+1

(I for one have full confidence that attempts by an academic to force
citations of their work will remain where they belong: in peer reviews
of every paper I submit ;p)

On 6 February 2015 at 10:24, Aaron Halfaker <[email protected]> wrote:
> I agree that we could be doing something interesting with the social
> dynamics of Wikipedia editing by releasing this dataset -- and that some new
> problems may result.  However, I think that it's much better to have too
> much academic interest than not enough.  With a little AGF and diligence, we
> ought to be able to deal with this problem like we've dealt with quality
> control concerns in the past.  Academics have to be very careful about their
> reputation, and it's hard to cite your own unnecessarily without giving up
> who you are since your name's going to be on the paper.
>
> Either way, this is a useful dataset for library sciences work and it's
> public anyway.  We're just making it easier to work with.  Honestly, that's
> how I got started working in this space -- helping someone get data for
> their own research.
>
> -Aaron
>
> On Fri, Feb 6, 2015 at 5:50 AM, mjn <[email protected]> wrote:
>>
>> I agree it's not a new worry, but it might change the nature of the
>> problem a bit, and is worth at least being vigilant about. I did have a
>> similar idea some years ago, to compute an "impact factor" for
>> being-cited-on-Wikipedia, but after discussing it with some colleagues,
>> didn't do so specifically because of the worry that it would encourage
>> more gaming of Wikipedia citations. Of course it's inevitable that
>> someone would eventually do it, but I still think it was probably right
>> on balance to not push that date forward.
>>
>> Regarding the SEO analogy, the external links on Wikipedia are on
>> average not the best part of Wikipedia, so it's not a very heartening
>> The citations for now are not nearly as spammy as the external links
>> are, and I hope it stays that way!
>>
>> It's of course not new that there is an incentive to spam citations.
>> Even without explicit Wikipedia-citation-tracking, there are incentives
>> to spam marginally relevant citations in order to increase perceived
>> prominence. Maybe being in a Wikipedia article will get your paper in
>> front of more grad students who will end up citing it "for real" after
>> encountering it on Wikipedia, etc. A direct citation count feels like
>> it's likely to exacerbate that, since now removing an irrelevant
>> citation to someone's article is a direct attack on their metrics!
>> Though it's possible the actual effect on editing patterns will be
>> small.
>>
>> From a research perspective, the new datasets of citations might be
>> interesting to track over time, and correlate back to editors, to see if
>> there are any interesting (or "interesting") patterns.
>>
>> -Mark
>>
>> --
>> mjn | http://www.anadrome.org
>>
>> Oliver Keyes <[email protected]> writes:
>>
>> > And SEO spammers will add themselves, too! This is not a new problem.
>> >
>> > On Thursday, 5 February 2015, Kerry Raymond <[email protected]>
>> > wrote:
>> >
>> >>  Do I understand this correctly? That Wikipedia articles that cite
>> >> academic publications will be included in citation count now (at least
>> >> for
>> >> altmetrics). While that’s great recognition for Wikipedia as a corpus
>> >> of
>> >> scholarly work, does that mean Wikipedia will be overrun with academic
>> >> authors adding citations to their academic papers in any Wikipedia
>> >> article
>> >> they can get away with in order to improve their citation counts for
>> >> their
>> >> CVs?
>> >>
>> >>
>> >>
>> >> I note that generally we can spot self-citation because the two papers
>> >> will have an author name in common, but with the ability to edit
>> >> Wikipedia
>> >> anonymously and pseudonymously means that we cannot spot self-citation.
>> >>
>> >>
>> >>
>> >> While judging research purely on citation counts is a deeply flawed
>> >> method
>> >> of assessment, nonetheless it is a reality and the pressure on folks to
>> >> “game” the system is tremendous given the role it can play in
>> >> appointment,
>> >> tenure, promotion and grant applications.
>> >>
>> >>
>> >>
>> >> On the positive side, we might be able to get rid of a lot of
>> >> citation-needed tags.
>> >>
>> >>
>> >>
>> >> Kerry
>> >>
>> >>
>> >>  ------------------------------
>> >>
>> >> *From:* [email protected]
>> >>
>> >> <javascript:_e(%7B%7D,'cvml','[email protected]');>
>> >> [mailto:[email protected]
>> >>
>> >> <javascript:_e(%7B%7D,'cvml','[email protected]');>]
>> >> *On Behalf Of *Pine W
>> >> *Sent:* Friday, 6 February 2015 8:13 AM
>> >> *To:* Wiki Research-l; Raymond Leonard; Wikimedia & GLAM collaboration
>> >> [Public]; North American Cultural Partnerships
>> >> *Subject:* [Wiki-research-l] Altmetric.com now tracks Wikipedia
>> >> citations
>> >>
>> >>
>> >>
>> >> FYI:
>> >>
>> >> http://www.altmetric.com/blog/new-source-alert-wikipedia/
>> >>
>> >>     Pine
>> >>
>> >> This is an Encyclopedia <https://www.wikipedia.org/>
>> >>
>> >>
>> >>
>> >>
>> >>
>> >>
>> >>
>> >>
>> >> * One gateway to the wide garden of knowledge, where lies The deep rock
>> >> of
>> >> our past, in which we must delve The well of our future, The clear
>> >> water we
>> >> must leave untainted for those who come after us, The fertile earth, in
>> >> which truth may grow in bright places, tended by many hands, And the
>> >> broad
>> >> fall of sunshine, warming our first steps toward knowing how much we do
>> >> not
>> >> know. —Catherine Munro *
>> >>
>>
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>
>
>
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-- 
Oliver Keyes
Research Analyst
Wikimedia Foundation

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