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Reviews of Lazy Virtues: Teaching Writing in the Age of Wikipedia
Lazy Virtues: Teaching Writing in the Age of Wikipedia is a March 2009 book from Vanderbilt University Press that explores the "Wikipedia movement" from the perspective of a writing teacher. Author Robert E. Cummings is an Assistant Professor of English and Director of First-Year Composition at Columbus State University, as well as the Writing Specialist for the university's Quality Enhancement Plan, in which he assists "teachers across campus in their efforts to maximize student writing in their curriculum." After a recorded group discussion about Wikipedia classroom assignments featuring Professor Cummings, three Wikipedians reviewed his book.
Review by Ragesoss
Scholars in traditional disciplines have only just begun trying to make sense of Wikipedia from an academic perspective. As they do so, each knowledge community will take its own ideas, theories, and methods and map them onto Wikipedia. A long browse through the catalog of academic studies about Wikipedia reveals just how fragmentary those disciplinary approaches are. The first scholarly book devoted to Wikipedia, unfortunately but not surprisingly, follows the established pattern: it explores Wikipedia from one specialized disciplinary perspective but does little to improve our broader understanding of the project.
Lazy Virtues: Teaching Writing in the Age of Wikipedia, by composition professor Robert E. Cummings, has a great capsule summary. Wikipedia assignments provide writing teachers the rare opportunity to have their students write for a realistic audience, about things that matter to them. Students are traditionally given assignments to write for imaginary public audiences, but inevitably tailor their work for the actual audience of one: the teacher. With assignments based on improving Wikipedia articles, students have a real, large, diverse audience. And in the hacker idiom, "laziness" can be a virtue when students edit Wikipedia articles of their own choosing: it takes less work, yet produces better results, to write about topics one already knows about and cares about. Based on the classroom experiences of Cummings (and many other teachers who have led Wikipedia assignments) and on the literature of composition studies, there is good evidence that writing for realistic audiences leads to better writing, with more care given to style and mechanics and better "buy-in" on the part of students.
What might have been a useful book for de facto writing teachers across the humanities and social sciences, however, is derailed by Cummings' narrow disciplinary focus. Most of Lazy Virtues is spent discussing neither virtuous laziness nor Wikipedia writing assignments; instead, Cummings treats commons-based peer production (CBPP) more generally, from the perspective of rhetoric theory and composition studies.
Cummings explores new applications of writing and rhetoric theory through analogy, drawing on economic theory and particularly the work of Yochai Benkler. Benkler, in his famous paper "Coase's Penguin, or, Linux and the Nature of the Firm", describes three types of economic production: the "market model", where an individual interacts directly with the market, choosing what to produce based on price signals; the "firm model", where a firm decides what to produce and directs the work of the individuals it employs; and a new kind of production—exemplified by Linux and other open-source software projects and by collaborative knowledge projects like Wikipedia—that Benkler describes as "commons-based peer production", in which individuals evaluate for themselves what they might contribute to a common project, based on both the needs of the project and their own aptitudes and inclinations.
Cummings sees the traditional writing classroom as analogous to the firm model. Teachers take on the role of intended audience, in effect defining for students what the "market" (audience) wants—as managers do for employees in a firm. Writing directly for peer audiences in a collaborative environment like Wikipedia, Cummings argues, is more like the CBPP model. He proceeds to stretch the economic theory–rhetoric theory connection much further than it ought to go: the concepts of commodity and commodification, transaction cost, and modularization all find counterparts in rhetoric. Cummings even suggests that a theoretical understanding of rhetoric will be crucial as an information economy becomes dominant over the production of traditional physical goods, and that (per the arguments of rhetoric scholar Richard Lanham), we might even "anticipate a revival of arts and letters based on its value of capturing the audience's attention" (p. 40). The fact that amateurs have captured so much online audience attention in spite of professional competition suggests either: the entertainment and infotainment industries are, rhetorically speaking, doing something terribly wrong; or no amount of rhetorical insight can stuff social media back into the tubes.
The book might seem attractive to Wikipedians looking for a deeper understanding of collaborative writing. But the application of rhetoric theory to Wikipedia and similar collaborative projects often obscures more than it reveals. For example, in discussing Marx's concept of commodity fetishism as applied to online rhetoric, Cummings writes that "it is possible to consider wikis as tools of information commodification, acting as information decontextualizing machines—grinding thoughts into atomic particles [...] devoid of authorial and content context" (pp. 45-46). That seems an odd way of looking at wikis. Wikis' key features are complete edits histories—which provide levels of chronological and intratextual authorial context that are inconceivable in collaboratively written print works—and ubiquitous hyperlinks—which create unlimited potential for content context.
There are occasional hints of provocative insights that rhetoric theory might bring to bear on Wikipedia, but Cummings sticks too close to Benkler's work and the canonical examples of CBPP to explore the rhetorical differences between different online community-based projects. In discussing Linux and forking, Cummings notes in passing that "epistemic rhetoric teaches us that a stable consensus within large discourse communities is simply impossible" (p. 142). This bears discussion, given the central role that consensus plays in Wikipedia, and the difference between the working definition of consensus and the idealization articulated by the official Wikipedia:Consensus policy. While forking is relatively frequent in open-source software communities, forks have been a relatively minor issues and in the far larger community of Wikipedia; content forks are generally suppressed, and project forks (such as Conservapedia and Citizendium) have not drawn away significant portions of the community. In some respects, at least, Wikipedia seems to demonstrate just the kind of consensus that ought not be possible. Unfortunately, Cummings does not even provide a reference to follow up on the lesson of impossible consensus that epistemic rhetoric has supposedly taught us.
The most redeeming aspect of Lazy Virtues is the set of accounts of Cummings' own Wikipedia assignments, which he used in first-year college composition courses in 2005. The assignments themselves are designed specifically for composition courses, and thus will be of little use to those who teach writing in other contexts, and Wikipedia has changed so much since 2005 that even repeating the assignments for the same type of course might prove difficult. But even if they do little to improve our understanding of Wikipedia and its potential as a teaching tool, I found Cummings' case studies of specific students and their performance in and reactions to Wikipedia assignments to be intrinsically interesting.
Review by Henry W W Potts
We are in a period of rapid technological change and much of society is endlessly playing catch-up, coming to terms with the implications of and uses for new developments. Each new development brings both enthusiasts and sceptics, and debate over Wikipedia has followed a familiar pattern. That same pattern has been played out in higher education, with the added contrast between a younger student body of "digital natives" and older lecturers who are "digital immigrants" (Prensky 2006).
While most are still responding to students' (and colleagues') use of Wikipedia, some in higher education have moved to teaching with Wikipedia (e.g. Callis, Christ, Resasco et al. 2009). However, as has been found in other areas of e-learning, there is a risk that we will replicate traditional patterns of teaching and learning without embracing the revolutionary nature of 'Web 2.0' approaches. If we are to fully grasp the potential of Wikipedia's use in higher education, we need a shared corpus of experience using it and to be able to make sense of those experiences within a theoretical structure. Robert Cummings' Lazy Virtues is a good beginning to satisfy that need.
Cummings puts forth a theoretical structure to understand Wikipedia and related projects as commons-based peer production (CBPP), an economic model from Benkler (2002). This he develops to apply to the teaching and learning of composition, with reference to rhetorical transaction theory and particularly James Berlin's (1987) taxonomy of composition theory. Central to Cummings' argument are two key features that CBPP environments like Wikipedia support. First, as reflected in the book's title, is "laziness", meant in the sense that individuals do more when their creativity is piqued in a context that allows them to self-determine their input. Second is the notion of other editors in Wikipedia providing an authentic audience for students rather than the instructor having always to pretend to be some hypothetical audience for differing writing exercises.
This use of a theory from economics may seem unusual, but Cummings devotes most of Chapter 1 to defending and explaining this choice. Chapters 2 and 3 are then more immediately practical and will be useful to lecturers wondering how to use Wikipedia activities in teaching, before further theoretical chapters to conclude the book.
While Cummings presents a strong case for his CBPP analysis, he largely does not comment on possible alternate theoretical approaches. Here, I think there was a missed opportunity, particularly around existing pedagogical theory. Approaches used in e-learning research like activity theory (Nardi 1996) or Communities of Practice (Lave & Wenger 1991) would seem readily applicable to Wikipedia and its use in teaching. Indeed, Lave and Wenger's notions of legitimate peripheral participation seem highly concordant with Cummings' own approach and the stress he puts on the authenticity of the audience in writing activities. In all, Cummings' approach would seem to fit what de Vaujany (2005) would describe as a determinist or causalist perspective: that is, where a change in the technology or the context for writing is expected to have predictable effects on behaviour. In contrast, much recent research conceptualises IT from an integrative perspective, as with actor-network theory or Wanda Orlikowski's technology structuration (Orlikowski 1992; 2000), where technology adapts to context and context adapts to technology.
Cummings notes in his final paragraph that Wikipedia is changing. An integrative socio-technical theory of Wikipedia would also help conceptualise how Wikipedia and the Wikipedia community are changing, and how society's attitudes towards Wikipedia are changing. As my fellow reviewers note, already parts of Cummings' case study of using Wikipedia in teaching seem dated: he had his students write or edit pages about films, and he describes two students who created the Wikipedia page for the film "The Color Purple" in late 2005. Three and a half years on and one would be surprised were such a successful film not already covered in depth on Wikipedia. Are we running out of easy article for such class assignments? Many of Cummings' students were sceptical about the value of Wikipedia back in 2005; few seemed familiar with it. In contrast, in a local survey of medical undergraduates in 2007/8, I found 83% (38/46) reported using the site as a learning resource, with 9% (4/49) having edited it.
One might also ask how such class exercises affect Wikipedia. Such exercises should be congruent with the goals of Wikipedia, and Cummings sees student understanding of those goals as being central to their experience, yet the implication of so many class exercises on Wikipedia is not addressed.
Lazy Virtues focuses on teaching writing in the composition classroom. With no criticism of Cummings, there is much more to be explored on using Wikipedia in teaching elsewhere in higher education. How do activities need to vary between low- and high-consensus subjects, for example? In particular, I can see how Lazy Virtues has immediate potential application to language teaching, particularly in less traditionally taught languages where the relevant language's Wikipedia represents a unique opportunity to encounter an authentic audience.
The research literature on Wikipedia and on using Wikipedia in higher education is growing rapidly. Lazy Virtues is a good start at developing a theoretical approach with some valuable practical examples.
References
- Benkler Y (2002). "Coase's penguin, or Linux and the nature of the firm." Yale Law Journal, 112(3): 369-447.
- Berlin JA (1987). Rhetoric and Reality: Writing Instruction in American Colleges, 1900-1985. Southern Illinois University Press, Carbondale.
- Callis KL, Christ LR, Resasco J, Armitage DW, Ash JD, Caughlin TT, Clemmensen SF, Copeland SM, Fullman TJ, Lynch RL, Olson C, Pruner RA, Vieira-Neto EHM, West-Singh R, Bruna EM (2009). "Improving Wikipedia: educational opportunity and professional responsibility." Trends in Ecology & Evolution, 24(4): 177-179
- De Vaujany, F-X (2005). "IT conceptualization: Respective contributions of sociology and information system". Journal of Information Technology Impact, 5(1): 39-58
- Lave J, Wenger E (1991). Situated Learning: Legitimate Peripheral Participation. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0521423740
- Nardi BA (1996). Context and Consciousness: Activity Theory and Human-computer Interaction. MIT Press, Cambridge, MA. ISBN 0262140586
- Orlikowski WJ (1992). "The duality of technology: rethinking the concept of technology in organizations." Organization Science, 3(3): 398-427.
- Orlikowski W (2000). "Using technology as a practice lens for studying technology in organizations." Organization Science, 11: 404-428.
- Prensky M (2006). "Listen to the natives." Educational Leadership, 63(4), 8-13.
Review by Awadewit
Robert E. Cummings begins his book Lazy Virtues: Teaching Writing in the Age of Wikipedia with the following appeal:
Having picked up this book, there is a good chance you have heard of Wikipedia. And if you know anything about Wikipedia, chances are also strong that you fall into one of two groups: you are either curious about Wikipedia and want to learn more, or you are worried by it—or a particular aspect of it—and are looking for confirmation of those worries. (The group of people who picked up this book because they are excited about Wikipedia and think it is a good development is, alas, still small enough to gloss over for the moment.)
— p. 1
As most readers of the Signpost will fall into the last category, this may be a bit of a rude awakening. I think we sometimes forget that there are people in our world that are ignorant of Wikipedia. We know about the hostile factions – but we forget about those who live in blissful ignorance of RS, NPOV, ArbCom, RFA, and RFC. At its heart, Cummings' book is not about Wikipedia nor is it addressed directly to Wikipedians (note that its subtitle is "Teaching Writing in the Age of Wikipedia"). Rather, it is addressed to those interested in composition theory and new media as well as writing instructors. As such, it is divided into "theoretical" and "practical" sections. As it is the practical sections that deal most directly with Wikipedia and will be of the greatest interest to the readers of the Signpost, I will focus on those here.
One of Cummings’ major arguments for the benefits of using Wikipedia as the basis of writing assignments in first-year composition courses is that the students are writing for a real audience. Explaining that students often feel that writing "for the professor" or even an imagined audience is limiting or pointless, he argues that Wikipedia writing assignments allow students to write for and respond to a real-life reading community. He goes so far as to claim that Wikipedia "was stable enough to expose my students to the demands of producing writing for a professional knowledge community: a place where their writing would be read and evaluated for its accuracy, its relevance, and its efficiency" (p. 9). It is at places such as these that Cummings begins to overreach, however. In his efforts to legitimize Wikipedia as a teaching tool in the eyes of his skeptical audience, he misses an opportunity to discuss Wikipedia's challenging uniqueness. For example, Wikipedia is indeed a knowledge community, but it is by no means a professional one. In fact, it is the jostling of experts and amateurs that makes the site so dynamic. Furthermore, although Cummings mentions the authority that a teacher cedes in Wikipedia writing assignments, he addresses this primarily from the perspective of students resisting or accepting their newfound freedoms within the traditional confines of the classroom. He fails to address one of the most interesting aspects of the assignments: the intersection between two types of collaborative projects, both of which reject the "cathedral" structure and embrace the "bazaar" model. What does it say, philosophically, that we are rejecting the authoritarian (in the best sense) production of knowledge? How will that change the nature of knowledge itself?
One of the most interesting sections of the book for Wikipedians is Cummings' case study in which several students worked on improving film articles over the course of three weeks. Cummings describes his assignment in great depth, an assignment which consists of several small reflective pieces of writing on the part of the student in addition to wiki-work. The assignment is not geared towards teaching students to write in a collaborative environment, but is rather aimed at prompting them to think more broadly about the nature of "audience". Because the assignment was so short and not part of a collaborative curriculum, it could not teach students to write collaboratively (only one student substantially edited the work of another, for example), which, in my opinion, fails to take advantage of Wikipedia's real strength: the wiki software and the wiki model. Certainly, there is nothing wrong with using Wikipedia as a way to teach the concept of "audience" and students can learn a lot about how to investigate different reading communities through such an assignment, but I felt that an opportunity to teach about collaboration had been missed. Moreover, the goals of the assignment were clearly geared towards the student learning about the writing process, not toward creating encyclopedic content. As a writing instructor and a Wikipedian, I was, of course, disappointed that the assignments did not attempt to integrate the students into the community. However, then I asked myself: Why was I disappointed? Is integration into the community really an important goal for all users? If so, why? If not, why not? To what extent does a contributor have to embrace Wikipedia's mission to contribute valuable content?
Like the Murder, Madness, and Mayhem project organized by Jbmurray, Cummings' assignment did not focus on the students learning the skills of argumentation. Because Wikipedia is (rightly) wedded to the principle of "no original research", the bulk of any project undertaken by students on Wikipedia is going to be, at its heart, a summary. One can argue that summary is a valuable skill and learning to research is important. However, all teachers and professors have to make choices about what skills to emphasize in the few short weeks that they have students in their classroom and I feel that it is vital that we ask how much is gained and how much is lost when we emphasize summary and research over argumentation and even rhetoric, skills that demand students think independently.
One of the drawbacks of Cummings' book for teachers interested in using Wikipedia is the unfortunate fact that much of it is now dated (through no fault of Cummings', it takes several years to publish a traditional monograph). His studies are from 2005 and the Wikipedia of 2009 is, of course, substantially different. For example, the emphasis that the Wikipedia community now places on sourcing makes smaller writing assignments, such as the one Cummings designed, much more difficult to successfully undertake. Large-scale projects, such as "Murder, Madness, and Mayhem", however, have been completed successfully. Teachers coming to Wikipedia from Cummings' book will have the basics of Wikipedia right (such as its core policy of neutral point of view), but they may also believe that the site is easier to navigate and the policies simpler than they are. This problem highlights the need to publish research on practical teaching methods and digital technologies quickly.
Reader comments
Usability study, Wiki Loves Art, and more
Usability study examines newcomers' editing troubles
Preliminary results of usability testing conducted in late March, as part of the grant-funded Wikimedia Usability Initiative (see earlier coverage), are now available. Participants expressed enthusiasm about Wikipedia as a useful resource, though they experienced substantial difficulties when trying to edit Wikipedia. Participants were unsure of Wikipedia's rules and proper etiquette. They also experienced difficulties with the markup and formatting, especially when it came to adding references, links, and editing tables, and it was challenging for them to create new articles. Participants experienced information overload when it came to the documentation and found it difficult to navigate the help resources.
Wikimedia Netherlands bringing Wiki Loves Art to Dutch museums
Following the Wikipedia Loves Arts photography events organized in New York and elsewhere, this June Dutch museums will open their doors to photographers to create Creative Commons-licensed images of important artwork. Wikimedia Netherlands, working with Creative Commons, is gathering volunteers to visit a number of Dutch museums; so far, participating institutions include the Jewish Historical Museum, the Netherlands Media Art Institute, and the Tropenmuseum.
Wikimedia signs deal with Orange
The Wikimedia Foundation has signed a deal with Orange to distribute mobile and web content in the UK, Poland, Spain and France, according to a Wikimedia Foundation blog post. According to the Foundation Q&A about the deal, the partnership will involve adding Wikimedia elements to the Orange web portals and creating mobile and web widgets.
Briefly
- Dottydotdot has launched The Wikipedia Forum, an independent message board for discussing Wikipedia. It is intended as a friendlier alternative to The Wikipedia Review, a forum that is frequented by a number of dedicated Wikipedia critics (as well as some active Wikipedians) and has been the subject of past controversy within the Wikipedia community.
- There is an RFC going about whether the page What Wikipedia is Not should include plot summaries or not.
Reader comments
Wikipedia Art dispute, and brief headlines
Wikipedia Art dispute pits artists against Wikimedia Foundation
Ars Technica reports (permalink) that the two artists responsible for the "Wikipedia Art" project have been threatened by the Foundation's legal counsel over the website wikipediaart.org. On February 15, artists Scott Kildall and Nathaniel Stern created the Wikipedia Art article, intended to "point to the 'invisible authors and authorities' of Wikipedia, and by extension the Internet, as well as the site's extant criticisms: bias, consensus over credentials, reliability and accuracy, vandalism, etc." the article was soon sent to Articles for Deletion. It was deleted 15 hours after its creation as something inappropriate for Wikipedia, although some participants considered the deletion discussion itself to be the work of art. The artists later created the wikipediaart.org website and presented the project in terms that, according to the Wikimedia Foundation, could be interpreted as suggesting a close connection between the project and Wikipedia. Based on concerns brought to the Foundation's attention by Wikipedians, legal counsel for Wikimedia Foundation Douglas Isenberg emailed the artists, who addressed the Foundation's concerns by adding a disclaimer to the website noting its non-association with Wikipedia.
In a commentary titled "Wikipedia Threatens Artists for Fair Use", an attorney at the Electronic Frontier Foundation decried what she characterized as a threat to the artists' free speech. The first email sent to the artists stated that use of the "Wikipedia" name was infringing on trademark rights and requested that the domain name wikipediaart.org be turned over to the Foundation, although Mike Godwin, lead counsel for the Wikimedia Foundation, described it as "about the gentlest "demand letter" one can possibly write" and considers the mattered settled with the disclaimer. He noted that "if someone decided to use the EFF website as a staging ground for a performance art piece, I'd entirely support their efforts to prevent anyone's confusing the artists' work with their own."
Briefly
- A new study published in the Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association concludes that "[b]ased on its search engine ranking and page view statistics, the English Wikipedia is a prominent source of online health information compared to the other online health information providers studied." Another recent study found that "[n]early 50% of US physicians going online for professional purposes are visiting Wikipedia for health and medical information".
- Informationweek.com notes (permalink) that "things that are offered for 'free' are quite fragile in terms of sustainability", while talking about Wikipedia.
- David Cameron, leader of the Conservative Party in the British Parliament, recently compared (permalink) Wikipedia to the UK government. He said, "Our government spends nearly £400 million a year on advertising to reach sixty million people while Wikipedia, one of the largest websites in the world, spends about one per cent of that to reach 280 million people".
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Interview on WikiProject Final Fantasy
In this week's edition of the WikiProject Report, we focus on a project that hits close to home for many of Wikipedia's nerdy editors (we know who we are): Wikiproject Final Fantasy. The project has been around since July 2005 and currently has 11 Featured Articles. Deckiller, who has contributed to most of those FAs, has volunteered to tell us more about the project.
1. What do you find challenging or frustrating about working on video game articles?
A few years ago, it was quite challenging to convince Wikipedians that video game articles could be of high quality. It took dozens of Featured Article promotions for that stigma to dissipate.
As we all know, quality standards have risen sharply since the days of "brilliant prose"; consequently, the challenge has become twofold. First, it can be difficult to find reliable sources for the non-technical aspects of video games; for instance, video game mechanics and storylines are unlikely to be featured in scholarly works. Plus, many video games are created in countries that don't speak English, such as Japan or South Korea. Most out-of-universe content must come from professional gaming websites, which offer only a handful of English interviews, reviews, and essays. Because sources are so scarce, many articles fall into two extremes: comprehensive with a few questionable sources, or poorly developed with only the most reliable references. It's hard to forge an article that is both comprehensive and reliably sourced in its entirety.
Second, our coverage of the "in-universe" aspects of games (mechanics, storyline, characters, and so on) must be brief yet informative. This is true for all articles, but the line is especially blurry with video games. Most users fall into three categories: those who advocate a brief treatment of "in-universe" aspects, those who encourage the inclusion of every detail, and those who try to strike a balance. I have spent many hours of my life trimming and expanding article sections to satisfy as many extremes as possible; it can get quite stressful. I'd say the best example of attaining such a balance is the Final Fantasy VIII featured topic.
Of course, we're always enlisting copy-editors to polish as much prose as possible. I'm a copy-editor myself, but it takes an entire team of word nerds to polish an article—especially when it features dense information such as gameplay mechanics.
2. With its large fanbase, Final Fantasy articles must fall victim to unregistered or novice editors adding original research and personal anecdotes, especially to the "in-universe" sections that you mentioned. How have you and the project members learned to deal with this?
Most issues of bias/original research are nipped in the bud by referencing strategy guides and game scripts. Although many video game articles avoid such sourcing, it helps to establish that exceptional claims require exceptional sources—even for in-universe sections. If it's not said plainly in the script or the strategy guide, then it could very well be original research. Editors who add obvious bias and original research are usually reverted and referred to the talkpage. I like to deliver a firm but reasonable response, emphasizing our policies as well as specific points to refute their claims. By bringing other project members into the discussion, the novice will hopefully realize that policies and consensus are enforced throughout the project's jurisdiction.
3. As for articles of somewhat smaller scope, such as those pertaining to specific characters, do you find that progress is ever disrupted by deletion debates and questions of notability?
We have very few debates about notability and deletion for two reasons. First, our project adamantly enforces the inclusion criteria. Second, we set an example by redirecting every "minor" keyword or character to the most relevant article; this shows newcomers that we are discouraging a stand-alone article on such a topic, and that it's either already covered elsewhere or too trivial. As a matter of fact, most of our merge discussions involve articles that already pass notability.
Virtually everyone in the project believes that articles must include significant real-world content and multiple reliable sources. We want to ensure that every article can reach good or featured status, a belief made clear to newcomers and on our project pages. This adherence to policies and guidelines is a major factor in our success; without endless debates and scattered information, we have been able to create tightly focused and comprehensive parent articles with decent potential. In short, high standards yield high results.
For instance, why have a dozen articles on every weapon, item, and monster in the Final Fantasy series when everything can be summed up succinctly and professionally in a single Gameplay of Final Fantasy article? We can prove that Final Fantasy gameplay as a whole is notable, but the same cannot be said of the virtual weapons and armor (for the most part), topics better covered in strategy guides and fansites. This is the sort of logic we try to present to our newest members, though almost all of them agree with our philosophies to begin with.
4. Most of the high-quality video game-related articles seem to be either characters from games or the games themselves. Has there been any discussion of collaboration, either amongst members of the project or between multiple projects, on the makers of Final Fantasy, such as Square Enix and Category:Final Fantasy designers?
Actually, there hasn't been much discussion of such a collaboration. The project has only two designer articles of at least GA status: Masashi Hamauzu and Nobuo Uematsu. Many are focused on elevating our game articles and subarticles to good or featured status; after this goal is reached, I'm sure members will shift their focus to the designers.
5. During the course of this interview, WikiProject Final Fantasy merged into WikiProject Square Enix. Can you tell us a little about that?
I was on Wikibreak during most of the discussion, but I've seen it coming for a while. Both projects had nearly identical rosters and philosophies, so the merger provides a broader and more streamlined jurisdiction without any major sacrifices. Discussions and collaborations can now be centralized, and the broader range of topics may entice others to join.
6. In addition to Final Fantasy articles, you've also worked on various other video games. What lessons or skills have you learned from editing Final Fantasy articles that apply to other video games? Or to editing in general?
First, I've become a decent copy-editor, thanks to the numerous FACs and peer reviews we've gone through (and more than a little help from Tony1's amazing guide to professional prose). Second, our project was one of the first to balance real-world and in-universe content within an article. We also helped to popularize succinct plot summaries, a concept now presented in the Writing about Fiction guideline. Thanks to this practice, I've become effective at writing concise synopses as well as balanced articles. Third, I've learned that debates on Wikipedia can be very intense; like every topic, video games (and fiction in general) has several points of controversy, such as the inclusion criteria for subarticles. One must keep a cool head and help form a compromise; the truth is usually in the middle.
7. Finally, what advice can you give to inexperienced users who are looking to start contributing to Final Fantasy, Square Enix, or other video games articles?
Users should understand our policies and guidelines, as well as the specific guidelines for the WikiProject. A basic understanding of these procedures prevents redundant discussion and reversions, which are common with newcomers.
I also suggest that users work on articles that have not yet reached good or featured status. Maintaining healthy articles is always necessary, but it should be a low priority when there are other articles on life support. Instead of ten users spending a week debating the length of a plot summary, I'd like to see users spend that very same time sourcing a poor article or merging redundant content.
Lastly, all editors — not just newcomers — should understand that editing Wikipedia is a team activity. An article will never reach its potential if only one person works on it; we need researchers, copy-editors, image specialists, and — most importantly — feedback from a variety of users. Everyone's opinion is important, but nobody's opinion is absolute; that is why everyone needs to come together and form a consensus, which usually requires a compromise. Users who believe in this philosophy will help forge great articles and gainful discussions.
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Approved this week
Administrators
Three editors were granted admin status via the Requests for Adminship process this week: TheDJ (nom), Vianello (nom) and Law (nom).
Bots
Eleven bots or bot tasks were approved to begin operating this week: Citation bot (task request), DeadLinkBOT (task request), Sambot (task request), Whip, dip, and slide (task request), DustyBot (task request), BenzolBot (task request), MerlLinkBot (task request), ListasBot (task request), MSBOT (task request), ListasBot (task request) and SoxBot (task request).
Featured pages
Six articles were promoted to featured status this week: Han Dynasty (nom), Eli Lilly (nom), Federal Bridge Gross Weight Formula (nom), Changeling (film) (nom), Hue chemical attacks (nom) and Take Ichi convoy (nom).
Eleven lists were promoted to featured status this week: Iced Earth discography (nom), List of judicial appointments made by George Washington (nom), List of CMLL World Heavyweight Champions (nom), Veronica Mars (season 3) (nom), List of Olympic medalists in basketball (nom), List of Grade I listed buildings in North Somerset (nom), List of Silver Slugger Award winners at catcher (nom), List of Silver Slugger Award winners at outfield (nom), List of songs in Guitar Hero: Metallica (nom), Jamelia discography (nom) and List of ROH World Champions (nom).
One topic was promoted to featured status this week: Members of the Gregorian mission (nom).
No portals were promoted to featured status this week.
The following featured articles were displayed on the Main Page this week as Today's featured article: William IV, SkyTrain, Learned Hand, Hurricane Ismael, Operation Passage to Freedom, A Vindication of the Rights of Women and Kit.
Former featured pages
Seven articles were delisted this week: Phishing (nom), Compact Cassette (nom), Noah's Ark (nom), Syed Ahmed Khan (nom), Mini Moke (nom), Pakistan (nom) and Battle of Warsaw (1920) (nom).
One list was delisted this week: List of NFL champions (nom).
No topics were delisted this week.
Featured media
The following featured pictures were displayed on the Main Page this week as picture of the day: Pot-bellied pigs, Cobbe portrait, Chachani, Australian synchotron, Sand wasp and Women making tortillas.
No media files were featured this week.
No featured pictures were demoted this week.
Fifteen pictures were promoted to featured status this week and are shown below.
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B'nai B'rith membership certificate -
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Bugs, Repairs, and Internal Operational News
This is a summary of recent technology and site configuration changes that affect the English Wikipedia. Please note that some bug fixes or new features described below have not yet gone live as of press time; the English Wikipedia is currently running version 1.44.0-wmf.1 (fbc8c4f), and changes to the software with a version number higher than that will not yet be active. Configuration changes and changes to interface messages, however, become active immediately.
Bug fixes
- The ability has been added for oversighters to unhide a username (reversing the hide-user feature) when unblocking an account; Previously, it was only possible to reverse the hide-user action by reblocking the user with the hide-user setting unchecked. Also, when unblocking and unhiding a user, the hidden edit summaries can now be restored. (r49685, bug 18543; bug 18542)
- When purging an image page, the metadata now will also be purged. (r49848, bug 18571)
- MediaWiki Exif handling now properly handles tags that are arrays, such as GPS coordinates. (r49677, bug 13172)
- Subversion revision numbers for MediaWiki extensions are now shown on the Special:Version page. Revision numbers previously displayed were oftentimes inaccurate, but changes made will have the revision numbers automatically update now and show accurately on the Special:Version page. (r49890, bug 18242)
New features
- Developer Andrew Garrett (User:Werdna) has restructured the MediaWiki code used to manage user preferences, which are now managed using a class and is separated logically from the user interface code. Along with the changes, the GetPreferences hook is now available (and must be used by) MediaWiki extensions to access and add user preferences. The code has been rewritten to be more efficient; Wikipedia users should not see any difference. [1]
Other news
- The TorBlock configuration has been changed to require explicit block exemption, rather than allowing all logged-in users to edit via a Tor proxy. The change is due to the amount of harassment and vandalism problems coming in via Tor proxies, which substantially overweighs the amount of positive contributions via Tor. [2]
- The Google Summer of Code projects for Wikimedia have been announced: Niklas Laxström (User:Nikerabbit) will be working to improve localization and internationalization, Zhe Wu will work on an image thumbnailing daemon, Gerardo Antonio Cabero will be improving the Cortado Java applet for playing videos, and Jeroen de Dauw will be improving the Semantic Layers extension and integrate it with the Semantic Google Maps extension. [3]
- The pywikipedia mailing lists have been restructured and split into multiple lists, with bug reports now sent to the pywikipedia-bugs list, svn updates to pywikipedia-svn, announcements to pywikipedia-announce, and general pywikipedia discussion on pywikipedia-l. [4]
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The Report on Lengthy Litigation
The Committee officially adopted their proposed policy for temporary removal of permissions. They also appointed Mackensen, Thatcher and Tznkai as interim members of the Audit Subcommittee until elections are held.
The Arbitration Committee opened two cases this week, and closed none, leaving nine cases open.
New cases
- Abd and JzG: A case brought regarding a dispute between Abd and JzG about the latter's use of administrative tools on Cold fusion.
- Macedonia 2: A case about naming disputes at the Macedonia article, and ChrisO's use of administrator tools in the dispute.
Evidence phase
- Aitias: A case regarding Aitias's use of his administrator tools.
- Tang Dynasty: A case about editing conflicts on Inner Asia during the Tang Dynasty.
- Ryulong: A case regarding Ryulong's use of his administrator tools.
- Obama articles: A case opened to review behavior of editors of articles related to Barack Obama.
- West Bank - Judea and Samaria: A dispute about editor behavior in discussions about naming conventions for certain Israel- and Palestine-related locations.
- Date delinking: A case regarding the behavior of editors in the ongoing dispute relating to policy on linking dates in articles. An injunction has been issued prohibiting large-scale linking or delinking of dates until the case is resolved.
Voting
- Scientology: A case regarding behavioral problems in Scientology-related articles; the case is related to the prior case Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/COFS.
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