9: Wikipedia Flashcards
When and who established Nupedia? When was Wikipedia extablished?
Nupedia, established by Jimmy Wales and Larry Sanger in 1999
Peer-reviewed by volunteer experts (preferably phd holders)
Approved only 21 articles in its first year of operation
Very slow growth so Wikipedia was established in 2001
What led to Wikipedia’s rapid growth?
Revolutionary premise was that rapid growth could be obtained by crowd-sourcing the writing of articles
200 articles published in its first month
By 2007, it had published more than 2 million articles which made it the largest encyclopaedia in human history, larger even than the Chinese Yongle encyclopedia of 1408
Currently has over 5.5 million articles in the English language version
Total of 40 million articles in 299 languages
As of early 2014, 18 billion page views and 500 unique visitors each month
Fifth most popular website in the world
Owned by the non-profit Wikimedia Foundation
Name and describe Wikipedia’s three key policies.
Three key policies
Neutral Point of View (NPOV)
All encyclopedic content on Wikipedia must be written from a neutral point of view (NPOV), which means representing fairly, proportionately, and, as far as possible, without editorial bias, all of the significant views that have been published by reliable sources on a topic.
Verifiability/Reliable Sources (V/RS)
Readers must be able to check that any of the information within Wikipedia articles is not just made up. This means all material must be attributable to reliable, published sources. Additionally, quotations and any material challenged or likely to be challenged must be supported by inline citations.
No Original Research (NOR)
Wikipedia does not publish original thought: all material in Wikipedia must be attributable to a reliable, published source. Articles may not contain any new analysis or synthesis of published material that serves to reach or imply a conclusion not clearly stated by the sources themselves.
Comment on Wikipedia’s accuracy.
Studies show that accuracy is not bad Giles (2005) Chesney (2006) Rosenzweig (2006) Rector (2008)
Medical and pharmacological entries more dubious
And Wikipedia has tried to improve, making citations to reliable sources are mandatory. New policies in place to guard articles on living humans
How is Wikipedia a new kind of encyclopedia?
Many argue that Wikipedia really is a new kind of encyclopedia
Dissolves author-reader hierarchies
Opens up the ‘black box’ of knowledge construction
Juxtaposes spaces previously kept separate
Opens up space for a more democratic presentation of knowledge claims
Who challenges the vision of Wikipedia being a new kind of encyclopedia?
But over the last five years or so there have been challenges to this vision of a new kind of encyclopedia
Some Wikipedians argue that Wikipedia will not be taken seriously unless it more closely resembles a traditional encyclopedia - “Wikipedia is not a junkyard”
To this end, these “deletionists” attempt to remove content that is, in their opinion, not noteworthy or incomplete (stubs)
Fighting the “deletionists” are another group, the “inclusionists” who advocate that Wikipedia is big enough for all - “Wikipedia is not paper”
As well as having serious implications for the content of Wikipedia, it raises issues of its ultimate sustainability
Discuss Wikipedia’s homogenous tendency of its editors.
Wikipedia is faulted for the homogenous tendency of its editors - American, white, male, working in the IT industry
But gender balances have been the focus of most scrutiny
Wikimedia Foundation survey (2008): 13 percent of editors female
Lam (2011): coverage of topics of more interest to females was significantly less than those topics of more interest to males
Wagner (2015): found women to be slightly over-represented, but their portrayal was very different (more likely to include romantic and family relationships)
Klein and Konieczny (2015): “steadily improving trend” but significant differences between cultural and linguistic communities
Discuss Wikipedia’s geographical dispersal.
Geographical dispersal is also noted, but to a more limited extent
Graham (2011): determined that there exists a core-periphery pattern in Wikipedia’s coverage of nation-states
The pattern was explained by:
Country population
Availability of broadband Internet
Number of local editors
How is the Cambodian history represented on Wikipedia?
For the series of articles on Cambodian history:
There is a link between article quality and dominant discourse. The more a particular historical era is of interest to a dominant discourse the better the quality
Cambodian history is dominated by a French and American derived discourse that situates the French as the saviours of an ancient civilization run into the ground and a nostalgia industry that focuses on the years the country was the target of US aggression.
This is a problematic representation
Cambodians themselves are not actors in the construction of this discourse, having inherited it and being unable to marshal the necessary resources to challenge it
What are the measures of quality to examine Wikipedia’s coverage of Cambodian history?
An empirical study of Wikipedia’s coverage of Cambodian history uses four measures of quality:
Ratio of citations to number of words in the text
Number of editors
Nature of the sources (peer-reviewed journals, reputation of publishers)
Number of unique authors cited
Explain the varying levels of quality for different sections of Cambodian history
Early history: very weak
Early kingdoms: generally better
French protectorate, Japanese occupation, and early post-independence: very weak
American intervention, Cambodian-Vietnamese War, PRK: generally better
Contemporary history: average
The varying levels of quality follows the interest of the Wikipedian community
Tourist interest in the early kingdoms
French view of civilizational decline in the period since the early kingdoms
American nostalgia interest in the years of war
How is the representation of Cambodia’s political economy?
The political economy of representation:
The discourses are inscribed in these articles are not wrong, but represent limited perspectives, especially of Cambodians
Need to identify champions that could add fresh and novel perspectives to counter-balance dominant discourses
What are the limitations of Wikipedia’s policies?
Two key policies are supposed to govern Wikipedia:
Neutral Point of View
Wikipedians are not supposed to participate in debates, but merely to report on them
But their reportage is to be structured around a dominant, majority view and significant minority views
Super-small views are not to be covered except as part of a separate article
The deeper issue of inclusivity on Wikipedia
Inclusivity is not only about allowing anyone to contribute
By choosing or omitting to choose particular outside experts as judges of knowledge claims, editors define boundaries of acceptable comment
How is the Philipphine history an example of Wikipedia’s exclusivity?
Wikipedia and Philippine history: inclusive or exclusive?
To verify claims, Wikipedians used articles/reference lists chosen from the set of links provided by the main History of the Philippines page on Wikipedia.
Most of the sources are available online (even excluding digitized books). They consist of:
Short articles (newspapers and other media companies)
Government websites
Institutional websites (universities)
Continues the genre of “textbookese” (Wineburg and Crismore)
That is, the view that all texts are the same, mines or fields from which “facts” can be extracted without thought
Together the reliance on online summary articles makes it appear that there is little need for editors to seek new material and to explore previously unnoticed work leading to a decline in inclusivity
The lack of inclusivity is clearly shown through an examination of the key books used by these editors:
Agoncillo, History of the Philippine People
Worcester, The Philippines: past and present
Zaide, The Philippines: a unique nation
Tracy, Manila ransomed: the British assault on Manila
Dolan, The Philippines: a country study
Why is there such a dependence?
Why such dependence?
Lack of awareness of the boundaries of the knowledge producing community
Lack of incentives to seek new material
Not a lack of knowledge producers
