual publishing (as in the current system)

[hunter-gatherer]

Gitlab has an article on their website somewhere where they address some of your concerns. I'm on mobile now and can't find it, but the article advocates for a 'Handbook first' approach to documentation. We did this at my last job and I found it well worth the effort. The BDFL ended up being the quality of our work. In other words, the most correct version always wins out.