Hi Asaf and Raul,
The shorter version:
My background tells me that ethnographers bring a new perspective and depth
to many quantitative research endeavours. I am fully on board that for some
projects you cannot rely on quantitative analysis alone.
The longer version:
As a researcher in the Foundation, I can share with you some of my thoughts
on the subject of what is called "thick data" in the article.
* In the context of the article, thick data refers to ethnographic studies,
not necessarily other qualitative approaches for understanding deeper. It's
important to distinguish the two since although the Research team does
qualitative and quantitative research, none of that research that I'm aware
of at the moment involves ethnographic research.
* Most of the people in the Research team that I have talked to value
ethnographic research.
* Combining ethnographic and big data approaches is not a solved problem,
many acknowledge that it's an important one, but it's not solved. Quite a
few top tier academic institutions have acknowledged and are working on it.
The so called Social Computing programs are the children of this
acknowledgement. :-)
I got my PhD in a department called management science and engineering. The
department was created by combining three programs: Operations Research
(think applied math and more recently big data work), Organizational
Behavior (ethnographic studies and more), System Economics (or Economics of
Systems I believe). I experienced first-hand the challenges and
opportunities of increasing research interactions among these traditionally
separate programs/departments. We are making progress on this front, we are
not there yet, neither in academia nor in research institutions and
industry.
* As Aaron and Jonathan have mentioned, the Research team values
qualitative and quantitative research. The most recent example of it may be the
research
<https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Research:Characterizing_Wikipedia_Reader_Behaviour>
we have started to understand Wikipedia readers in fall 2015. That research
has not involved ethnographic research, however, it definitely has involved
and will continue to involve a mix of qualitative and quantitative
approaches.
I hope this helps.
And thanks again for starting this conversation. :-)
Best,
Leila
Leila Zia
Research Scientist
Wikimedia Foundation
On Wed, Jan 27, 2016 at 12:34 AM, Asaf Bartov <abartov(a)wikimedia.org> wrote:
Estonian Wikipedian Raul Veede, User:Oop, asked to
relay this link to "the
metrics people", so I am sending it here and to the Community Engagement
team at the Wikimedia Foundation.
<http://goog_433392935>
https://medium.com/ethnography-matters/why-big-data-needs-thick-data-b4b3e7…
Cheers,
A.
--
Asaf Bartov
Wikimedia Foundation <http://www.wikimediafoundation.org>
Imagine a world in which every single human being can freely share in the
sum of all knowledge. Help us make it a reality!
https://donate.wikimedia.org
_______________________________________________
Analytics mailing list
Analytics(a)lists.wikimedia.org
https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/analytics