[Wiki-research-l] How to make Wikipedia more attractive to academics
For a discussion about how to make Wikipedia more attractive to academics, see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Ambassadors/Archive_5#How_to_make_the_project_more_attractive_to_academics Pine -Original Message- From: Amir E. Aharoni Sent: Thursday, 03 May, 2012 04:58 To: Research into Wikimedia content and communities Subject: Re: [Wiki-research-l] long in tooth: ignoring recent scholarship 2012/5/3 Richard Jensen rjen...@uic.edu: Looking at a spinoff Shakespeare article: [[Shakespeare's plays]]. It's peak activity year was 2007. A dozen people made 10 or more edits. It has 26 citations and no bibliography. There are no scholarly journals. Half the citations are over 40 years old. Only one book was published after 2007. That profile strongly suggests editors who are unfamiliar with current scholarship. I sense low-hanging fruit here. What academic wouldn't want his paper to be cited more? Wikipedia is not an academic source, but it's a hugely popular one. A correctly-done campaign to get academics and their students to cite recently published papers will benefit everybody. Happily the article on [[WIlliam Shakespeare's Style]] is MUCH more up-to-date. ... Which shows that a lot of is very intermittent and haphazard, but often in a good way. -- Amir Elisha Aharoni · אָמִיר אֱלִישָׁע אַהֲרוֹנִי http://aharoni.wordpress.com “We're living in pieces, I want to live in peace.” – T. Moore ___ Wiki-research-l mailing list Wiki-research-l@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wiki-research-l ___ Wiki-research-l mailing list Wiki-research-l@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wiki-research-l
[Wiki-research-l] Wikipedia Education Program Metrics and Activities Meetings
I think that these these “Wikipedia Education Program Metrics and Activities Meetings” may interest some of the recipients of Research-l, especially those who use Wikipedia in their classes. https://outreach.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_Education_Program_Metrics_and_Activities_Meeting Notes from past meetings are linked from that page. The next one is scheduled for April 23. To sign up for announcements of meetings, you can add your Wikipedia contact information to this list. https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Global_message_delivery/Targets/Wikipedia_Education_Program_meeting Regards, Pine___ Wiki-research-l mailing list Wiki-research-l@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wiki-research-l
[Wiki-research-l] Wikidata opinion piece in The Atlantic
Here's an opinion piece, The Problem with Wikidata, by Mark Graham, who is a Research Fellow at the Oxford Internet Institute, which appears on The Atlantic's website. I'm not personally supporting or opposing his views but I found this to be an interesting read. http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2012/04/the-problem-with-wikidata/255564/ Pine ___ Wiki-research-l mailing list Wiki-research-l@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wiki-research-l
Re: [Wiki-research-l] Motivations to Contribute to Wikipedia
I have concerns about this survey. I will address one set of comments to Audrey, and a second set of comments and a question to the Research Committee. Audrey: thanks for your interest in Wikipedia. I suggest that you look at the other research that has previously discussed motivations of Wikipedia contributors and factors that can effect that motivation, such as http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_Editors_Survey_2011 and http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Research:Wikimedia_Summer_of_Research_2011/Summary_of_Findings. On your research Meta page, I disagree with your characterization of extant literature as “lacking,” because while it isn’t comprehensive it also shouldn’t be dismissed. Also, I am wondering why you would use a 2006 source for information about Wikipedia user contribution activity because 2006 was a long time ago in the context of Wikipedia’s lifetime. Regarding surveys of Wikipedians in general, I am skeptical about the reliability of surveys in measuring the motivations of Wikipedia contributors because so many people are not the kind of dedicated volunteer who would be likely to read Research-l or volunteer ten minutes of their time to participate in a study about their motives. Also, you will need to consider bad actors like vandals, spammers, POV pushers, and PR manipulators. Your survey might reveal interesting characteristics of certain classes of editors, but I would be very surprised if your survey results were representative of the entire population of Wikipedia editors. Another complicating factor is that motivations of any single editor can change over time. Finally, and perhaps most significantly, I have some procedural concerns. Did you discuss your survey with anyone in the Wikipedia research community before you announced it here? Your page on Meta says that you “will also request the Research Committee's support in recruiting subjects.” Your section on “Wikimedia Policies, Ethics, and Human Subjects Protection” says nothing about consultation with or approval of the Research Committee, and the most recent published minutes from the Research Committee (that I was able to find) don’t appear to show that your research was discussed by them. I think that they might have had valuable ideas that could have helped you in designing your survey and understanding the existing work on editor motivation. It is my understanding that Research Committee approval is required before soliciting Wikipedia subjects for surveys (see my question below). RCOM members: I would appreciate an official reply to the following concerns. Is it policy that surveys which recruit participants (instead of passively examining editor contributions) must be approved by RCOM before they are sent to Wikimedia mailing lists and/or announced to the broader Wikimedia community (beyond a relatively limited scope such as a single wikiproject, such as GOCE on EN, which might give its approval to the survey only within the scope of that wikiproject)? I am under the impression from the December 12, 2011 RCOM meeting minutes that RCOM approval is required for surveys such as the one that Audrey made. My personal view is that surveyors should get RCOM’s approval before making broad public announcements which recruit research participants, because even well intended researchers can experience difficulties due to questionable assumptions built into the design a study, a limited understanding about the Wikipedia community, or a lack of knowledge about significant existing research. Also, there can be privacy and copyright concerns regarding survey data, and those reasons alone seem sufficient to require that RCOM’s approval is necessary in addition to the approval of any academic institution that is associated with a survey. Also, I am under the impression that permission from the WMF’s legal department is required, in addition to RCOM approval. In the absence of RCOM approval and WMF Legal approval, should information about such an unapproved survey be removed from Meta? Thanks, Pine From: Audrey Abeyta Sent: Saturday, 17 March, 2012 13:01 To: wiki-research-l@lists.wikimedia.org Subject: [Wiki-research-l] Motivations to Contribute to Wikipedia Hello all, I am an undergraduate student at the University of California, Santa Barbara, conducting a senior honors thesis on users' motivations to contribute to Wikipedia. A more detailed description of the project can be read here: http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Research:Motivations_to_Contribute_to_Wikipedia My project's success is dependent on the valuable responses of Wikipedia contributors, which I am collecting through an online questionnaire. This brief questionnaire is completely anonymous and should take approximately 10 minutes to complete. If any of you are willing to complete this questionnaire, it can be accessed here: https://us1.us.qualtrics.com/SE/?SID=SV_8ixU9RkozemzC4s. Please feel free to
[Wiki-research-l] Budget for Summer of Research 2011
Because this subject was previously mentioned on Foundation-l and Research-l, I thought that those who are interested in research budgets might want to look at the information that’s now available here. Thanks to Steven Walling (WMF) for following up. I’m hoping that we’ll see more of this kind of information in the future so that the community can compare ROIs of proposed and completed projects. http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Research_talk:Wikimedia_Summer_of_Research_2011/Summary_of_Findings Pine___ Wiki-research-l mailing list Wiki-research-l@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wiki-research-l
Re: [Wiki-research-l] Circadian Patterns of Wikipedia Editorial Activity
Thank you for forwarding this. I found it interesting. I will mention this research to some other editors on English Wikipedia who may also be interested. Regarding posting announcements of published research in this email list: this email list's information page on Meta says in part, Typical on-topic posts include: * announcement of a new research project * discussions of methodology * questions and answers about related projects, so your email is appropriate for this list according to the published standards. Sincerely, user:Pine Date: Wed, 25 Jan 2012 20:12:08 +0100 From: taha.yas...@gmail.com To: wiki-research-l@lists.wikimedia.org CC: taha.yass...@theorie.physik.uni-goettingen.de Subject: [Wiki-research-l] Circadian Patterns of Wikipedia Editorial Activity Dear all, I write to you only to promote our recent publication on: Circadian Patterns of Wikipedia Editorial Activity http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0030091 I apologize if it's not convenient or usual to do so in this mailing list. Bests, Dr. Taha Yasseri. - www.phy.bme.hu/~yasseri Department of Theoretical Physics Institute of Physics Budapest University of Technology and Economics Budafoki út 8. H- Budapest, Hungary tel: +36 1 463 4110 fax: +36 1 463 3567 - ___ Wiki-research-l mailing list Wiki-research-l@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wiki-research-l ___ Wiki-research-l mailing list Wiki-research-l@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wiki-research-l
[Wiki-research-l] Research: writing styles of female editors on English Wikipedia
I think that I forgot to post this item to research-l when this research was first published. Mind the Gap(s)! Writing Styles of Female Editors on Wikipedia is available on Meta at http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mind_the_Gap. The work is a collaboration of user:LauraHale, user:Hawkeye7, user:Pine, and several participants on the IRC channel #wikimedia-gendergap Conversation is welcome on the talk page. ___ Wiki-research-l mailing list Wiki-research-l@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wiki-research-l
Re: [Wiki-research-l] Comments on RCOM meeting minutes for December 2011
-- Message: 4 Date: Wed, 28 Dec 2011 14:43:07 -0800 From: Dario Taraborelli dtarabore...@wikimedia.org Subject: Re: [Wiki-research-l] Comments on RCOM meeting minutes for December2011 To: Research into Wikimedia content and communities wiki-research-l@lists.wikimedia.org Message-ID: 2fdcf283-c032-427d-883d-78f65d4a6...@wikimedia.org Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Hi, meetings are logged here: http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Research_Committee/Meetings/ you can post any comments on the talk page at: http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Research_Committee/Meetings/Meeting_2011-12-22 Cheers Dario * Thank you. I have posted my comments at http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Research_Committee/Meetings/Meeting_2011-12-22 Pine ___ Wiki-research-l mailing list Wiki-research-l@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wiki-research-l
[Wiki-research-l] Comments on RCOM meeting minutes for December 2011
I have some comments on http://etherpad.wikimedia.org/RComDec2011. I'm not an RCOM member so how can I submit comments? Pine ___ Wiki-research-l mailing list Wiki-research-l@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wiki-research-l
