what is behind the massive success of Wikipedia ?

[Eren Eeager]

how did Wikipedia have this massive success?. You know, who writes articles for free? Is not this something a more green society does? 

It is more of a green idea than an orange one considering it is non-profit oriented, yet it is having a massive success even in orange society like US. how come this happen?

[Carl-Richard]

It's in many ways a stage yellow project. I'm not familiar with the history of wikipedia, but it's a fascinating thing  

[Nak Khid]

Normally to get published you have to have credentials and submit your work to the publisher for review 

People who write articles there don't do it for the money. They do it either to help inform and help people
or to try to instill their point of view on the subject or to like the fact that they have the status to be the authority on a subject
What often happens is that  after an article is written a lot of other people add to it or make corrections to it.  
So if you try to say something bizarre or with a heavy political slant  other people will quickly edit it and challenge it in the talk commentaries attached to the article.  If  edit wars evolve an article could be come locked for further arbitrary edits. 
Anybody can writes an article but after they do thousands of other people who have signed up with wikipedia are looking and if they see what they thing is an error they might change it.   This seems like an arbitrary situation but it has resulted in pretty good accuracy when compared to regular encyclopedias.   The key are their reference at the bottom of the articles.  If you make claims having a reference source is expected. 
The key to the success is the open participation made available and the apparent pretty good quality of the articles. Also the fact that things are updated frequently and many sub topic entries and branches get created extending a subject 

 

Edited July 28, 2020 by Nak Khid

[Eren Eeager]

@Nak Khid have you ever written an article? I didn't and I think many people here didn't too so it made me thinking who does it then?

[Gesundheit]

For me, Wikipedia is the worst place to learn about anything. Very rarely I resonate with their language both in my original and English languages. The authors are highly intellectual/logical in a very strict and robotic manner. That directly turns my mind off.

But of course it's one of the greatest sources for information.

[Nak Khid]

33 minutes ago, Eren Eeager said:

@Nak Khid have you ever written an article? I didn't and I think many people here didn't too so it made me thinking who does it then?

I have edited articles, adding info and in some cases correcting information. 
Random people do it  but it's not super easy until you learn some technical things about the formatting an proper referencing. 
If you edit and you make a lot of mistakes people may quickly simply revert the article to it's previous state with the click of a button 

[JosephKnecht]

3 hours ago, Eren Eeager said:

It is more of a green idea than an orange one considering it is non-profit oriented, yet it is having a massive success even in orange society like US. how come this happen?

You just need the support of enough green people to start the movement. The rest of the people will follow. 

Most edits and article entries on Wikipedia follow the Pareto Distribution (meaning a small number of participants edit the majority of all articles).

Here is a video of the guy who supposedly edited 1/3 of all English articles. 

 

[Leo Gura]

5 hours ago, Eren Eeager said:

who does it then?

Something like 0.000001% write articles for Wikipedia. It's a highly niche thing. It works based on power-users. Lot of academic types I imagine.

[allislove]

I worked in a company that was founded by the guy who founded Wikipedia, but that company was a profit-oriented.
There was a power-user of Wikipedia in my team. I think, he was top 5 in his country. 
He enjoyed rivaling with other power-users, having meetups of power-users, etc.

[Lyubov]

it's just so damn convenient!

[supremeyingyang]

I wrote my Bachelor Thesis about Wikipedia.

6 hours ago, allislove said:

He enjoyed rivaling with other power-users, having meetups of power-users, etc.

 

7 hours ago, Leo Gura said:

Something like 0.000001% write articles for Wikipedia. It's a highly niche thing. It works based on power-users. Lot of academic types I imagine.

It's very competetive, male and academic. In my estimation you can't get in nowadays if you want to write whole articles feom scratch like @Nak Khid wrote. Why? All the good ones are taken, the rest is hard to write thats why they are left over.

There are different Types of Users. IPs (Edit without account). Authors, Administrators, Bureaucrats und Vandals Hunter. Their vocabulary is a bit martial: flamewar, vandal, hunter, protect... The structure is not suited for as many women as man. The Ratio is maybe 30:1. If its not build as its build with competing man it wouldnt work for free in my estimation.

Every Language Division is somwhat free..

You need to discuss every change in depth if someone asks in a reasonable time space, thus you need to know the rules good. It's about what you are are capeable of...

One Problem is literature. Is a Weblink considered proper literature? What if some printed a misinformation? Thats discussed in depth in most article that behind the scenes in mailibg lists

I could go on for a while but thats it for now

Edited July 29, 2020 by supremeyingyang

[Nak Khid]

13 minutes ago, supremeyingyang said:

I wrote my Bachelor Thesis about Wikipedia.

 

It's very competetive, male and academic. In my estimation you can't get in nowadays if you want to write whole articles from scratch like @Nak Khid wrote. Why? All the good ones are taken, the rest is hard to write thats why they are left over.

 

You need to discuss every change in depth if someone asks in a reasonable time space, thus you need to know the rules good. It's about what you are are capeable of...

 

If you have a username that does not indicate gender then how would you know if it is male dominated?  
Also there is now restriction on  females to sign up yet they don't on their own volition. Is there a problem?  

And,  there are new topics all the time deriving from current events, new technology, notable new people etc 
Suppose some random new person joins and gets on top of it before anybody else and they have studied the formatting well can they create the new article? 
Also if you look at any number of controversial topics that are locked can certain people still access them to put in new information? 

If you think about how to make it all work, it is very complex 

[supremeyingyang]

@Nak Khid

well, technically thats true. but thats what the power users themself say in papers: 95% man. Frame it the other way: only estimated 5% females contribute. i predict that won't because of wikipedia structure

20 minutes ago, Nak Khid said:

Suppose some random new person joins and gets on top of it before anybody else and they have studied the formatting well can they create the new article? 

Also if you look at any number of controversial topics that are locked can certain people still access them to put in new information? 

If you think about how to make it all work, it is very complex 

you can do a new one then, but they rip it apart. you are also likely to choose the 'wrong name'. its a rules game. you say, but the rules say... until the other part surrender. sometimes they never do and they go to a judge (a role that is also used if i remember right)

[Lindsay]

It’s free, google usually lists it at the top of the search results. Anyone can contribute. Constant updates. Wide range and variety of information, 

[docs20]

Dude you get so much knowledge and trivias with just one click, for free, on everything. Do you want the old encyclopedia?

[Rilles]

Wikipedia is like our modern day Gutenberg printing press tbh... its just such a genius invention... How many times a day do you use Wikipedia just to check out some fact... exactly!