Romaine Wiki says about women, participating as editors on Wikipedia:
They expect a social environment, with easy interaction, where they are
stimulated and can form groups to be able not to feel alone on the wiki and to work together, >where they can get constructive feedback, where they can follow easily what colleagues, friends and other people they know personally are doing on Wikipedia. As >example, there is no way for people to follow friends/colleagues on what they have written. There is no easy way to say to a group of users (friends/colleagues) >you have written a new article and you like suggestions. It is time for Wikipedia to go to the next generation. It is time for Wikipedia getting social.
One can't remain anonymous AND be social on Wikipedia, not in the way described above. I disagree, that women need this aspect of being social in order to find editing compelling. I like limiting interactions to talk pages, and occasional off-Wiki emails about side points. I have sent and received maybe five off-wiki emails in two years of daily editing.
As for keeping up with certain people, I do like doing that! You can do that by following an editor's edit history. I think you can even set it up as an RSS feed and track it in a feed reader if you really want to. When I write a new article, approve an AfC or find an article that I think needs deletion and want to share or get additional insight, I just copy the relevant URL, then email or send by Twitter DM to Wikipedia editors with whom I am friends, if I don't think they'll see it on their talk page. It is a way of easily sharing. I try not to do it a lot, as Wikipedia is not a social network. It is fun, and validating to discuss things, and support other editors, but that can usually be accomplished using user talk pages and article talk pages very easily, as well as Wikipedia project pages.
Wikipedia would need to be something else, in order to become social in the same way as Twitter or Pinterest or Facebook.
~FeralOink (Ellie Kesselman)
Hi Ellie & all,
Maybe my previous mail was to generalising, what I tried to say is that a lot of people feel it the way I described, but certainly not everyone. So, it is perfectly fine if you do not need it, but at the same time this prevents most contributors learning to edit Wikipedia to stay active.
Wikipedia is not a social network, but that does not mean Wikipedia can't be social. Wikipedia exists out of two mayor parts: the content and the community. A community means there is interaction between the people who are part of that community. That interaction needs to match what people expect and like. If the interaction is too primitive, people do not feel themselves comfortable and stop editing.
The Visual Editor is an improvement for working on the content. Now the new users need an improvement in some software to work together. And not much is needed for that, it is just a matter of expanding the education extension with some features to make it also for new users a happy place to be.
Otherwise Wikipedia/Wikimedia is promoting people go horse riding, while they expect a modern car.
Greetings, Romaine
2015-06-06 6:36 GMT+02:00 Ellie K myindigolife@gmail.com:
Romaine Wiki says about women, participating as editors on Wikipedia:
They expect a social environment, with easy interaction, where they are
stimulated and can form groups to be able not to feel alone on the wiki and to work together, >where they can get constructive feedback, where they can follow easily what colleagues, friends and other people they know personally are doing on Wikipedia. As >example, there is no way for people to follow friends/colleagues on what they have written. There is no easy way to say to a group of users (friends/colleagues) >you have written a new article and you like suggestions. It is time for Wikipedia to go to the next generation. It is time for Wikipedia getting social.
One can't remain anonymous AND be social on Wikipedia, not in the way described above. I disagree, that women need this aspect of being social in order to find editing compelling. I like limiting interactions to talk pages, and occasional off-Wiki emails about side points. I have sent and received maybe five off-wiki emails in two years of daily editing.
As for keeping up with certain people, I do like doing that! You can do that by following an editor's edit history. I think you can even set it up as an RSS feed and track it in a feed reader if you really want to. When I write a new article, approve an AfC or find an article that I think needs deletion and want to share or get additional insight, I just copy the relevant URL, then email or send by Twitter DM to Wikipedia editors with whom I am friends, if I don't think they'll see it on their talk page. It is a way of easily sharing. I try not to do it a lot, as Wikipedia is not a social network. It is fun, and validating to discuss things, and support other editors, but that can usually be accomplished using user talk pages and article talk pages very easily, as well as Wikipedia project pages.
Wikipedia would need to be something else, in order to become social in the same way as Twitter or Pinterest or Facebook.
~FeralOink (Ellie Kesselman)
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