Comments on: Kids these days: the quality of new Wikipedia editors over time

By: Diigo H807 group posts (weekly) « Cluasa Capaill

Diigo H807 group posts (weekly) « Cluasa Capaill — Sun, 08 Apr 2012 20:01:54 +0000

[...] Kids these days: the quality of new Wikipedia editors over time — Wikimedia blog [...]

By: Maryana Pinchuk

Maryana Pinchuk — Thu, 05 Apr 2012 00:21:16 +0000

Dave, thanks for your comment. For an informative glimpse into why we still need more contributors, I urge you to type “Wikipedia:Backlog” into your Wikipedia search bar sometime. You’ll find a sobering view of our supposedly “complete” English Wikipedia. And on the rest of the 280+ projects, the cleanup categories are even more dramatic. Bottom line, there may be a bit of truth to the “low-hanging fruit” theory, but it’s by no means the whole story.

By: Dave

Dave — Wed, 04 Apr 2012 22:50:29 +0000

This entire post assumes there’s a problem with Wikipedia. There isn’t. If anything, there’s a problem with the public perception of Wikipedia (or it’s perceived “brand promise”, in marketing speak).

Wikipedia is commonly understood to be the website that anyone can edit. There are two big reasons that this is not true anymore:
– The vast majority of the low-hanging fruit, in terms of simple edits that beginners can do, has been picked (as commenter Danard said “The common man has no more information to add to Wikipedia…”)
– The scale of Wikimedia has necessitated a lot of rules and guidelines to keep things organized

So there’s the clash. New editors think they can walk up to any article and “fix” something, but the reality is that they’re more likely to be breaking both the rules and the content.

Again, there isn’t a problem with Wikipedia. It’s hands-down the best resource in its category that the world has ever seen, and it’s improving and growing every day. The “problem” is that the unavoidable fallout from a high-quality, mature system is that it takes more work to get started.

The quality of Wikipedia has outpaced the abilities of the average person. That means you need a change in branding strategy, not a change to the very successful system of editors and editing.

By: John Aspinall

John Aspinall — Mon, 02 Apr 2012 17:24:50 +0000

I was active in editing for about a year, I’d say. By the end of the year, I’d had enough of the wiki-lawyering, the triumph of process over content, and the death by a thousand reverts to call it quits. Mark Atwood, above, has it exactly right. I see an inward-focused culture, more concerned with their own selves than with their (putative and advertised) goals.

By: Michael Restivo

Michael Restivo — Mon, 02 Apr 2012 14:28:29 +0000

This is very interesting. I hope more research is conducted that looks into new editor retention. Looking forward to reading the ABS article once published; should be a great issue overall.

By: Mark Atwood

Mark Atwood — Thu, 29 Mar 2012 16:28:07 +0000

Established editors who take a proprietarian approach to “their” articles in the face of edits by real world domain experts, editors who speak wiki jargon, the very concept of “deletionism”, these are what is strangling the life out of Wikipedia. Reading the comments above where established editors with stung egos is illustrative.

By: David L

David L — Thu, 29 Mar 2012 07:45:53 +0000

Last edit I made (adding a musician to a name’s disambiguation list) was knocked back by a bot. I made a vague effort to follow the recommendations to have the edit accepted, but in the end I gave up.

By: WTF666

WTF666 — Thu, 29 Mar 2012 06:02:58 +0000

Wikipedia newbies whine all the time. It usually comes down to their laziness of not wanting to spend the time to add citation references and follow wikipedia rules.

By: naugtur

naugtur — Wed, 28 Mar 2012 20:46:03 +0000

Let me translate what I have written in response to changes announcement in an article I contributed: http://pl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dyskusja_wikipedysty:Naugtur
”
Here’s why I gave up contributing. Articles I submited were written in cooperation with a Prof. who specializes in computional linguistics and became a prof doing that, but it didn’t stop an experienced wikipedia editor from “fixing” the article. I also remember seeing an article contributed by a 60yr old MIT professor removed, because some twenty-something experienced editor… Because he thought it was a case of self-advertising.

So why would I want to contribute scientific content if anyone can “fix” it to use words he likes if he has over N edits?
”

FYI, I don’t think that’s the attitude newcomers from academic background should face.
I still love the Wikipedia project, but I’m not willing to fight my way through people who know better.

PS. I probably won’t track the comments here, but I’m open for discussion and I left my address for anyone wanting to reach me for a follow-up of the above thoughts.

By: Daniel Swiecki

Daniel Swiecki — Wed, 28 Mar 2012 17:28:19 +0000

If I stepped into my university library and six people shouted at me at the top of their lungs that I was not qualified to walk here, that my foot was not in fact attached to my body, and that I should get the hell out, I would never go to the library again.

That also happens to be my summary of my experience submitting a single edit to wikipedia.