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Male Domination?

During my time on English Wikipedia, I’ve come to realize just how male dominated it is (I myself am male). Seriously, how many Wikipedians are female? If these legendary creatures do exist, they would be classified as “rare and endangered”. But perhaps they are more common than I think, as it is difficult to tell and we tend to assume the user is male. But I digress; Female Wikipedians are few and far between. Unfortunately - we need Female Wikipedians, to continue effectively as an encyclopedia, as they can offer insights that males cannot. Male/female insights and interest differ radically. Compare:

• F-35 to Madonna (entertainer)
• System of a Down to Destiny’s Child
• Soccer to Netball
• Prada to Half Life 2

The truth lies within the Article quality. How can we overcome this?

If I am wrong, and every second editor is female – correct me. I also apologize for stereotyping and generalizing. I am also unsure of how Wikipedia’s Homosexual community rates in this.

User:Dfrg.msc File:DFRG. MSC.jpg 06:58, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

I do feel rather stereotyped and generalized by the selection of articles you feel I should be editing. Do you want me to be barefoot, pregnant, and in the kitchen as well? --Serie 08:13, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

But wait, according to Plato and Jung, among others, we have a male side and a female side, each of us. This is well-known to those who uphold the ideas of yang and yin. Perhaps it is merely a matter of considering NPOV when writing. And, those who seek their "other side" might even become more sensitive to the views of "the other" in their relationships. A win-win situation. --Ancheta Wis 09:15, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

Yes, the examples picked were stereotyped, but I believe the point holds. The very fact that a man trying to make the point picked these examples speaks volumes. Male contributors, even well-intentioned ones, often don't know what topics women are likely to want to read or write about. The gender imbalance results one of the more significant unintended biases of Wikipedia. - Jmabel | Talk 22:47, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

No offense, but I was just wondering what this discussion could possibly achieve. --Nscheffey^(T/C) 00:49, 16 August 2006 (UTC)

Some issues are easy to address. Look for false assumptions that all people are men (e.g. by searching text for 'he', 'him', and 'his'). See an example edit. bobblewik 16:44, 19 August 2006 (UTC)

This isn't an "issue". When gender is unspecified, it is accepted in English grammar to use the masculine pronoun. It's arbitrary; it doesn't imply everyone is male. ~ Booya ^Bazooka 14:26, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

"Accepted" is rather overstating the case. It is traditional, and is accepted by some people, while being opposed by others and now uncommon. See also grammatical gender. Warofdreams talk 16:43, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Maybe wikipedian women just have better taste than the music and clothing you've picked. soccer is BY FAR more popular than netball. I think I know just as many women who listen to system of a down as men. your point is probably true in anycase, but by stereo typing what men and women are interested in, you're probably making the problem WORSE, not better. perhaps you should be looking more at truly gender specific topics, such as erectile disfunction Vs breast cancer. personally, I can't see any solution anyway... hey, wait! why don't we change the theme colours of wikipedia from blue to pink! --naught101 23:15, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

I suspect this has more to do with presumptions than anything else. Despite my username's derivation from the first female officer of the Russian army, and a statement at the top of my userpage to that effect (including a portrait), when other editors refer to me by a personal pronoun it's usually "he." I've created nine new warfare categories and quite a few military articles, but have yet to edit Madonna. Maybe I should change my username to G.I. Barbie. Durova 04:36, 23 August 2006 (UTC):

The gender of people from nationalities other than European/American may not be obvious to Europeans and Americans. Most people get MY gender wrong, even though I'm here under my given name. (PS: this seems to be catching, because now at least one South Asian has got it wrong as well. How mortifying.) The gender imbalance is probably going to change in the future. I suspect many women edit without logging in, as they may not necessarily want to have to deal with user talk and community stuff as well as simple edits. I used to do that before I created a user ID. PS I'd also like to say that all your examples are very occidental. I have played and liked Half Life (not 2, it hasn't come to these shores yet) but neither Prada nor netball have any associations for me. Nor does Madonna. --Rimi 13:14, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

I'm guessing that this topic has already been much discussed and researched on WP:BIAS. nadav 08:17, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

1. I am a female.
2. It is super-easy for people to deduce that from my username (but I don't mind).
3. I've never been a Madonna fan and would rather eat my own vomit than listen to En Vogue ripoff artistes Destiny's Child.
4. I like soccer.
5. I could give a rat's arse about Prada or most any other big-name designer. Exceptions are Ralph Lauren and any of the Kahn & Bell-style New Romantic designers, but the former is due to his egalitarian designs and the latter is due to my overall interest in that whole scene/genre (and the only "name" in the whole scene was Antony Price anyway).
6. I've never really thought about any apparent male "bias" here on Wikipedia.
7. I do enjoy hammering a point home so many times the poor point has got no actual point to it.
8. BTW, something I WAS interested enough in to try to create a new article for is the fantastic group the Scars, which has since been contributed to by at least one other person. (Yay!) It certainly ain't no Destiny's Child-type thing. And I like that.  ;)
9. I'll go now. I promise. (Krushsister 02:50, 2 September 2006 (UTC))

• Yes, the examples picked were stereotyped, but I believe the point holds. The very fact that a man trying to make the point picked these examples speaks volumes. Male contributors, even well-intentioned ones, often don't know what topics women are likely to want to read or write about. The gender imbalance results one of the more significant unintended biases of Wikipedia. - Jmabel | Talk 22:47, 9 August 2006 (UTC) . Yes! he (or she) gets it! This is what I am on about! Dfrg.msc ^{1 . 2 . 3} 22:57, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

Don't you see that that mindset just perpetuates stereotypes? As a woman, I do not think I have distinctly different tastes in articles I like to read than any man. I like to read about sports, construction, books, mathematical concepts, people, etc. I like to pull from a wide variety of knowledge and learn about many different things. Any differences that do occur in male/female tastes of article reading etc. are only a result of socialization. Ex: maybe more women read about "beauty" because they grow up thinking this is a higest good. Although, lately it seems more pressure is put on males to be attractive as well, so perhaps they read about beauty, just the same. Who knows - there is no clear brightline. The point is that this is silly. It's ridiculous to think we should write articles thinking "ahh this is an article men will be interested in reading" or "ahh this is an article women will be interested in reading." By saying: "Male contributors, even well-intentioned ones, often don't know what topics women are likely to want to read or write about" --- you are just perpetuating stereotypes. Gender is a social construct. Sex (anatomical differences) do exist, but gender, does not. (Or at least, is very questionable and insubstantial). Information should not be gendered. Free knowledge.

• One of our most prodigious and esteemed contributers, User:SlimVirgin, is a woman. Batmanand | Talk 11:30, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

  Have you read our article on tokenism?

  OK, quite separately from the sort of list User:Dfrg.msc presented, feminism is tremendously under-covered—a topic that may not be a uniquely female concern, but it is hard to imagine it would be so neglected if Wikipedians were 50% women. Some glaring examples are that the articles on Mary Daly and Ti-Grace Atkinson are little more than stubs, as is women's studies. I'm not saying all women are interested in these topics. I am saying that most of the people interested in these topics are women, and that the relative absence of women is probably why these topics are being shortchanged. In general, articles on women are shortchanged. Until I got to it, the article on Marie of Edinburgh (Queen Marie of Romania) focused almost entirely on where she fit the British Royal Family; it didn't even mention that she represented Romania at Versailles after World War I; and it still doesn't say a third of what it should say about someone who was arguably the most politically powerful woman in Europe in her time (I can't think who else would have been a contender). - Jmabel | Talk 06:05, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

I have come across a strange statistic recently, apperently the amount of IT Consultant's nowaday's employed, roughly 60% are male and the rest of the percentage (40%) are female. Now it also states that the amount of employed female Consultant's is growing. The thing is though, i have noticed a more female based subject at academic level that is web design and media. The other subject's such as networking & programming tend to be more male based. I suspect that Wikipedia number of user's could be evident of this, and i beleive the ratio to be somewhat similiar to the IT Consultancy figure. The answer is yes female user's are amongst us. I have noticed from my personal experience, women can be quite creative and effienct in thier task's where as men take a logical approach. Again both genda's can have these both trait's and are not limited to one or if two at that.

Anti argumentum ad hominem 05:04, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

Am I the only one who finds the above post (and to some extent this thread) disconcerting? If there's one consistent point voiced by the self-identified female contributors here, it's Don't pigeonhole me. Yet the responses - from apparently sincere and well-meaning men - tend back toward pigeonholes. So let's turn the tables: look at Sylvester Stallone, War, and Baldness. Those articles aren't in fantastic shape either. I might even wonder whether enough men edit Wikipedia if it weren't for a fairly good piece about Viagra. Durova 00:28, 2 October 2006 (UTC)

Remote control is good, too - and belching. Obviously lots of guys here. - DavidWBrooks 00:41, 2 October 2006 (UTC)

Tell the Wikitruth

Once you've read Wikiruth, it's hard to think of Wikipedia as anything other than an autistic care group for the obese and the underemployed. - Andrew Orlowski, The Register [1]

Oh yeah, 'n Sanger is no Super-Sales Wales, never mind Citizendium is the lamest name ever. I mean, what is with the friggin' Latin thing anyway? edia-endium my Aunty Fanny :) Wyss 19:31, 24 September 2006 (UTC)

well there is no question that jimbo has proved himself to be an impressively good PR guy but Sanger knows how to create a buzz at least.Geni 01:23, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

Did Orlowski have a Wikipedia editor jilt him at the altar or something? The guy's rather fixated on anything he can possibly find to criticize Wikipedia over. *headshake* Tony Fox (arf!) 01:41, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

"Autistic care group"? That's definitely a new one.

One could say the same thing about blogs like Orlowski's, but it's not worth it. The bottom line is... who cares? If you think WP is full of lies and is edited by obese, underemployed autistic people, either ignore it or help fix it. I hardly think it's influential enough to justify hand-wringing. --zenohockey 02:51, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

Fix it? Wikipedia is very inefficient for most editors except in the most obscure articles. As a result, many get sucked into the "social-community/bureaucracy" aspects. As I and many others have noted elswhere, Wikipedia is a helpful notion but its current implementation, popular though it may be, is but an alphabetized meta-blog and online social community. I have better things to do with my life than collaborate with sock puppets and cranks. It took me around 14,000 edits to understand how much time I was truly wasting, though I did learn something about online social communities and collaboration schemes. :) Wyss 11:57, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

Pfft... This link just goes to show that some trolls have journalism careers. Laugh at it for the comedy it is and move on. Durova 17:39, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia's systemic flaws as an encyclopedia are widely documented. However, if one wishes to participate in an alphabetized meta-blog/online social community with a Byzantine bureaucracy which encourages sock puppets, trolls and endless references to pop culture beliefs which have naught to do with scholarship, yeah, then "pfft," I think, would be the appropriate response to any criticism that Wikipedia is not an encyclopedia. Wyss 17:50, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

Reading the above, one becomes curious as to just why, if, in your words, "I have better things to do with my life than collaborate with sock puppets and cranks," you're hanging around and "wasting your time" providing editorial comment on the whole thing with us "sockpuppets and cranks" then? Tony Fox (arf!) 20:04, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

[2], [3]. ;) Durova 22:07, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

Yeah, anything to avoid discussing the systemic issues: Attack me instead, since it takes no thought and makes you look like a defender of the faith to whomever it is you want community support from. I came to write enyclopedia articles and left because I couldn't without wasting 95% of my time on other codswallop. Tell the Wikitruth indeed. :) Wyss 10:35, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

In the United States, we have this volunteer program where groups sign up to pick up litter along various segments of the public highways. And most of the criticism I've read from folks like Wikitruth & Orlowski is the same as criticizing these groups because the labor they're volunteering is "not really helping society". I guess that they lie awake all night worrying that we might actually be getting some satisfaction from our contributions to Wikipedia, & are doing their damnedest to prevent that from ever happening. -- llywrch 21:45, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

I think you have it backwards. Wikipedia generates the litter, lots of it. Think of Wikipedia as a drunken lout speeding down the "information superhighway" tossing all kinds of sundry codswallop out the car window for others to pick up after. Lots of its dodgy content gets picked up by scraper sites, the Google bots and others, hence multiplying the trash and by the bye, last I heard, littering was a crime in the states (sometimes a serious one). Meanwhile the well-meaning Wikipedia volunteers who try to clean up after Wikipedia's "dark side" generate even more traffic for the site, enhancing its popularity and contributing to Mr Wales' ability to raise millions of dollars for Wikipedia's commercial spin-off Wikia: Their time is utterly wasted in an editorial sense, since Wikipedia's systemic flaws are easily correctible, but nonetheless very helpful in helping Mr Wales with his wider goals (whatever they may be). Wyss 17:53, 30 September 2006 (UTC)

You've made your position clear. The only point unclear is why you are still participating here -- since you despise Wikipedia so much. -- llywrch 19:12, 30 September 2006 (UTC)

Uhm, so please cite a diff which shows me saying I "despise" Wikipedia. Meanwhile, could you paraphrase what you think my "position" is, so I can get some sort of notion as to how clear I've made it to you? Thanks. Wyss 20:09, 30 September 2006 (UTC)

• "Think of Wikipedia as a drunken lout speeding down the 'information superhighway' tossing all kinds of sundry codswallop out the car window for others to pick up after."
• You repeat Orlowski's quote that appears at the top of this thread on your user page & at the talk of your Talk page.
• As for diffs, I found this was clearly not intended as a compliment.

I found these contirbutions insulting -- to me & to everyone involved with Wikipedia.If you have specific criticisms about how it works or what appears here, state them & if you are convincing, we'll act on them. If you don't like Wikipedia, no one is forcing you to use it. But if you hang around Wikipedia just to tell us how much it sucks, then don't be surprised if someone concludes that you're just another troll & blocks you. -- llywrch 23:47, 30 September 2006 (UTC)

Or just refused to feed him. Robert A.West (Talk) 23:51, 30 September 2006 (UTC)

So let me get this straight, my request to cite where I said I "despise" Wikipedia is ãnswered with the Orlowski quote and a bit of pithy but constructive criticism by yours truly? Followed by a thinly veiled accusation of trollery and an open threat to block? Never mind I'm not the one who responded with "pffft" or whatever.

Meanwhile my request that you paraphrase your understanding of my "position" (as you put it) went wholly unanswered, which to me is a hint that you either don't know or don't care. If it's the latter, what are you doing participating in this conversation? All I did was post the Orlowski item and subsequently respond to comments. I do sincerely apologize if someone has taken any of this as an insult. I was rather hoping it might make someone think.

Anyway I never said I despised Wikipedia. If you have interpreted my comments in this thread as such, you're mistaken. Nor am I "hand wringing." Wyss 13:49, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

You say that Wikipedia is broken and beyond fixing. Yet you bother to post here, deploring the state of affairs. That is hand-wringing by definition. People don't show up to proclaim the worthlessness and irredeemability of something unless they have come to despise it. If you want to shake the electrons of Wikipedia from your fingertips, please do so and leave those of us who care about the project to do our best, succeed or fail. Robert A.West (Talk) 15:35, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

I never "proclaimed" that Wikipedia is "worthless" and "irredeemable," not even close. Please stop mis-representing (or mis-understanding and then attempting to characterize, inaccurately) my remarks, thanks.

I care about Wikipedia and think it is a worthwhile project with some systemic flaws which are "redeemable" (more or less easily fixed). Until that happens though, Wikipedia could further degenerate into a mega-traffic, snipe-festing, alphabetized meta-blog and social community/online game more akin to a MUD than an encyclopedia. Wyss 15:47, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

Well, you did call it a "drunken lout"... I guess that's not "irredeemable", so can you perhaps suggest an appropriate 12-step program it can enroll in? *Dan T.* 16:09, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

As an editor I made more than 14,000 edits, learning along the way Mr Wales knows spot on that Wikipedia's pop-culture and online role-playing opportunities "sell" (create mass-market level traffic and media buzz) whilst scholarship and peer review (as with Nupedia) do not. Can reliable, scholarly encyclopedia content be efficiently created through wiki-enabled online collaboration? Yes. Out of over a million Wikipedia articles, thousands (perhaps a few percent) are helpfully written and sourced. Meanwhile there is no problem solving "12-step" program available to any editor so long as Wikipedia's very highest leadership unilaterally continues to follow an unscholarly but far more profitable "meta-blog/MUD" model of encyclopedia building. Wyss 16:46, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

This is the first time I have heard of WikiTruth. I just read about Wikipedia:Publicgirluk photo debate, and it made me ill and a little embarassed to be a part of Wikipedia. I just put a project together to keep comics article editors from getting burned out, but this may have done me in. Ugh. --Chris Griswold (☎☓) 15:11, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

Publicgirluk was obviously a hoax/trolling event. What I found so unhelpful and unencyclopedic was:

• The content ever made it onto Wikipedia to begin with.

• Wikipedians asked the "female editor" to pose for additional pictures, through what amounted to coercion and inappropriate pressure, never mind their dodgy motives. It amounted to trolls trolling trolls.

• When the inappropriate and clearly unencyclopedic material showed up, Wikipedia was wholly unable to deal with it through its own deeply flawed due process, which was circumvented anyway by Mr Wales after immature-seeming, utterly agog and way-too-overly-excited editors and admins wasted far too much time going on about it. Wyss 17:45, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

So, what is your recommendation? Or even an idea that might lead to one? Absent that, you are just hand-wringing. Robert A.West (Talk) 18:50, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

Since you seem to have missed it (why are you so obsessed with labeling me a "hand wringer" anyway), a few posts up, I'll copy paste it down here for you:

As an editor I made more than 14,000 edits, learning along the way Mr Wales knows spot on that Wikipedia's pop-culture and online role-playing opportunities "sell" (create mass-market level traffic and media buzz) whilst scholarship and peer review (as with Nupedia) do not. Can reliable, scholarly encyclopedia content be efficiently created through wiki-enabled online collaboration? Yes. Out of over a million Wikipedia articles, thousands (perhaps a few percent) are helpfully written and sourced. Meanwhile there is no problem solving "12-step" program available to any editor so long as Wikipedia's very highest leadership unilaterally continues to follow an unscholarly but far more profitable "meta-blog/MUD" model of encyclopedia building. Wyss 18:57, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

All of which is just meaningless rhetoricizing. Yay. Can you say that again in English, please?

Why is this on the news section of the pump anyway? It should be under misc. or, if you actually have some sort of real solution you suggest, proposals --tjstrf 19:03, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

This page is for discussion of news. Given this discussion has moved far from the original topic, please consider taking it elsewhere. Any specific proposals can be discussed at Wikipedia:Village pump (proposals). Current and proposed policies can be discussed at Wikipedia:Village pump (policy). Warofdreams talk 19:04, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

Unbelievable. Bye. Wyss 19:17, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

Arbcom elections 2006

The page for candidate statements is now open but elections are not for anther 2 months so no need to hurry:

Wikipedia:Arbitration Committee/Elections/December 2006/Candidate statements

Geni 00:06, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

Censorship in Singapore?

Per a discussion in #wikipedia-en: Certain pages on Malayasian subjects on enwp were recently discovered to be inaccessable from at least one ISP (singnet.com.sg), such as (not a full list):

• Malaysian_Malaysia
• People's_Progressive_Party_(Malaysia)
• Social_contract_(Malaysia)
• Malaysia-Singapore_Airlines

Some things to note about these:

1. The page can be viewed by changing the url slightly: such as encoding a few characters in hexidecimal, or using the history to find an oldid, or using a google cache.
2. The same pages with the same content are also accessable on other wikis, making this seem suspiciously targeted if it is indeed censorship.
3. The pages above with parenthesis are only blocked if the url contains the parentheses, the wikilinks above to the articles apparently work fine, indicating it is only google links (which use literal parentheses in the url) that are targeted.
4. These return (when failing) a connection timeout or blank page. This is in contrast to other blocked internet sites, such as pornography, which will return a message such as "The site you requested is not accessible. For more information please check Media Development Authority."
5. Doesn't seem blocked on Pacific Net?

Test results on [[Malaysian_Malaysia]]

Inaccessable:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malaysian%20Malaysia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mal%61ysian_Malaysia
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Malaysian+Malaysia

Accessable:
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=-&curid=1890739
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=50951374
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%4D%61%6C%61%79%73%69%61%6E_%4D%61%6C%61%79%73%69%61
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%4D%61%6C%61%79%73%69%61%6E_Malaysia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malaysian_%4D%61%6C%61%79%73%69%61
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Malaysian_Malaysia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malaysia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malaysia_Malaysian
https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Malaysian_Malaysia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M%61laysian_Malaysia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M%61l%61ysi%61n_Malaysia

Also accessable (nonexistant/other):
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malaysian_Malaysia_Blahblahblah_missing_page
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1ysian_Malaysia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maaysian_Malaysia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mal%62ysian_Malaysia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%4Dalaysian_%4Dalaysia
http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Malaysian_Malaysia

Can any other Singapore users verify or deny this? (Move this to the appropriate VP section if misposted, but this seemed like news) --Splarka (rant) 00:25, 4 October 2006 (UTC) (I am not in Signapore, but am posting this on behalf of a wp user who is)

Page views

I just wanted to point out a tool that I ran across on :FR. It lists the most-viewed articles and works on many different language wikipedias. Check it out. --Zantastik talk 22:37, 4 October 2006 (UTC)