Thanks to Sumana Harihareswara for introducing the research that
demonstrates an increase in traffic because of providing links and content
on Wikipedia projects.
Thanks also to Jodi Schneider and Laura Hale for their further comments on
the ultimate question on "what to keep and what to get rid of" across
Wikipedia projects. Each raises important point respectively on the need
for more local information sources and the caution against undesired
links/content for traffic via Wikipedia.
I would like to add to *a short description how it can be (or is) done
through processing references/links/sources in different areas of Wikipedia*,
from the community space of "Reference desk" to the content space of
article pages.
Right now, the English Wikipedia community have both Wikipedia:*Reference
desk* <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Reference_desk> (offers Q/A
services) and Wikipedia:WikiProject Resource
Exchange<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WikiProject_Resource_Exc…
(handling *Shared
Resources<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WikiProject_Resource_Ex…
*and *Resource
Request<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WikiProject_Resource_Exch…
*
to compile a list of organized verified sources). This overall process, if
further developed and streamlined, can be used both to unearth more non-Web
local information (as Schneider suggests) and filters out unjustified
content/sources that seek only traffic (as Hale kindly reminds us).
I believe that the above two spaces offer a *buffer zone* for resources
both online and offline, *before* they are found, picked up and deemed
suitable and reliable sources for respective user communities
Wikipedia/other Wiki projects to use them. In other words, *if the two
spaces work together with enough support, the issue of resource
exploration, compilation and verification can be better processed with
minimal impacts on the article pages*.
However, the current status of how well such overall process in English
Wikipedia work remains unclear (to me at least), and in other Wikipedia
projects such as Chinese Wikipedia, there are no such places for uses to do
so.
Hence, I would still encourage GLAM institutions to be "BOLD" in
contributing links and content and then point out the need for exposing the
existing resource-review groups of users (or lack thereof) to exercise
their routine judgement regarding "what to keep and what to get rid of".
Since the English Wikipedia's practice, while having a relative better
overall process than most other projects, has serious linguistic
limitations in exposing/using non-English resources, let alone non-Web
information, some efforts need to be done.
I hope this conversation can be heard and further contributed by other
researchers and Wikipedia contributors who share the similar concerns on
the inclusion/exclusion of information resources (of GLAM kind) in
Wikipedia and other Wiki- projects. It is a conversation need to be had.
Best,
han-teng
liao<http://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Hanteng#.E7.A0.94.E7.A9.B6.E9.81.…
On Sun, Mar 17, 2013 at 9:32 PM, Jodi Schneider <jschneider(a)pobox.com>wrote;wrote:
Your concerns are well-placed, Laura -- bit I think
that points out the
need for local information templates within Wikipedia, that can get readers
to relevant non-Web info.
See for instance:
http://everybodyslibraries.com/2013/03/04/from-wikipedia-to-our-libraries/
-Jodi
On Sat, Mar 16, 2013 at 9:27 PM, Laura Hale <laura(a)fanhistory.com> wrote:
On Sat, Mar 16, 2013 at 6:31 PM, Sumana Harihareswara <
sumanah(a)wikimedia.org> wrote:
http://www.dlib.org/dlib/march13/szajewski/03szajewski.html
"This case study examines the use of Wikipedia by the Ball State
University Libraries as an opportunity to raise the visibility of
digitized historic sheet music assets made available in the university's
Digital Media Repository. By adding links to specific items in this
collection to relevant, existing Wikipedia articles, Ball State
successfully and efficiently expanded the user base of this collection
in the Digital Media Repository by vastly enhancing the discoverability
of the collection's assets...
While this research is incredibly valuable, I would be almost hesitant to
put it out into the wider English Wikipedia community because adding links
for traffic, or the perception there of, could cause backlash. Companies
doing that intentionally across pages is often viewed as a form of
marketing, and there are pockets of the community that are extremely
hostile towards this sort of action because inside the English Wikipedia
community, it is viewed as little different than paid editing and link
baiting. :/
Sincerely,
Laura Hale
--
twitter: purplepopple
blog:
ozziesport.com
_______________________________________________
Wiki-research-l mailing list
Wiki-research-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org
https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wiki-research-l
_______________________________________________
Wiki-research-l mailing list
Wiki-research-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org
https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wiki-research-l