Hi Anders,

While I would normally agree with your logic, take note that for both the 
Cebuano and Waray Wikipedias, there were only 1-2 editors who said "yes" to the 
endeavor.  For Waray, that was JinJian.  For Cebuano, that happened to also be 
JinJian and one other editor who is currently not active.

I think Sverker meant well when he proposed (and implemented) bot-generated 
articles for both Wikipedias, but other Filipino Wikipedians have also seen 
first-hand what bot-generated articles do.  As I mentioned previously, the 
Tagalog Wikipedia also had tens of thousands of bot-generated articles (our 
article count went up from near-20,000 to over 60,000 as a result), which was 
stopped only because of community opposition.  The biggest question thus is how 
will a small community be able to maintain all these articles to begin with?

Now, as I’ve understood Sverker has given Wikipedia editing workshops in Cebu, 
as has Wikimedia Philippines in Samar and Leyte (where Waray is spoken).  At 
this point, we’re figuring out how to grow our community in those regions, 
though if you ask me we’re still at a loss as to how we can sustainably grow 
communities in the Philippines without us having to look at them too closely.  
It’s not just a matter of content not being there—we’re also dealing with a 
whole gamut of socio-cultural factors as to why after all our attempts at 
introducing Wikipedia to people and showing them how to edit, people still 
don’t choose to do so.

That said, while I also think the Wikipedians concerned meant well, I hope this 
serves as a lesson to those considering bot-generated articles: bot-generated 
articles won’t jump-start a community, as the Cebuano and Waray examples have 
shown.

Regards,

Josh

> Wiadomość napisana przez Anders Wennersten <m...@anderswennersten.se> w dniu 
> 7 lip 2015, o godz. 04:33:
> 
> I am not saying this should be repeated. I am saying we should respect their 
> choice, and not as outsiders criticize their effort. or put erroneous bad 
> faith assumptions  on why they did this choice.
> 
> Anders
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Ilario Valdelli skrev den 2015-07-07 13:21:
>> The best evaluation is to understand the evolution and the trend.
>> 
>> In the last months in waray for instance I have seen less than 10 edits in
>> the overall project in one month.
>> 
>> This is not revitalization. I agree with the enthusiasm of the community
>> members but I am personally in favor of comparison of numbers in a long
>> time perspective.
>> 
>> I am happy to see more data and to monitor them to know if this is a model
>> to be replied but the numbers are not really supportive.
>> 
>> Regards
>> Il 07/Lug/2015 13:12, "Anders Wennersten" <m...@anderswennersten.se> ha
>> scritto:
>> 
>>> What gives you the right to be judgemental how they act on their version?
>>> Is that your idea of the movement values and vision, to talk badly of other
>>> efforts?
>>> 
>>> and I know for a fact they did not to this to get into this list you are
>>> upset of. It is untrue when you state "like this which have inflated
>>> article counts"
>>> 
>>> And I also know as a fact they are very happy with this effort because it
>>> has energized their small community. You talk of big increased I think of
>>> how many communities of this size that implodes  which is a more common
>>> scenario.
>>> 
>>> As I have already stated I have no problem that you (and others) have
>>> another view of the benefits of botgenrated arciels.
>>> 
>>> But please be supportive to the very small communities, who do their best
>>> to survive and grow
>>> 
>>> Anders
>>> 
>>> Craig Franklin skrev den 2015-07-07 12:21:
>>> 
>>>> There is already a consensus on enwiki (please, hold your rotten tomatoes)
>>>> that projects like this which have inflated article counts due to
>>>> extensive
>>>> botting rather than through having a lively community not be included on
>>>> the main page.  I think a lot of the comments here about a huge article
>>>> count attracting communities to curate that content are somewhat
>>>> disingenous, it seems that despite having lots of articles there is only
>>>> one active user on Waray Wikipedia, who is responsible for more than 99%
>>>> of
>>>> total edits.  As Milos has alluded to, "number of articles" is a poor
>>>> metric for understanding how useful a particular project is to speakers of
>>>> that language.
>>>> 
>>>> Speaking here as a speaker of a minority language myself, I understand the
>>>> temptation of quickly creating lots of articles to have some sort of
>>>> demonstrable impact, and I believe there is a place for some bot
>>>> generation
>>>> of articles on any project.  But after hitting "Random" a few times on
>>>> Waray, and seeing what came back, I'm not really sure how this is a more
>>>> useful resource for speakers of the language than just going into Wikidata
>>>> with the interface set to Waray.  I believe the time honoured, if slower
>>>> way of creating a Wikipedia, lovingly handcrafting it article by article,
>>>> is far more likely to lead to a positive impact for people.
>>>> 
>>>> Cheers,
>>>> Craig
>>>> 
>>>> 
>>>> 
>>>> On 7 July 2015 at 07:55, Asaf Bartov <abar...@wikimedia.org> wrote:
>>>> 
>>>>  Indeed, as Josh points out, there are also costs (even if only perceived
>>>>> or
>>>>> reputational costs) to populating a tiny Wikipedia with next to no active
>>>>> editors with hundreds of thousands of bot-generated stubs.  Is having
>>>>> stubs
>>>>> on all French communes in Cebuano better than having nothing in Cebuano?
>>>>> Probably, yes.  And by increasing pageviews (which is measurable), one
>>>>> increases the likelihood of "organic" conversion of readers into editors
>>>>> (which is *still* the most effective way to make Wikipedians, albeit not
>>>>> the easiest to directly control).
>>>>> 
>>>>> But, again as Josh says, that increase in *editorship* is yet to be
>>>>> attained.  The Waray Wikipedia (btw, "Waray-Waray" is, it turns out,
>>>>> objectionable to Waray speakers, and is mildly derogatory) is still
>>>>> largely
>>>>> edited by *one* committed individual, User:JinJian[1], as the stats
>>>>> plainly
>>>>> show.  Given that the bot was run *with* JinJian's consent, there can be
>>>>> no
>>>>> objection to its operation.
>>>>> 
>>>>> As Milos suggests, there seems to be an emotional response to those
>>>>> Wikipedias appearing in the top 10 view.  This should be divorced from
>>>>> those communities' sovereign decisions to run or not run the bot.  If the
>>>>> top 10 inclusion truly bothers people, and there's a strong consensus
>>>>> that
>>>>> Wikipedias largely populated by bot-generated stubs "should" not be
>>>>> included, a discussion could be had on what this view *should* mean,
>>>>> precisely, if not plainly the top 10 Wikipedias by article count.  And
>>>>> whatever refined definition is agreed upon (e.g. thresholds like a
>>>>> minimum
>>>>> number of active editors, or some formula involving the "article depth"
>>>>> figure, or whatever) can then be made the basis for the list, or indeed,
>>>>> for a different list, that would be more satisfying for those who are
>>>>> displeased with being "under" these Wikipedias on the list.
>>>>> 
>>>>>     A.
>>>>> 
>>>>> [1] http://stats.wikimedia.org/EN/TablesWikipediaWAR.htm#wikipedians
>>>>> 
>>>>> On Mon, Jul 6, 2015 at 2:04 PM, Josh Lim <jamesjoshua...@yahoo.com>
>>>>> wrote:
>>>>> 
>>>>>  I can probably speak for those communities.  On the whole, the logic
>>>>>> behind the Lsjbot experiment was simple: build it and they will come.
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> So far though, this hasn’t happened.  We from the Tagalog Wikipedia were
>>>>>> also approached for this experiment, but we know what happens when
>>>>>> bot-generated articles are made: the community is overwhelmed.  Out of
>>>>>> 
>>>>> that
>>>>> 
>>>>>> fear, we declined to participate.
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> One of the concerns some editors in the Philippines have (and these are
>>>>>> sentiments I share) is that these two Wikipedias turn us into a
>>>>>> laughingstock, willing to increase article numbers at any cost.  At one
>>>>>> point, the Cebuano Wikipedia was described as a Wikipedia of French
>>>>>> communes, not content relevant to Cebu or Cebuanos.  I don’t think we’d
>>>>>> like that with other Wikipedias in the Philippines or elsewhere.
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> Regards,
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> Josh
>>>>>> 
>>>>>>  Wiadomość napisana przez WereSpielChequers <
>>>>>> werespielchequ...@gmail.com>
>>>>>> w dniu 6 lip 2015, o godz. 04:52:
>>>>>> 
>>>>>>> These are fascinating experiments, I hope that the Waray-waray and
>>>>>>> 
>>>>>> Cebuano
>>>>>> 
>>>>>>> communities will at some point report back to the wider community as to
>>>>>>> 
>>>>>> how
>>>>>> 
>>>>>>> this worked out. My fear is that too fast a growth rate could overwhelm
>>>>>>> whatever community we have in those languages leading to burn out of
>>>>>>> existing editors dealing with too many newbies at once, my suspicion is
>>>>>>> that this will vary by language depending on such variables as the
>>>>>>> 
>>>>>> ratio
>>>>>> of
>>>>>> 
>>>>>>> PC users to smartphone users, and the ease with which editors can
>>>>>>> 
>>>>>> access
>>>>>> the necessary character sets.
>>>>>>> We have long known that bot creation of stubs that are of interest to
>>>>>>> speakers of a language is a way to recruit readers, and that some
>>>>>>> 
>>>>>> readers
>>>>>> become editors. What I think we don't yet know is the maximum growth
>>>>>> rate
>>>>>> that a wiki community can cope with.
>>>>>>> There is also a sustainability angle, though hopefully we can mitigate
>>>>>>> 
>>>>>> that
>>>>>> 
>>>>>>> by bot replacing of articles where the source has changed but they
>>>>>>> 
>>>>>> haven't
>>>>>> 
>>>>>>> been edited on the Cebuano or Waray-waray Wikipedias. Otherwise within
>>>>>>> 
>>>>>> a
>>>>>> decade we could have pedias that look very dated, for example various
>>>>>>> record holders whose articles in other languages show their records
>>>>>>> 
>>>>>> have
>>>>>> been surpassed, and villages
>>>>>>> WereSpielChequers
>>>>>>> _______________________________________________
>>>>>>> Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at:
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>>>>>> <mailto:wikimedia-l-requ...@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe>
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> JAMES JOSHUA G. LIM
>>>>>> Bachelor of Arts in Political Science
>>>>>> Class of 2013, Ateneo de Manila University
>>>>>> Quezon City, Metro Manila, Philippines
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> jamesjoshua...@yahoo.com <mailto:jamesjoshua...@yahoo.com> | +63 (915)
>>>>>> 321-7582
>>>>>> Facebook/Twitter: akiestar | Wikimedia: Sky Harbor
>>>>>> http://about.me/josh.lim <http://about.me/josh.lim>
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>>>>>> 
>>>>> --
>>>>>      Asaf Bartov
>>>>>      Wikimedia Foundation <http://www.wikimediafoundation.org>
>>>>> 
>>>>> Imagine a world in which every single human being can freely share in the
>>>>> sum of all knowledge. Help us make it a reality!
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JAMES JOSHUA G. LIM
Bachelor of Arts in Political Science
Class of 2013, Ateneo de Manila University
Quezon City, Metro Manila, Philippines

jamesjoshua...@yahoo.com <mailto:jamesjoshua...@yahoo.com> | +63 (915) 321-7582
Facebook/Twitter: akiestar | Wikimedia: Sky Harbor
http://about.me/josh.lim <http://about.me/josh.lim>
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