User:Lamarlana01/reflection

Introduction

Before I took this class, I never really understood how Wikipedia worked. I knew that it was an online encyclopedia but I never put much thought into who was writing the content behind the articles. This class has given me a new appreciation of the work that goes behind each article created. It also has made me appreciate the community that surrounds Wikipedia. Although quirky, I love that Wikipedia values unbiased articles as well as mature and ethical debate between Wikipedians. I feel that it is a very open and honest community with high affective commitment. Wikipedians feel a sense of identity based off of Wikipedia and it is admirable that they feel bonded this way, and show it through love like barnstars, kittens, and baklava. There are many good things that Wikipedia does, but it also has some limitations as well.

Positives

Wikipedia's moderation is very thorough because other Wikipedians volunteer to look over and easily change things on an article that are incorrect. I remember one time I was looking at a musician's Wikipedia page and the first sentence was about how that particular musician was racist. I was shocked that this comment would be included on Wikipedia, but a moderator quickly swooped in and corrected it. Wikipedia also moderates with the "Get Help" button to make your article live. This experience was very easy and helpful because Shalor gave their opinion of what needed to change on my article to make it more of a Wikipedian style. Furthermore, almost immediately other people started editing my article. For example, Onel5969 user made this slight change on my article.

This community does a good job of governing the content. I think that Wikipedia acknowledges and includes the Belmont Principles in their governance. They have respect for persons because they care about their contributors and make sure they are informed of all edits, why something was edited and how to edit. In addition, they make sure to have open and non-harming discussions about issues between people to ensure that each party is understood. Furthermore, Wikipedia utilizes beneficence because they maximize the benefits of peoples' contributions by keeping Wikipedia free, so all have the chance to use it and also keeping it ad-free to support their contributors' wants. Lastly, Wikipedia ensures justice by having a council of unbiased contributors who go through case by case and write out why they made the decisions they did. Therefore, Wikipedia is a mostly ethical place that follows the main principles of "good faith".

Furthermore, I enjoy Wikipedia for their use of gratitude. I really liked that I learned how to thank someone, and I got to use it when someone edited my article and thank them for it. Not only does it feel good for them to get appreciation, but it felt good on my end to give it. I think that gratification is one aspect that Wikipedia does really well. Although Cialdini notes in "The Science of Persuasion" that gratification can be harmful because it can hurt people when they don't receive gratification when they expect to, I think that it can still do a lot of good. Cialdini mentions that gratification can be good when the person doesn't expect to receive it, and with the love button on Wikipedia, the receiver does not expect to get it, therefore making it a positive experience. I think that this is a good incentive for Wikipedians who work really hard on making and editing articles, and can be done with intrinsic motives to make someone happy.

Negatives

I feel extremely proud of my contributions to Wikipedia and the article I wrote about Polly Nor. However, there are some limitations to Wikipedia. First of all, I felt confused and frustrated when trying to learn how to navigate Wikipedia. I think they try to help newcomers by having the tutorials, but I feel that the tutorials and Wikihow pages are a bit wordy and convoluted which makes them hard to follow. Even when trying to give someone love, I struggled on how to do so, as did other students in the class. Therefore, I think their format is confusing and makes it hard to learn how to write and edit the best possible article. Wikipedia's management of newcomers in this class was helpful and well done for me, especially because we had a teacher and librarians to rely on, but if I was trying to figure this stuff out on my own, I don't think I could have and would have given up easily. The Wikipedia community has been helpful in getting my article published and editing it. I just feel that it’s lacking in the formative process of getting there.

In addition, I feel that some of Wikipedias norms are a bit outdated. For example, as I mentioned before that I really like that you can “love” something, but the actual badges given look like they came from a word document from 2004. In addition, the amount of badges is exhausting and makes everything feel cluttered and overwhelming. I think this might be a reason why Wikipedia feels so hard to dive into because it looks outdated and is hard to navigate due to the sheer amount of information on each page. Also, the vocabulary associated with Wikipedia was a bit hard to grasp at first because it felt like a whole new language. If I hadn’t taken this class and I tried to use Wikipedia on my own, I probably would’ve thought “what the heck is a sandbox, wiki orphan, and what makes a notable source”? I appreciate that this class has taught me what all these terms mean, but the format in which Wikipedians discuss Wikipedia feels confusing and a little scary to the outsider.

Another norm that feels outdated is that Wikipedia does not consider people of pop culture notable enough to write about. Our society is changing and pop culture is an ever present part of it. Just because the NY Times hasn’t written about a Youtuber, doesn’t mean they are not notable in their profession. Using the example of Youtube, a popular Youtuber might have millions of subscribers and views and commentary about what they say and do. Yet, they still aren’t notable enough to be written about even though more people probably know about them than their local governor. I think that low brow media is just as important in our society today as high brow and therefore, I think Wikipedia should change with the times and allow articles to be written about prominent people in the media.

Recommendations

Based on the positive and negative experiences I've had with Wikipedia, I would recommend for them to do a few things. First of all, I would recommend that they create a program that welcomes newcomers and introduces them to more experienced Wikipedian's who are there to help. I think that there would be a higher retention rate of contributors if they enacted a program like this. The videos are great but it's still confusing on how to proceed with everything. I think if they had a live chat function or each new member was assigned a Wikipedian to help them, it would improve content creation and understanding for the new members.

Furthermore, another way to retain contributors would to be regulate the trolls. Kraut and Resnick discuss how internet trolls have “no vested interest in the community functioning well” (p.155) and mess with it just for fun. I understand that Wikipedia has a policy of open speech, but I think there needs to be concrete rules about how to deal with trolls and what is trolling. This will conduce an environment that non-trolls can feel more comfortable with creating content and keep creating content.

Lastly, in order for Wikipedia to remain standing and ad-free, they need donations. I think their use of A/B testing to see which slogans work is productive but needs to be centralized. Christian discusses in "The A/B test: Inside the technology that’s changing the rules of business" how companies can get carried away by changing minute details of their slogan, leaving no real difference except for very small changes in how it's received. After looking at the log of how many changes Wikipedia has made, I think they have become carried away with A/B testing. I think at this point, they just need to pick the slogan that received the most donations, and maybe change it once a year to see if reactions are different. I think A/B testing can be good if used right, but I think that Wikipedia has done too many changes in a short amount of time, and that's why their results are minimal.

Conclusion

Wikipedia does many great things like moderate pages to make sure they are indifferent, use gratification to show love to their contributors, as well as use the Belmont principles to enact respect, beneficence and justice among members. However, there are limitations; it’s format is confusing, a bit outdated, is not always new user friendly, and doesn’t appreciate pop culture and generational changes. Overall, I have had a great experience using Wikipedia and like I said before, I am very proud that I was able to write an article that is open to read to the whole world.