WP should serve the readers, but it has to be written by the available writers. We're dependent on volunteers from the people interested in working on an encyclopedia like ours'. They'll have not just certain interests, but certain abilities. This will vary with the different encyclopedias , but at the enWP, there are very few people in most fields who have the ability to write long comprehensive well--organized articles. No matter how desirable it might be to have them, they arenotthee, and the many education programs have brought in rather few regular partcipants.
On Mon, Dec 17, 2018 at 6:58 AM Jonathan Cardy <[email protected]> wrote: > I am more active in categorisation on Commons than on Wikipedia, and there > is a difference there as images in a very fine grained category may be the > specific images that one sees if they click on the commons category link in > a Wikipedia article. > > But on both I see allocating more specific categories as part of the > workflow of many of our editors. Checking through entries in a high level > category, sifting out hoaxes and the like and moving the rest into more > appropriate categories. > > I suspect what we really need is a better watchlisting system, one that > doesn't just give you options to ignore bot and minor edits but also to > ignore category edits and edits that are just reversions of IP and newbie > edits. > > Get Outlook for iOS<https://aka.ms/o0ukef> > > ________________________________ > From: Kerry Raymond <[email protected]> > Sent: Sunday, December 16, 2018 11:43 pm > To: 'WereSpielChequers'; 'Research into Wikimedia content and communities' > Subject: RE: [Wiki-research-l] Readers of Wikipedia > > I’m not suggesting categories are bad. I certainly don’t want > uncategorised articles. I also make use of hidden tracking categories to > manage groups of articles associated with various projects. But we do have > to recognise that it is editors that appear to make the most use of them. > Eye-tracking studies on desktop and I believe some instrumentation in > mobile viewing shows that readers don’t look at them (although I > acknowledge that they may indirectly benefit the reader through improved > search). I do outreach work (general talks about Wikipedia and edit > training) and I know from those interactions that our readers have mostly > never seen or used our categories, even many librarians (folks for whom > categorisation is part of their fundamental way of working) appear not to > have noticed our categories. > > What I am objecting to is what I see on my watchlist every day, many > recategorisations into increasingly fine-grained categories. Also > Categories for Discussion Speedy seems to be a way to constantly fiddle > with the category tree (mostly just renaming) which then result in huge > numbers of edits to rename the categories in all the affected articles. If > you look at some of our top contributors, that’s what they do all day, yet > goodness knows how much time is spent by the rest of us reviewing these > very-low value edits on our watchlists. I would be very interested if > anyone had any studies on the cost/benefit of various types of edit (maybe > a job for ORES) against the benefit to the article (and hence the reader) > and the consumed time (by all parties) of that edit. For example, vandalism > would score strongly negative (damage to article content) but corresponding > removal of that vandalism would not score as strongly positive, because > it’s not a zero-sum game due to risk of exposure of the vandalism to the > reader before the revert and due to the reviewer cost (I review many > changed articles that have had an edit-revert sequence) and the window in > which the vandalism may have been ex, so even though the impact on the > content is net zero, the impact on everyone who reviews it needlessly is a > net negative for the project). All edits (good or bad) have a reviewer > cost. Do we know anything about reviewer costs of edits? > > A couple of people have asked me about my mention of studies showing > people don’t look below the references. I was referring to a presentation > at Wikimania this year (URL to slides below). While the slides do not > explicitly mention categories, it shows readers rarely get to the bottom of > an article, where the categories lurk. > > > https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e1/Which_parts_of_a_%28Wikipedia%29_article_are_actually_being_read_%28Wikimania_2018%29.pdf > > I don’t know if there is more information available on the topic, but > hopefully as it was WMF Research, someone on this list may be able to point > us to more info. > > Kerry > > From: WereSpielChequers [mailto:[email protected]] > Sent: Monday, 17 December 2018 1:26 AM > To: Kerry Raymond <[email protected]>; Research into Wikimedia > content and communities <[email protected]> > Subject: Re: [Wiki-research-l] Readers of Wikipedia > > I've long seen categorisation on wikipedia as a way to bring articles to > the attention of those who follow certain categories. During the cleanup of > unreferenced biographies a few year ago this was a useful adjunct, with > several wikiprojects cleaning up all the articles legitimately categorised > for them. Some of the other Wikiprojects did at least go through and prod > or speedy the non-notables and hoaxes in their areas. > > I'm pretty sure it still operates that way, categorisation of an > uncategorised article sometimes brings it to the attention of people who > know the topic. > > And of course where the article doesn't contain the words in the category, > categorisation then improves search. > > If like me you are a glass third full person categories make a useful > contribution. > > > On Sat, 15 Dec 2018 at 22:21, Kerry Raymond <[email protected] > <mailto:[email protected]>> wrote: > Pointy? I think you may misunderstand my use of the term “hostage”. I > don’t use it with the meaning of abducting people for ransom, but in the > sense of “subject to things beyond our control”. > > > > I agree entirely that Wikipedia should serve its readers and to that end > “To do” lists are compiled with the intention of giving adequate coverage > of topics perceived to be needed. Yet, many of those “To do” lists are full > of redlinks years later because we have volunteer contributors whose > interests / expertise may not align with the perceived needs. Whereas if > Wikipedia employed its writers, it could direct them to write articles > about required topics. It would be a wonderful thing if we could harness > the volunteer energy that goes into largely unproductive activities like > endless category reorganisation (given studies show readers rarely look > below the reference section and don’t see or use the categories) into > writing content that is actually needed. But alas it is not so. > > > > Kerry > > > > > > From: Ziko van Dijk [mailto:[email protected]<mailto:[email protected]>] > Sent: Sunday, 16 December 2018 3:32 AM > To: Kerry Raymond <[email protected]<mailto:[email protected]>>; > Research into Wikimedia content and communities < > [email protected]<mailto: > [email protected]>> > Subject: Re: [Wiki-research-l] Readers of Wikipedia > > > > Hello, > > Thanks for the link and the comments, Leila! > > > > Am Fr., 14. Dez. 2018 um 00:44 Uhr schrieb Kerry Raymond < > [email protected]<mailto:[email protected]> <mailto: > [email protected]<mailto:[email protected]>> >: > > hostage to the interests of their contributors (unless they actively > remove the material). That is, you get the topics that the contributors are > willing and able to write, no matter what the intention might be. > > > > That's a very pointy expression: "Hostage to the interests of their > contributors"! In fact, WP should serve recipients, but the reality is > often different. We alreday saw that Article Feedback Tool as a means to > find out what recipients think. I would be happy with a new, less ambitious > approach, where we don't expect recipients to contribute to the improvement > of content but just want to know their opinion. > > > > By the way, the distincion of large and short articles I have found in > Collison's "Encyclopedias through the ages" (or similar) from 1966. It is > not very prominent in there, but I have elaborated on the idea in 2015, > with a distinction of definition articles, exposition articles, longer > articles and dissertations. > > > > An encyclopedia with "short" articles - or a meaningful combination of the > four types above - would fit well to the original concept of hypertext not > being an actual set of texts (or nodes), but being an individual's specific > learning strategy or reading path. > > > > Federico: remember, most of the oldest German texts (Old High German) deal > with Biblical topics... :-) > > > > Kind regards > > Ziko > > > > _______________________________________________ > Wiki-research-l mailing list > [email protected]<mailto: > [email protected]> > https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wiki-research-l > _______________________________________________ > Wiki-research-l mailing list > [email protected] > https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wiki-research-l > -- David Goodman DGG at the enWP http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:DGG http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:DGG _______________________________________________ Wiki-research-l mailing list [email protected] https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wiki-research-l
