can wikipedia survive popular success and community decline?
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SXSW 2010 talk - Can Wikipedia Survive Popular Success and Community Decline?TRANSCRIPT
Can Wikipedia Survive Popular Success and Community Decline?
Andrew LihUniversity of Southern California
February 22, 2010@ UC Santa Barbara
Monday, February 22, 2010
article view sourcediscussion history
HOW A BUNCH OF NOBODIES CREATED THE WORLD’S
GREATEST ENCYCLOPEDIA“Imagine a world in which every single person
on the planet is given free access to the sum of
all human knowledge. That’s what we’re doing.”
—Jimmy Wales
With more than 2,000,000 individual articles on
everything from Aa! (a Japanese pop group) to
Zzyzx, California, written by an army of volunteer
contributors, Wikipedia is the #8 site on the World
Wide Web. Created (and corrected) by anyone with
access to a computer, this impressive assemblage
of knowledge is growing at an astonishing rate of
more than 30,000,000 words a month. Now for the
first time, a Wikipedia insider tells the story of how
it all happened—from the first glimmer of an idea to
the global phenomenon it’s become.
Andrew Lih has been an administrator (a trusted
user who is granted access to technical features)
at Wikipedia for more than four years, as well as a
regular host of the weekly Wikipedia podcast. In The
Wikipedia Revolution, he details the site’s inception
in 2001, its evolution, and its remarkable growth,
while also explaining its larger cultural repercussions.
Wikipedia is not just a website; it’s a global commu-
nity of contributors who have banded together out of
a shared passion for making knowledge free.
Featuring a Foreword by Wikipedia founder Jimmy
Wales and an Afterword that is itself a Wikipedia
creation.
U.S. $24.99
ANDREW LIH was an academic in new media and
journalism for ten years, at Columbia University
and Hong Kong University. He has been a com-
mentator on new media, technology, and journal-
ism issues on CNN, MSNBC, and NPR. Lih is
based in Beijing.
Become a part of The Wikipedia Revolution yourself,
and try your hand at editing the last chapter at: http://
www.wikipediarevolution.com/wiki/Main_Page
Jacket design by Ervin Serrano
Jacket photographs: globe by Frank Whitney/Jupiterimages;
puzzle by Shutterstock
Author photograph by Mei Fong
3/09
Prin
ted
in U
SA ©
200
9 H
yper
ion
Wikipedia RevolutionFrom Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Jump to: navigation, search
This article is about the book. For the different, similar terms related to Wikipedia, see
Wikipedia (terminology).
For Wikipedia’s non-encyclopedic visitor introduction, see Wikipedia:About.
Wikipedia Revolution (pronunciation ) is the story of the free,[1] multilingual ency-
clopedia project supported by the non-profit Wikimedia Foundation. The website’s name
is a portmanteau of the words wiki (a technology for creating collaborative websites) and
encyclopedia. Wikipedia’s 10 million articles have been written collaboratively by volun-
teers around the world, and almost all of its articles can be edited by anyone who can
access the Wikipedia website.[2] Launched in 2001 by Jimmy Wales and Larry Sanger,[3] it
is currently the largest and most popular[1] general reference work on the Internet.[4][5][6]
The Wikipedia Revolution traces Wikipedia’s phenomenal success back to its roots, and
profiles the people who have contributed to its stated mission of giving every single person
free access to the sum of all human knowledge.
THE WIKIPEDIA REVOLUTION
ANDREW LIH
How a Bunch of Nobodies Created the W
orld’s Greatest Encyclopedia
ISBN: 978-1-4013-0371-6
ANDREW L IH
From the Introduction to The Wikipedia Revolution by Wikipedia founder, Jimmy Wales
By now, it’s hard not to use the Internet without experiencing Wikipedia in
searches and surfing. It has become an incredibly useful Internet resource in
many languages. Yet when you use Wikipedia, you may not understand the
philosophy behind it.
This book tells the story of how Wikipedia began and evolved from a traditional
encyclopedia into the intricate global community that it is today.
THE WIKIPEDIA REVOLUTIONUS and UK editionsItalian, Japanese, Russian
Monday, February 22, 2010
MotivationsMedia and press
Monday, February 22, 2010
Eugene Kim cancels his demore: vandalizing pages
Monday, February 22, 2010
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2009/aug/12/wikipedia-deletionist-inclusionist
Monday, February 22, 2010
http://www.businessinsider.com/chart-of-the-day-wikipedias-growth-tumbles-2009-8
Monday, February 22, 2010
http://www.theinquirer.net/inquirer/news/1496429/wikipedia-dying
Monday, February 22, 2010
http://www.littleabout.com/news/27556,will-wikipedia-long.html
Monday, February 22, 2010
http://www.legalbrief.co.za/article.php?story=20090819085946131
Monday, February 22, 2010
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB125893981183759969.html
Monday, February 22, 2010
BackgroundA brief history
Monday, February 22, 2010
Monday, February 22, 2010
Larry Sanger
by SimSullen, licensed under Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 License
Monday, February 22, 2010
Jimmy Wales
By WiLLGT09@flickr, file is licensed under Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 2.0 Generic
Monday, February 22, 2010
Ward CunninghamThis file is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 License
Monday, February 22, 2010
Monday, February 22, 2010
ComScore Top 5 (Nov 2009)Alexa Top 6 (Feb 2009)
Since 2006, overtookNY Times, Amazon, Fox Interactive,
eBay, Time Warner sites
Ranking
Photo by: victoriapeckham@flickr, Creative CommonsMonday, February 22, 2010
DiversityIndependence
DecentralizationAggregation
Wisdom of Crowds (James Surowiecki)
Photo by: victoriapeckham@flickr, Creative CommonsMonday, February 22, 2010
Small simple tasksLarge diverse groupsDesign for selfishness
Result aggregation
Wisdom of Crowds Online (Derek Powazek, SXSW2009)
Photo by: iskanderbenamor@flickr, Creative CommonsMonday, February 22, 2010
Modular/structured writingRadical inclusion
Personal/social pagesTools to diff, inspect, monitor vandalism
Wikipedia features
Photo by: Susan NYC@flickr, Creative Commons
Monday, February 22, 2010
FreeOpen
NeutralTimelySocial
Wikipedia’s Features(Lih, Wikipedia Revolution)
Monday, February 22, 2010
2010 Jan 31
Monday, February 22, 2010
Articles in en: Wikipedia, ProjectionsVarious, Wikipedia:Modelling Wikipedia's growth
Monday, February 22, 2010
2003 Feb 9
Text
Monday, February 22, 2010
2004 Jun 15Monday, February 22, 2010
2005 May 30Monday, February 22, 2010
How radically inclusive is it?User friendliness?
Welcoming social spaces? How much writing is left? Community shrinking?
Wikipedia questions
Photo by: Susan NYC@flickr, Creative Commons
Monday, February 22, 2010
Wikipedia CultureNorms evolving over time
Monday, February 22, 2010
IAR
NPOV
AGF
Gen1
Monday, February 22, 2010
IAR NPOV
AGF
3RR
CSD
Gen1
Gen2
Semi-protection
Disputeresolution RfA
Monday, February 22, 2010
IAR NPOV
AGF
3RR
CSD
BLP
CSD G1-12CSD R1-3CSD I1-8
CSD C,U,T,P
Anonymous articlecreation
Gen1
Gen2
Gen3
nontaggedfair useimages
Semi-protection
Reliablesources
Unsourced
Disputeresolution
No spoiler tags
RfA
Monday, February 22, 2010
IAR NPOV
AGF
3RR
CSD
BLP
CSD G1-12CSD R1-3CSD I1-8
CSD C,U,T,P
Anonymous articlecreation
Gen1
Gen2
Gen3
nontaggedfair useimages
Semi-protection
Reliablesources
Unsourced
No spoiler tags
Disputeresolution
Gen4semi-flagged protection
Intermediary flagged
protection
flagged protection
RfAgauntlet
Monday, February 22, 2010
Policies not necessarily additive
Norms depend on entry time into community
Wikipedia norms
Photo by: User:Zzubnik, Creative Commons
Monday, February 22, 2010
Wikis: people talking to each other
mailing listtalk pages
Village Pump
THEN NOWmailing lists
Wikipedia-LWikien-L
Foundation-LInternal-L
....
irc#wikipedia#wikimedia
#wikipedia-en-admins...
talk pages
WP:Portal pages
Communityportal
Village pump(s)RFC pages
Foundation employee communications
Monday, February 22, 2010
Wikis: trusted/administrative users
“No big deal”Here’s your mop...
Edit countEditor Review
3 months, 1000 edits?
“Optional” questions
THEN NOW
Soapbox issues
Hypothetical scenarios
Monday, February 22, 2010
Actual RfA questions• As an administrator, what would be your approach to
tendentious editing?
• Does a sign have copyright? When can a Wikipedia image include a sign, or conversely when would a sign appearing not be appropriate?
• ...how you intend to proceed with CSD in the future - ie, how certain will you need to be before you delete an article, and under what circumstances would you seek the opinion of other editors?
• When is the last time you told a lie? What were the circumstances, and do you regret it?
Monday, February 22, 2010
I CAN HAZ ADMINSHIP?
Monday, February 22, 2010
User FriendlinessEditing and Usability
Monday, February 22, 2010
90% lurkers9% contributors
1% hard core
90/9/1 communities
Photo by: Susan NYC@flickr, Creative Commons
Monday, February 22, 2010
Monday, February 22, 2010
Monday, February 22, 2010
Editing followthrough
• Wikitravel: only 5% of those who press “edit” actually save
• Wikipedia: 1/8 to 1/4
• WikiHow: 30% with guided editing
• Wikia: WYSIWYG editor >> 50%
Sources: Jack Herrick, WikiHow; Erik Zachte, Wikimedia Foundation
Monday, February 22, 2010
“Every user in this study struggled to get a basic grasp of the editing interface... largely failed to make edits correctly without repeated
attempts and efforts”
Wikimedia Usability Study
Photo by: Susan NYC@flickr, Creative Commonshttp://usability.wikimedia.org/wiki/Usability_and_Experience_Study#Feeling_Stupid
Monday, February 22, 2010
Example: Wikia Muppet Wiki page
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Wiki_feel_stupid_v2.ogv
Monday, February 22, 2010
Example: Wikia Muppet Wiki page
Monday, February 22, 2010
Example: Editing in MediaWiki markup mode
Monday, February 22, 2010
Example: Editing in Wikia-developed WYSIWYG mode
Monday, February 22, 2010
Example: Editing in WYSIWYG not always possible
Monday, February 22, 2010
Pressing down
• Arcane wiki editing/markup
• Intimidating adminship system
• Internecine rules, overinstruction?
Monday, February 22, 2010
Why now?
• Stats missing since Oct 2006 to 2009
• Database “dump” process was not finishing
• Q4 2009 - full dumps available
Monday, February 22, 2010
en: new articles/quarter
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July 2007
http://stats.wikimedia.org/EN/TablesWikipediaEN.htm
Monday, February 22, 2010
Monday, February 22, 2010
Contributors en: Wikipedia
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Monday, February 22, 2010
Articles in en: Wikipedia
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Dangers of applying projectionsMonday, February 22, 2010
Projecting to infinity?
Monday, February 22, 2010
Standard logistic curve
Monday, February 22, 2010
Articles in en: Wikipedia, ProjectionsVarious, Wikipedia:Modelling Wikipedia's growth
Monday, February 22, 2010
Articles in en: Wikipedia, ProjectionsVarious, Wikipedia:Modelling Wikipedia's growth
Monday, February 22, 2010
Article “supply”
• Fruit on the ground
• [[Dog]], [[Music]]
• Low hanging fruit
• [[History of England]]
• Higher hanging fruit/deletion• [[Medical research related to low-carbohydrate diets]]
Monday, February 22, 2010
Articles in en: Wikipedia, Projections
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Fruit on the ground
Low hanging fruit
Higher hanging fruit
Monday, February 22, 2010
Hypotheses
• Human knowledge always expanding, but...
• Steep exponential logistic curve of Wikipedia 2001-2005 was to “catchup” with existing knowledge
• Will settle into a less dramatic curve, even linear?
Monday, February 22, 2010
The Singularity is Not Near: Slowing Growth of Wikipedia (PARC)
Monday, February 22, 2010
Articles in en: Wikipedia, Projections
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Based on Chi, Suh, PARC Augmented Social Cognition group
Fruit on the ground
Low hanging fruit
Higher hanging fruit
Specialized/Maintenance/
News/Pop culture
Monday, February 22, 2010
Research/Stats
• UN University MERIT study
• Wikimedia Foundation usability study
• PARC Augmented Social Cognition
• Felipe Ortega, Libresoft
• Erik Zachte, Wikimedia
• User:Dragonsflight (Robert Rohde)
Monday, February 22, 2010
Wikipedia survival analysis (Ortega) in WSJ challenged
WMF conclusion: decline in contributors, but steady now
2009 Summary
Monday, February 22, 2010
Wikipedia languagesCrowdsourced projects
Other communities?
Monday, February 22, 2010
DMOZ - directory.mozilla.org
Monday, February 22, 2010
“DMOZ chose to place editorial control in the hands of a small cabal of editors, and in so doing, made the directory opaque, unresponsive, and outdated.
The editorial policy of DMOZ killed DMOZ.”
DMOZ
http://forum.psychlinks.ca/search-engines-and-seo/17335-on-the-irrelevance-of-odp-dmoz.htmlMonday, February 22, 2010
Lack of theoretical models in comparable socio-technical systems (Chi, Suh)
New horizons
Monday, February 22, 2010
Slow steady quality decline
Flagged revisions, quality increase
Inability to update in timely manner
Infiltration of spam and non-neutral content
Scenarios
Monday, February 22, 2010
Next steps?
• Research, literature on the charting of human knowledge
• Find better way to determine community “departures”
• Social media fatigue/distraction?
• Efficacy of technical features in lieu of editors? Locking, flagging, bots
Monday, February 22, 2010
Andrew LihAnnenberg School for Communication and Journalism
University of Southern California
http://andrewlih.comTwitter: fuzheado
Monday, February 22, 2010