In 2011 the project was only ten years old, four more years is time for big changes to
have occurred. Changes we know something about include the repercussions of the transition
from manual vandal fighting to predominately automated vandalism rejection. This may have
had more subtle implications than the obvious one of the reduction in raw edit count. In
2011 we had an admin cadre still dominated by admins appointed in the era when "good
vandal fighter" was sufficient qualification to pass RFA. Four years on the admin
corps has changed by not changing. Roughly a fifth of our remaining admins have been
appointed in the last four years, but through a process with a very different de facto
criteria than before, and of course the vast majority of our admins are now four years
older than in 2011. If the theory is true that vandal fighting was very attractive to
teenage boys, then in 2011 our youngest admins might still not have been legally adult.
Nowadays I doubt if we have many admins who are undergraduates.
Sometimes the dialogue within the movement can look like a bunch of over confident thirty
something's talking at a bunch of grey beards who they think are adolescents and who
think they are being hectored by young pups straight out of college. An editor survey
would test theories such as the greying of the pedia, and as with any occasion when one
has ones first look in the mirror after a long gap, it would tell us much about
ourselves.
Another reason for doing another editor survey, and indeed a former editor's survey,
is that some of us have been trying to fix the Gendergap for years, it would be nice to
see if our efforts have had any impact. It could even test the theory that the community
is more abrasive towards women. We know that we are less successful at recruiting female
editors than male ones, I'm not sure if we have tested whether we are more successful
at retaining established male editors than female ones, and if so whether we are losing
women because they are lured away or driven away.
Regards
Jonathan Cardy
On 15 Feb 2015, at 08:34, koltzenburg(a)w4w.net wrote:
ah, thanks, GerardM,
so -- if I read your reaction correctly -- the underlying hypothesis on which it
is based says that much has changed (or may have) since those old days?
What information do you base this hypothesis on?
my main point, anyway, is to cast a doubt as to the methods used in such
statistical work and interpretation of the outcome, any comments on that?
see also "Clearly, we need to measure some things, but we also need to be
highly skeptical of what we choose to measure, how we do so, and what we
do with the resulting data." Joseph M. Reagle Jr. (17 December 2014),
Measure, manage, manipulate,
http://reagle.org/joseph/pelican/social/measure-manage-manipulate.html
best,
Claudia
koltzenburg(a)w4w.net
My GPG-Key-ID: DDD21523
---------- Original Message -----------
From:Gerard Meijssen <gerard.meijssen(a)gmail.com>
To:Research into Wikimedia content and communities <wiki-research-
l(a)lists.wikimedia.org>
Sent:Sun, 15 Feb 2015 08:05:24 +0100
Subject:Re: [Wiki-research-l] a cautious note on gender stats Re: Fwd:
[Gendergap] Wikipedia readers
Hoi,
Obviously I know. My point is that when we talk
about diversity, it is because it was recognised
as a problem ... When papers of 2011 are quoted in
2015 when diversity is mentioned, it does not give
us a clue if the problem is as bad, worse or very
much improved. Consequently it is very much beside
the point. Thanks, GerardM
On 15 February 2015 at 07:48,
<koltzenburg(a)w4w.net> wrote:
> Hi GerardM,
>
> why not have a guess ;-)
>
> Claudia
> ---------- Original Message -----------
> From:Gerard Meijssen <gerard.meijssen(a)gmail.com>
> To:Research into Wikimedia content and communities <wiki-research-
> l(a)lists.wikimedia.org>
> Sent:Sat, 14 Feb 2015 18:42:08 +0100
> Subject:Re: [Wiki-research-l] a cautious note on gender stats Re: Fwd:
> [Gendergap] Wikipedia readers
>
>> Hoi,
>> What year are we living ?
>> Thanks,
>> GerardM
>>
>> On 14 February 2015 at 17:24,
>> <koltzenburg(a)w4w.net> wrote:
>>
>>> my2cents re figures on percentages (... in a gender binary
paradigm),
>>> well...
>>>
>>> I'd suggest to take into account User:Pundit's thoughtful
> considerations,
>>>
>>> author of: Jemielniak, Dariusz (2014), Common knowledge? An
> ethnography
>>> of Wikipedia, Stanford University Press, pp. 14-15
>>>
>>> Dariusz Jemielniak writes:
>>> "According to Wikipedia Editors Study, published in 2011, 91
percent of
>>> all Wikipedia editors are male
([reference to a study of 2011] This
> figure
>>> may not be accurate, since it is based on a voluntary online survey
>>> advertised to 31,699 registered users and resulting on 5,073
complete
> and
>>> valid responses [...] it is possible that male editors are more likely
> to
>>> respond than female editors. Similarly, a study of self-declarations
of
>>> gender showing only 16 percent are
female editors (Lam et al. 2011)
> may be
>>> distorted, since more females may choose not to reveal their gender
in
> a
>>> community perceived as male dominated."
>>>
>>> additionally, asserting status and flaunting seniority (also described
>>> by Jemielniak at the end of the paragraph previous to the one
quoted
> above)
>>> is generally perceived to be a commonly employed trick to resist
any
>>> changes;
>>>
>>> and, last but not least, one might argue that the group perceived as
>>> "in power" might feel to find strongly unbalanced outcomes most
> rewarding,
>>> and hence might tend to publish them as widely as possible and not
> least
>>> quote from them persistently, too...
>>>
>>> any rebuttals from stats experts here?
>>>
>>> best,
>>> Claudia
>>> koltzenburg(a)w4w.net
>>> My GPG-Key-ID: DDD21523
>>>
>>> ---------- Original Message -----------
>>> From:Jane Darnell <jane023(a)gmail.com>
>>> To:Research into Wikimedia content and communities <wiki-
research-
>>> l(a)lists.wikimedia.org>
>>> Sent:Sat, 14 Feb 2015 10:49:29 +0100
>>> Subject:[Wiki-research-l] Fwd: [Gendergap] Wikipedia readers
>>>
>>>> Forwarding here in case anyone has information
>>>> that could benefit Yana
>>>> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
>>>> From: Jane Darnell <jane023(a)gmail.com>
>>>> Date: Sat, Feb 14, 2015 at 9:44 AM
>>>> Subject: Re: [Gendergap] Wikipedia readers
>>>> To: "Addressing gender equity and exploring ways
>>>> to increase the participation of women within
>>>> Wikimedia projects." < gendergap(a)lists.wikimedia.org>
>>>>
>>>> In 2013 the Dutch Wikimedia chapter hired an
>>>> external party to conduct a survey and the results
>>>> (translated to English) are here:
https://nl.wikimedia.org/wiki/Bestand:Motivaction_report_translation_v02.pd
>>> f
>>>>
>>>> The study was split into two parts; one on the
>>>> contributors and one on the "users", aka readers.
>>>> Users were 50/50 male female (page 51),
>>>> contributors were 88% male, 6% female, and 6%
>>>> would not say (page 26)
>>>>
>>>> On Sat, Feb 14, 2015 at 8:11 AM, Yana Welinder
>>>> <yana(a)wikimedia.org> wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> Hi all,
>>>>>
>>>>> What are some good studies of the gender of Wikipedia
readers?
>>>>>
>>>>> Thanks,
>>>>> Yana
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> _______________________________________________
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>>>>> To manage your subscription preferences, including
unsubscribing,
>>> please
>>>>> visit:
>>>>>
https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/gendergap
>>> ------- End of Original Message -------
>>>
>>> _______________________________________________
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>>>
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> ------- End of Original Message -------
>
>
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>
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