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5 August 2015

 

2015-08-05

Wikipedia better equipped to deal with systemic bias than traditional publishers

Atmosphere and Environment XII (1970) by Louise Nevelson

The German publisher Taschen is one of the world's leading producers of art books. Among their most popular books are the Taschen Basic Art series, small (about 10 in. × 12 in.) affordable ($10 US) volumes, invaluable introductory volumes which are ubiquitous in libraries, museums, and bookstores.

In 2010, the artists Ditte Ejlerskov and EvaMarie Lindahl contacted Taschen to point out that out of 97 volumes published in the Basic Art series, only five included women: Tamara de Lempicka, Maria Helena Vieira da Silva, Frida Kahlo, Georgia O'Keeffe, and Jeanne-Claude (who shares a volume and a Wikipedia article with her collaborator and husband Christo). Taschen asked the pair about which artists they had omitted and should include in the series. That particular artists would be omitted through oversight or happenstance is reasonable, but that one of the world's leading publishers of art books is completely unaware of their major omissions is startling, as any art aficionado could easily produce a list of a half-dozen omissions instantly.

Ejlerskov and Lindahl produced a list of 100. This list was the basis for their exhibition last year at the Malmö Konsthall in Sweden called About: The Blank Pages. They assembled the 97 Basic Art books on two bookshelves, accompanied by covers they had created for each of the women on their list, covering books of blank pages.

The Basic Art series is not the canon. Canonicity or artistic excellence is certainly one criterion for inclusion, but artists are also clearly included on the basis of popularity, artistic influence, or representation of a particular historical moment, so one cannot argue that particular women were excluded from the list because their work is not as good as male artists included in the series. Even the most fervent adherents of Basic Art subjects Norman Rockwell or Keith Haring won't attempt to claim that they belong in the same rank as Michelangelo. One can quibble about many of the names on Ejlerskov and Lindahl's list (or ones omitted from the list, such as Remedios Varo, Tracey Emin, Kara Walker, or Sarah Goodridge), but one cannot seriously argue that artists like Mary Cassatt, Artemisia Gentileschi, Judy Chicago, and Cindy Sherman do not far outstrip some in the Basic Art series like Friedensreich Hundertwasser or Franz Stuck or the preposterous Fernando Botero in terms of artistic merit, influence, historical importance, and popularity.

The Swan (No. 16) (1915) by Hilma af Klint

Like the Basic Art series, Wikipedia serves an introductory audience, and in this particular area, Wikipedia succeeds where Taschen has failed. Of the 100 names on the list, which I've linked in my userspace, only two artists were omitted from the English Wikipedia when I wrote this editorial: The Canadian artist Helen Frances Gregor appears to be absent from Wikipedia entirely, and Russian painter Nadia Khodasevich Leger is mentioned a few times in passing as the wife of Fernand Léger, but not as an artist in her own right. We have many issues with systemic and gender bias on Wikipedia, but we also have the ability to address those biases in a way that a traditional publisher like Taschen cannot. We can question and argue about those omissions while Taschen cannot even recognize its own errors. We can form projects like Art + Feminism and WikiProject Women artists to systematically address these issues and improve our own coverage, while Taschen requires a public shaming before it can even begin to do so. It is another testament to the ability of Wikipedia to respond to omissions like these that even before this editorial was published, an enterprising editor created articles on the missing artists, articles I expect will be featured on Did You Know within a week.

Below is a gallery of self-portraits by twelve of the artists on Ejlerskov and Lindahl's list who are included in the English Wikipedia:



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2015-08-05

Je ne suis pas Google




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2015-08-05

VisualEditor, endowment, science, and news in brief



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2015-08-05

Meet the boilerplate makers

Can't work without 'em, if you're working on a wiki, but it seems that many Wikipedians can't work with 'em, either. Templates, of course – the backbone of every page providing layout, banners, infoboxes, and fancy links that change around when you refresh the page. Luckily, we have a team of editors super-versed in how to manipulate the markup to produce the final result that we want, providing a smooth and (hopefully) stylish appearance to the reader. WikiProject Templates, with a current membership of around 60, helps to do the following:

  1. Conducting efforts to better organise, document and display all templates in the template namespace, including: navigation templates, infobox templates, inline templates linking country articles, stub types, image copyright tags and user language templates (Babel).
  2. Solving specific templates issues, such as standardisation and locations.
  3. Improving the general documentation on how to create and use templates, in addition to improving the documentation pages of the individual templates.
  4. Clean-up of the unused, unneeded and/or redundant templates, using the templates for discussion (TfD) process and guidelines.
  5. Providing help and guidance in creating, updating, correcting and testing templates.
  6. Improving template accessibility

That's rather a big remit when all looked at together, so to give us more of an idea, we interviewed APerson, Paine Ellsworth and Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing).

What motivated you to join the project? Do you have a particular interest or proficiency in maintaining templates?

  • Paine Ellsworth: Back when I joined, I was fascinated by the fact that even a small edit to a template has the power to affect every page to which it's transcluded, and I wanted to help manage the template namespace. I guess I've gained a little proficiency over the years, mostly just learning from other template editors.
  • APerson: I always was very interested in templates, and especially liked some of the amazing things that could be accomplished via templates. For instance, according to some people, templates are (or were) Turing complete.
  • Pigsonthewing: I first became interested in template development in 2007, when I realised they could be made to emit microformats (machine-readable metadata), making their content understandable to computers, as well as people. The work I did on that is one of the things that led to Wikidata. Learning to code templates for that purpose gave me a wider interest in their use, and especially their accessibility, since web accessibility is another interest of mine. I'm also active in having redundant templates deleted or merged; we have far too many with only minor variations, and that's both confusing for editors (and readers, when the templates' presentation varies arbitrarily in similar articles) and a cause of unnecessary extra work for those of us who maintain them.

Does WikiProject Templates collaborate with any other projects?

  • Paine Ellsworth: There is a list of collaborations on the project page in the section "Related WikiProjects", and there are probably several more that are "unofficial" or "informal", such as WikiProject Redirects and WikiProject Disambiguation.
  • Pigsonthewing: Informally: all of them. There isn't a single project that doesn't make use of templates, and thus benefit from our work. And of course we're always happy to hear from projects. (or editors) who have a template issue and need our help.
A template allows you to reproduce infinite content.

How would you rate this project's success and participation?

  • Paine Ellsworth: Since templates are by their nature a delicate issue due to their potential to harm the overall Wikipedia project if misused, in my opinion my fellow project members, past and present, have done an admirable job of managing template namespace.
  • Pigsonthewing: In the famous phrase, "it is too early to judge". There is still a lot to do, to make, improve, and deploy templates, and to improve their accessibility. But we've come a long, long way in that regard, too.

What are WikiProject Templates's most pressing needs? How can a new contributor help today?

  • Paine Ellsworth: There is a list of open tasks on the project page, and I would encourage new editors to read the project page, its talk page and other template-related project and help pages to learn as much as possible about template management. And then dig right in!
  • Pigsonthewing: We need people – not just template editors, but also those who deploy them – to understand how accessibility issues affect templates; currently the hot issue is that many of them don't understand colour contrast requirements. We see people wanting to put, say, dark red text on dark green backgrounds, and a lot of people just can't read that. Some people can't read combinations that you or I might not find troublesome. All we need to do is to abide by the International Standard on web accessibility, but some resist that, often for weak reasons, or even no apparent reason at all.

Anything else you'd like to add?

  • Paine Ellsworth: Just that working with other template editors on the project has been more than a rewarding experience, and I wish them and all the workers at The Signpost only the very best!
  • Pigsonthewing: Populating templates with data from Wikidata is going to be a big game changer, and we're only just scratching the surface, there. And there's work to do to standardise templates (and the underlying Lua modules) across this Wikipedia, and to share them with other-language Wikipedias and sister projects, too. We need to combine the "TemplateData" required by the Visual Editor (VE) with ordinary template documentation, so we don't have to store (and update) everything twice. Finally, we need VE to work better with templates.


The WikiProject report will be taking a break for a couple of weeks while the regular author has a vacation. If you're interested in having a wikiproject that you work with featured in a future report, make sure to drop a note at the Signpost's WikiProject desk, and as always you may take a look in the archive to read previous reports.



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2015-08-05

Probe into Nehru edits launched; dangers of the right to be forgotten

Jawaharlal Nehru in 1957
  • Nehru probe launched: NDTV reports that the Indian government has launched an investigation into the source of June 26 Wikipedia edits regarding Jawaharlal Nehru that caused outrage in that country (see previous Signpost coverage). (Aug. 5)
  • Clashing rights: In the New York Times, Farhad Manjoo writes about the spread of the right to be forgotten and its potential dangers in the wake of European court rulings demanding Google take down links. Manjoo quoted Jimmy Wales as saying “If we’re asking Google to comply in every version of Google worldwide, it becomes very hard to say where we want Google to draw the line. It’s a race to the bottom. Governments all around the world will immediately say, ‘Great, we’ll ask for things to be deleted worldwide.'" (Aug. 5)
  • Editorial comrades: The Daily Beast interviews Christopher Robinson and Gavin Kovite, authors of the new novel War of the Encyclopaedists, about protagonists who keep in touch by editing a Wikipedia article. (Aug. 2)
  • Grudge match: A few media outlets reported that the feud between rappers Drake and Meek Mill spilled over onto Wikipedia, with Drake partisans vandalizing articles. (July 31)
  • Pre-production: Bollywood Dhamaka reports that the Wikipedia article of actress Mandana Karimi, who debuts in the upcoming film Kyaa Kool Hain Hum 3, has been deleted. A source told Bollywood Dhamaka that “Mandana is trying to procure the details of how the page got deleted. She is talking to some of her friends, who are proficient in information technology to help her sort out the mess. The actor's team will set up a new page." Karimi's article was deleted on July 14 following an AfD discussion on the grounds of notability and that she had not starred in any films that had been released. (July 31)
  • Wales slams Reddit: Wales spoke out to the Huffington Post about the embattled social media website Reddit. Wales suggested that Reddit should act more forcefully against hate speech, which is rampant on Reddit, though many on the site have suggested that clamping down on such content would be censorship. Wales said "Censorship involves a government using force or someone using a threat of intimidation or violence to suppress speech. That's a very different thing to saying that this is a private platform, where we are not welcoming hate speech." (July 31)



Do you want to contribute to "In the media" by writing a story or even just an "in brief" item? Edit next week's edition in the Newsroom or contact the editor.



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2015-08-05

Mrityorma amritam gamaya...

If you were wondering, the title above is part of a mantra in the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad; it translates to, "From death lead us to immortality." Perhaps a touch melodramatic, I'll admit, but it seemed appropriate to me this week, given the milestones this list crossed. Death is no stranger to this list, but it has never cast such a pall as this week, when for the first time half the slots in the top 10 were devoted to it, including the top 3. The other milestone is, of course, India, who for the first time claimed five slots in the top 10.

For the full top-25 list, see WP:TOP25. See this section for an explanation of any exclusions. For a list of the most edited articles of the week, see here.

As prepared by Serendipodous, for the week of July 26 to August 1, 2015, the 10 most popular articles on Wikipedia, as determined from the report of the most viewed pages, were:

Rank Article Class Views Image Notes
1 A. P. J. Abdul Kalam Good Article 3,589,713
The surge of views this former scientist and reluctant politician received upon his death this week at the age of 83 is merely a reflection of the regard in which he was held by his fellow Indians. A Muslim in a predominantly Hindu country, he rose to the very top of the political ladder, first as a developer of India's missile and nuclear programs, and then as President. Despite adhering to Islam, he considered himself an Indian and drew much inspiration from his country's Hindu heritage. As a result, his one term as President was one of the most popular in his country's history. A lifelong advocate of technology, he believed that India could become a developed country through embracing and expanding its knowledge base.
2 Yakub Memon Start-class 1,098,805 The Muslim terrorist, believed to have played a role in the 1993 Bombay bombings that killed 257 people, was hanged this week amid speculation that he was paying for the crime of his still-at-large brother Tiger Memon. Many commentators contrasted his death with the outpouring of grief which greeted that of his fellow Muslim and national hero A. P. J. Abdul Kalam, and pondered what it augured for the future of India's society.
3 Roddy Piper C-class 1,086,945
Wikipedia viewers love their wrestlers, and so the death of "Rowdy" Roddy Piper, world-renowned WWF and WCW heel, at the relatively young age of 61, was bound to stir emotions. In the ring, "Hot Rod" played up his Scottish roots, affecting the rage of a Glaswegian football hooligan and entering to the sound of bagpipes, for which he was named (his real last name, incidentally, was Toombs, which you would think would be a perfectly acceptable wrestling name). While never a wrestling fan, I will always remember him as the working class hero of John Carpenter's political alien invasion allegory They Live, in which he originated the now-legendary line, "I have come here to chew bubblegum and kick ass- and I'm all out of bubblegum!" OK, so it makes no sense, but it's still cool.
4 Bajrangi Bhaijaan Start-class 948,650
Bollywood's Muslim-targeted counterprogramming to the raging box office tsunami of Baahubali: The Beginning, starring Hindu/Muslim superstar Salman Khan (pictured) and opening on Eid weekend, made Rs 2 billion ($31.2 million) in its first nine days, and earned support from legends like Shekhar Kapur. In its first 15 days, the film has grossed more than Rs 4 billion ($62.5 million) worldwide. But Khan's tweets in apparent support of Yakub Memon have led to posters for the film being defaced in some areas.
5 Bobbi Kristina Brown Start-Class 930,371
The eerie death of the daughter of the late Whitney Houston (found, like her mother, in a bathtub) has cast a pall of tragedy on a family already no stranger to it. Aged just 22, she had already become a focus of tabloid gossip and speculation.
6 List of highest-grossing Indian films List 725,049
With the barnstorming performances of Baahubali: The Beginning and Bajrangi Bhaijaan making national news in India, people are interested to know how they stack up against the recent crop of record breakers.

NOTE: includes views for its redirect page List of highest-grossing Bollywood films

7 Baahubali: The Beginning C-class 747,036
At $41 million, this sprawling, two-part historical epic is the most expensive film in Indian history (no, it isn't actually Bollywood, since it was made in South India, much to Bollywood's chagrin). Starring the Telugu actor Prabhas (pictured), the first part, subtitled "The Beginning", broke box office records upon its release on July 10, earning Rs 2.15 billion ($34 million) worldwide in just 5 days and in just three weeks has already crossed the Rs 4.85 billion ($76 million) mark, showing remarkable stamina for an Indian blockbuster, most of which drop off by 80 percent at that point.
8 Ant-Man (film) C-class 515,092
Other than Guardians of the Galaxy, this was always going to be Marvel Studios's biggest gamble, and signs did not augur well after writer-director Edgar Wright abandoned the project when denied total creative control. And yet, while it is hardly the box-office miracle that Guardians was, it has proved a moderate domestic hit, at $132 million to date, though it is on course to become the lowest-grossing film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
9 Deaths in 2015 List 482,484
The viewing figures for this article have been remarkably constant; fluctuating week to week between 450 and 550 thousand, apparently heedless of who actually died.
10 Ronda Rousey B-class 482,298
The undefeated UFC women's bantamweight champion beat Bethe Correia in 34 seconds during UFC 190 on August 1 in Correia's home town of Rio de Janeiro. Apparently Correia had been trash talking Rousey prior to the fight, which strikes me as a rather odd thing to do to someone who a) has never lost a fight and b) won her last fight in 14 seconds.



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2015-08-05

Maya, Michigan, Medici, Médée, and Moul n'ga


This Signpost "Featured content" report covers material promoted from 19 July to 25 July.

Map of the Maya civilization.

Three Featured articles were promoted this week.

  • Fabula Nova Crystallis Final Fantasy (nominated by ProtoDrake) The New Tale of the Crystal (Fabula Nova Crystallis) is a series of games based on a mythology developed by Japanese video game writer Kazushige Nojima. The five games so far released within the Final Fantasy franchise have the theme of gods from an "unseen realm" destructively interfering in the human world; each god has an associated crystal, and in one story they are themselves "crystal-powered mechanical beings".
  • Hugh Beadle (nominated by Cliftonian) Sir Hugh Beadle was a lawyer, judge and politician, born in 1905 in Salisbury, Southern Rhodesia (today Harare, Zimbabwe). Beadle practised law in Bulawayo during the 1930s, and in 1939 became a Member of Parliament for the governing United Party, led by the Prime Minister Godfrey Huggins. Beadle served as Huggins' Parliamentary Private Secretary for six years before becoming a Cabinet minister in 1946. He retired in 1950 to become a judge of the Southern Rhodesian High Court.
  • Maya civilization (nominated by Simon Burchell) The Mesoamerican Maya civilization was developed by the Maya people over several thousand years. The earliest period, known as the Pre-Classic, lasted from about 2000 BC to 250 AD. The civilization was at its peak from circa 250 AD to 900 AD after which it gradually declined until the Maya's unfortunate encounter with conquistador Hernán Cortés and his compatriots in the early 16th century. The Maya had a sophisticated and highly developed writing system, and they produced stunning artwork, sculptures and pottery. They are also known for human sacrifice, astronauts, and a sophisticated calendar which predicted the apocalypse three years ago. Their chief export was maize (corn), which the Maya called naal and xiim, for the cob and grain respectively.
Sherlock Holmes: I think I know who did it. - The Man with the Twisted Lip

Seven Featured lists were promoted this week.


Albert Bridge at night, with the tollhouses, London
Jade Raymond
St Etheldreda's Church Interior, London, UK - Diliff
Curcuma longa roots


Twenty-two Featured pictures were promoted this week.

Wave clouds above the lonely desert



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2015-08-05

Get help editing Wikipedia with the new “Co-op” mentorship program

The following content has been republished from the Wikimedia Blog. The views expressed in this piece are those of the author alone; responses and critical commentary are invited in the comments section. For more information on this partnership see our content guidelines.


What if there were a gathering place on Wikipedia for newer editors to find a mentor? What if we could match these editors to mentors based on their needs and goals? And what if we could do more to help editors beyond pointing them to documentation? This was the motivation behind developing a recently piloted mentorship space called the Co-op on the English Wikipedia.

Funded by an Individual Engagement Grant, our team assessed the current state of help spaces on the English Wikipedia and created the Co-op, a mentorship space informed by our research. For instance, we noted that newer editors are often familiar with some guidelines and policies, but are unsure of how they are implemented in practice. Consequently, we ensured that editors using the Co-op could be matched with mentors to focus on conventions and best practices in editing that are not always easily found in documentation.

Another common theme was that newer editors seeking help were initially overwhelmed by the sheer number of help pages and felt lost. In building the Co-op, we created a system to design mentorships based on concrete topics or problems, rather than leaving them too broad or unfocused.

Using the Co-op is simple: editors are matched with mentors based on how they wish to contribute, which they specify within a profile. These matching criteria include writing, image help, and technical work (such as syntax), among other topic areas. Editors can provide more specific details about why they are seeking mentorship within their profile as well. A bot then searches and matches the editor to a mentor who has volunteered to teach in that area. The two editors are pinged using the notifications system and informed about the match, where mentorship can then begin. Editors can change their profiles at anytime based on their needs and goals. Mentors can award Co-op barnstars to editors who have achieved their goals during mentorship:

Screenshot of the landing page for the Co-op mentorship space on English Wikipedia.

Our final report details the outcomes of our background research in evaluating help spaces on the English Wikipedia in addition to the development and results of the Co-op pilot itself. The pilot was a one-month long experiment that brought in 49 participants to use the Co-op, and was supported by our team in addition to 25 mentors. Here are some key findings on the impact of mentorship through the Co-op:

  • Mentored editors were more productive than compared to editors who were not mentored. During the pilot, mentored editors made 7 times as many edits (35 vs. 4.5 in median edits). They also edited more articles during the pilot (10 vs. 3 on average).
  • 68% of mentored editors remained active in April 2015, the month after the end of pilot, whereas only 22% of non-mentored editors remained active.
  • Editors using the Co-op waited far less time for mentorship to begin (12 hours) compared to the only other mentorship space on en.wiki, Adopt-a-user (4 days).
  • Despite being geared toward newer editors, the Co-op was utilized by more experienced editors who reported having positive and constructive experiences through mentorship.

Based on our findings, the Co-op appears to facilitate positive and productive experiences for editors. As such, we have reopened the Co-op for general use. Our team feels that the broader editing community can begin to take charge of the Co-op to promote its maintenance and growth. There are certainly areas where our mentorship space can be improved, some of which can be found on our phabricator task board. In order for the Co-op to succeed, we also need mentors who are willing to engage with and help teach newer editors. Mentors need not be good at everything on Wikipedia, and can choose to teach only in the areas they are comfortable. If you are interested in becoming a mentor, we invite you to sign up today.

We feel that the Co-op's model of mentorship shows promise for providing a positive experience for newer editors. Whether you are looking for a mentor, or want to be a mentor, we invite you to check out and participate in the Co-op!

[[m:User:I_JethroBT|I JethroBT
Co-op Project Manager



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