Knowledge (XXG)

:Knowledge (XXG) Signpost/2011-03-14/News and notes - Knowledge (XXG)

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read books, have editing experience and have a desire to share knowledge are only a subset of the general population. It seems to me that if someone hadn't already become an editor years back based upon hearing about Knowledge (XXG) and being interested, odds are good they just weren't all that interested. Early adopters are going to be more suited for the tasks involved, obviously, and the pool of available potential newbies will just get worse and worse as time goes on. That's not to say that we should not treat newbies with respect and welcome them, but I think we already do that to the extent we should be. As a basic philosophy we ought to do more to hang onto and encourage long time contributors who have proven themselves to the project. While Knowledge (XXG) is the encyclopedia anyone
784:, but that page doesn't appear to attract much attention any more. I'd be curious to know what the trend in the ratio of stubs:non-stub articles. If the ratio since the 2006 peak of new articles has been in favor of non-stub articles, that would support the "low-hanging fruit" hypothesis of declining new article creation -- viz., it is easier to improve an existing article than to create a new one. But if the ratio has remained roughly the same then the cause of the new article fall-off might be due to increased barriers to new article creation. (I don't know whether the XML data dumps would permit one to easily determine how the number of links to a page or template increased or decreased over time, which is the only way I can think of to arrive at this ratio.) -- 295: 303: 174: 166: 349:, currently Jay Walsh), whose purpose will be to "serve the Wikimedia community and Wikimedia Foundation staff by increasing the quantity and quality of communications between and among the Wikimedia Foundation and the Wikimedia community." The list of job duties, apart from those concerning the communication of the achievements of Wikimedia projects to an external audience, also indicates planned changes to the interaction between the Foundation and volunteers: 397: 587: 117: 107: 33: 127: 87: 137: 97: 683:
The relative drop in retention is obviously worrying. I am wondering though, do we have numbers available on the net amount of editors who are still active one year later? A quick look at the chart suggests (though there is no evidence) that this number is fairly constant. If it is, or is even rising
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stated that as long as the debate about the corresponding clause in German law (§ 72 UrhG) was still open, it had to be assumed that such reproductions "can not be used in Knowledge (XXG) unless the (reproduction) photographer has permitted the reuse". Another controversial conclusion was that while
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Knowledge (XXG) is getting big, is widely used and I would assume we could at least attract 10 times as many contributors. So why don't we? Two factors, learning to edit and motivation, of which I think the last is the most important. Most people are not self-starters and need to be told by someone
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The thing I don't get is why people who ought to know better are surprised that recent new editors don't stick around as long and blame it on how hard it is to use tools, that they aren't feeling welcomed, etc. Certain people are more suited for editing an encyclopedia than others. Individuals who
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She then went on to name "Openness Begets Participation" as a strategy to solve the problem ("I believe we need to make editing fun again for everybody: both new editors and experienced editors. ... Quality and openness go hand in hand"), and outlined "The Year Ahead", based on the Foundation's
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effect, in which the existing community struggles to integrate the newbies while at the same time striving to preserve the ability to do its work. It does that by developing self-repair and defense mechanisms – which in our case, turned out to be things like bot- and script-supported reverts,
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who "on a day-to-day basis ... will create, mine and analyze data to help understand readers and editors of different Wikimedia projects, especially Knowledge (XXG), across different geographies", and based on them create "reports, charts, graphs, maps and tables" to "concisely, clearly and
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Build strong relationships with Wikimedia project representatives (Knowledge (XXG) and its sister projects), chapter members, and informal organizations (including student groups) to improve the quality and quantity of story-telling directed at users, contributors, media, and important
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rose from 5,000 edits to 11,426. Since the start of last year the number of editors breaking the 100,000 barrier has jumped by more than half, from 68 to 109, whilst the number of editors who have contributed over 200,000 edits has doubled from ten to twenty. This prompted
248:"Between 2005 and 2007, newbies started having real trouble successfully joining the Wikimedia community. ... Here’s what we think is happening: As successful communities get really big, they naturally suffer growing pains. New people flood in, creating an 360:
Develop an internal, movement communications strategy for WMF that leverages pre-existing platforms (wikis, blogs, mailing lists, etc) and proposes new methods for bringing stories, mission-critical and general information to the 100,000+ strong Wikimedia
735:, both the software used to generate the datasets from the Knowledge (XXG) XML dumps and the tools for analysis are open source. That page has step by step instructions for recreating his software platform if you want to run your own analysis -- more at 322:
recently analyzed the edit numbers of the most active editors on the English Knowledge (XXG) (by edit count), concluding that 27% of all edits have been done by a core group of 4,000 editors. In the last three years the number of edits needed to get onto
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concerning the use of images on Knowledge (XXG) under German law, commissioned from its longtime counsel, Berlin law firm JBB. Regarding the reuse of reproduction photographs of two-dimensional public domain (gemeinfrei) works – the German equivalent of
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Thanks for the idea. If the WMF acts on your idea, we'll likely end up seeing Jimmy Wales' mug at the top of every page for the rest of the year. And the PTB will also disable our ability to suppress these messages even for users with a login. --
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deletions, user warnings, and complex policies. All those mechanisms are obviously helpful ... But they’ve also made it harder and harder for new people to join us, which in turn seems to have made experienced editors' work harder as well.
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they respect, community leaders etc. So even though we need to have a welcoming environment and keep on trying making it easier to contributer, I think we really need to have various big-shots to recommend contributing.
468:) as long as they are attributed, it is nevertheless not possible to publish them under a free license such as the CC-BY-SA, because the same clause (§ 59 UrhG) prohibited modifications. While presenting the expertise, 552:) appeared to be exactly identical except for one word in the lead ("XYZ is a village of Uttarakhand, India"), despite being over 5000 bytes long – the rest of each article was mostly filled by a brief history of the 472:
from Wikimedia Deutschland emphasized that it "does not have an immediate impact on current practices, e.g. on Wikimedia Commons, and should be understood as a contribution to the continued discussion within the
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to broaden the list from the 4,000 editors with the highest edit count to 5,000. So as of 9 March 2011, all editors with 9,168 edits or more are on the latest list (though some have opted out of being named).
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be editing it regularly. They can contribute what they can add of value, and as time goes on and articles are already established newbies will have less available to do. And that's a good thing.
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Establish a Foundation-wide, information broadcast schedule to enable more predictable and consistent sharing of Foundation news, activities and accomplishments with the community."
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photos taken from a public place of copyrighted buildings and sculptures that are permanently located in such a place may be freely reproduced under the
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too. My understanding is that it's actually not in tabular format currently, since he stores everything on his server hosting
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jumped from 10,000 to 100,000 entries in the space of five months with entries copied verbatim from other wikis, such as "
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It was an interesting read. I'm wondering though where I could find the tabular data from these charts, if available.
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have it in CSV form though in order to generate the graphs, so you should ask on the talk page of the March Update.
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for recognizing the value in providing useful quality content over junk stub farms. I applaud his decision. --
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The 4,000 most active Wikipedians compared to the rest of the EN Knowledge (XXG) community as of March 2, 2011.
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Article count inflation happens all the time with (what should be) the smaller Wikimedia wikis. Recently, the
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The retention of New Wikipedians dropped dramatically from mid 2005 to early 2007, and has since remained low.
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for family reasons at the end of June, after completing the development of the 2011–12 business plan.
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Foundation staff: New positions for "Movement Communications" and data analysis, chief officer leaving
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slightly, there is less to worry about. Does anyone know if and where these numbers can be found?
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on data from the pilot project exploring the use of the Article feedback tool has been published
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by CEDRO, a Spanish author's rights society, concerning a link on the Spanish Knowledge (XXG).
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meaningfully convey information for a lay audience, Wikimedia community and the foundation."
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This trend cannot be simply attributed to increased newbie experimentation or vandalism.
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Foundation reports editor trends, technology plans and communication changes
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Legal concerns about freedom of panorama and 2D reproductions in Germany
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Create a delightful experience for contributing and reviewing multimedia
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on his recent trip to India as the Wikimedia Foundation's fellow for
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Citing editor statistics, Foundation presents upcoming product plans
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Age (in "wiki-years") of editors who made at least 50 edits in 2010
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Actively monitor and participate in discussions on mailing lists.
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Last week, the Wikimedia Foundation posted a job opening for a
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Knowledge (XXG) talk:Modelling Knowledge (XXG) extended growth
527:: The Wikimedia Foundation recently received and acted upon a 351: 241: 239:
presented the study's results, interpreting them as follows:
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Quantity over quality: The sad story of Hindi Knowledge (XXG)
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More than 9000 articles deleted on the Hindi Knowledge (XXG)
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Amical Viquipèdia ("Friends of Knowledge (XXG)") association
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Editor retention has not worsened over the past three years.
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Edit distribution for the 4,000 most active Wikipedians (
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The retention rate of long-time editors is about 75–80%.
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List of 4,000 Wikipedians who have done the most edits
672:If your comment has not appeared here, you can try 235:), the Wikimedia Foundation's Executive Director 479:: The Hungarian Wikimedia chapter published its 284:Support community growth in developing countries 8: 556:state. The articles have since been deleted. 183:Wikimedia Foundation's "Editor Trends Study" 440:(collaboration with cultural institutions). 493:of Catalan Wikipedians has published its 231:– the English version has so far received 978:Knowledge (XXG) Signpost archives 2011-03 446:: The German Wikimedia chapter recently 172: 164: 18:Knowledge (XXG):Knowledge (XXG) Signpost 699:I think the information you want is at 675: 651: 196:Knowledge (XXG) communities are aging . 67: 503:: Wikimedia Nederland published their 388:Another job opening was posted for a 7: 345:, a new position (reporting to the 509:Europe-wide "Wiki Loves Monuments" 53: 28: 657:These comments are automatically 135: 125: 115: 105: 95: 85: 495:report for December to February 400:Outgoing CFOO Veronique Kessler 343:Movement Communications Manager 310:indicates that might satisfy a 776:I'll repeat here a suggestion 668:add the page to your watchlist 287:Serve audiences on all devices 1: 515:New article feedback analysis 281:Improve the newbie experience 219:In a letter to Wikimedians (" 733:Editor Trends Study/Software 501:Wikimedia Netherlands report 390:Data Analyst and Researcher‎ 701:Editor_Trends_Study/Results 466:Commons:Freedom of panorama 994: 902:22:46, 16 March 2011 (UTC) 886:19:22, 16 March 2011 (UTC) 870:14:42, 16 March 2011 (UTC) 845:08:22, 16 March 2011 (UTC) 827:08:08, 16 March 2011 (UTC) 794:17:44, 16 March 2011 (UTC) 762:22:57, 15 March 2011 (UTC) 727:21:31, 15 March 2011 (UTC) 713:17:07, 15 March 2011 (UTC) 694:09:15, 15 March 2011 (UTC) 540:: In a blog post titled " 448:published a legal opinion 751:who worked on the study 481:report for February 2011 477:Wikimedia Hungary report 414:announced she will leave 544:", Utkarshraj Atmaram ( 758:Steven Walling at work 665:. To follow comments, 590: 401: 347:Head of Communications 315: 299: 278:Create a visual editor 178: 170: 36: 589: 550:Hindi Knowledge (XXG) 404:In other staff news, 399: 305: 297: 176: 168: 35: 661:from this article's 856:edit, not everyone 805:Malagasy Wiktionary 622:Features and admins 505:report for February 462:freedom of panorama 410:since February 2008 731:As you can see at 652:Discuss this story 627:Arbitration report 591: 578:"News and notes" → 453:Bridgeman v. Corel 432:) has published a 426:GLAM trip to India 402: 316: 300: 265:Product Whitepaper 179: 171: 42:← Back to Contents 37: 825: 745:document-oriented 676:purging the cache 632:Technology report 470:Mathias Schindler 464:clause (see also 406:Veronique Kessler 386: 385: 318:In related news, 308:previous research 260: 259: 250:Eternal September 221:March 2011 Update 217: 216: 155:WereSpielChequers 47:View Latest Issue 985: 961: 840: 815: 760: 719:Martijn Hoekstra 686:Martijn Hoekstra 679: 677: 671: 650: 609: 601: 594: 577: 570:"News and notes" 569: 519:further analysis 352: 320:Kevin Rutherford 242: 233:over 18000 views 188: 157: 139: 138: 129: 128: 119: 118: 109: 108: 99: 98: 89: 88: 59: 57: 55: 993: 992: 988: 987: 986: 984: 983: 982: 968: 967: 966: 965: 964: 963: 962: 957: 955: 950: 945: 940: 935: 928: 908: 907: 838: 756: 681: 673: 666: 655: 654: 648:+ Add a comment 646: 642: 641: 640: 602: 597: 595: 592: 581: 580: 575: 572: 567: 532:takedown notice 457:controversially 430:User:Witty lama 422: 339: 163: 158: 148: 147: 146: 145: 136: 126: 116: 106: 96: 86: 80: 77: 66: 62: 60: 50: 49: 44: 38: 26: 25: 24: 12: 11: 5: 991: 989: 981: 980: 970: 969: 956: 951: 946: 941: 936: 931: 930: 929: 910: 909: 906: 905: 904: 873: 872: 848: 847: 801: 800: 799: 798: 797: 796: 769: 768: 767: 766: 765: 764: 656: 653: 645: 644: 643: 639: 634: 629: 624: 619: 614: 612:News and notes 608: 596: 584: 583: 582: 573: 564: 563: 562: 560: 558: 557: 535: 522: 512: 498: 487:Catalan report 484: 474: 441: 428:: Liam Wyatt ( 421: 418: 384: 383: 380: 379: 378: 375: 372: 368: 365: 362: 356: 338: 335: 292: 291: 288: 285: 282: 279: 258: 257: 254: 246: 215: 214: 211: 210: 209: 206: 203: 200: 197: 192: 162: 159: 144: 143: 133: 123: 113: 103: 93: 82: 81: 78: 72: 71: 70: 69: 65:News and notes 64: 63: 61: 58: 45: 40: 39: 30: 29: 27: 15: 14: 13: 10: 9: 6: 4: 3: 2: 990: 979: 976: 975: 973: 960: 954: 949: 944: 939: 934: 926: 922: 918: 914: 911:Keep up with 903: 899: 895: 890: 889: 888: 887: 883: 879: 871: 867: 863: 859: 855: 850: 849: 846: 843: 841: 835: 834:User:Utcursch 831: 830: 829: 828: 823: 819: 814: 810: 806: 795: 791: 787: 783: 779: 775: 774: 773: 772: 771: 770: 763: 759: 754: 750: 746: 742: 738: 734: 730: 729: 728: 724: 720: 716: 715: 714: 710: 706: 702: 698: 697: 696: 695: 691: 687: 678: 669: 664: 660: 649: 638: 637:Editcountitis 635: 633: 630: 628: 625: 623: 620: 618: 615: 613: 610: 606: 600: 599:14 March 2011 593:In this issue 588: 579: 571: 561: 555: 551: 547: 546:User:Utcursch 543: 539: 536: 533: 530: 526: 525:DMCA takedown 523: 520: 516: 513: 510: 506: 502: 499: 496: 492: 488: 485: 482: 478: 475: 471: 467: 463: 458: 454: 449: 445: 442: 439: 435: 431: 427: 424: 423: 419: 417: 415: 411: 407: 398: 394: 391: 376: 373: 371:stakeholders. 369: 366: 363: 359: 358: 357: 353: 350: 348: 344: 336: 334: 331: 326: 321: 313: 309: 304: 296: 289: 286: 283: 280: 277: 276: 275: 273: 271: 266: 251: 247: 243: 240: 238: 234: 230: 229:CentralNotice 226: 222: 207: 204: 201: 198: 195: 194: 193: 189: 186: 184: 175: 167: 160: 156: 152: 142: 134: 132: 124: 122: 114: 112: 104: 102: 94: 92: 84: 83: 75: 56: 54:14 March 2011 48: 43: 34: 23: 19: 913:The Signpost 912: 874: 857: 853: 832:Hats off to 802: 752: 747:). 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2011-03-14
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