Pine wrote:
I agree that the shift to mobile is a big deal;
I do not agree: Active editor attrition began on its present trend in 2007, far before any mobile use was significant.
I remain concerned that tech-centric approaches to editor engagement like VE and Flow, while perhaps having a modest positive impact, do little to fix the incivility problem that is so frequently cited as a reason for people to leave.
I agree that VE has already proven that it is ineffective in significantly increasing editor engagement. And I agree that Flow has no hope of achieving any substantial improvements. There are good reasons to believe that Flow will make things worse. For example, using wikitext on talk pages acts as a pervasive sandbox substitute for practicing the use of wikitext in article editing.
And I do not agree that civility issues have any substantial correlation with editor attrition. There have been huge civility problems affecting most editors on controversial subjects since 2002, and I do not see any evidence that they have become any worse or better on a per-editor basis since.
My opinion is that the transition from the need to create new articles to maintaining the accuracy and quality of existing articles has been the primary cause of editor attrition, and my studies of Short Popular Vital Articles (WP:SPVA) have supported this hypothesis.
Therefore, I strongly urge implementation of accuracy review systems: https://strategy.wikimedia.org/wiki/Proposal:Develop_systems_for_accuracy_re...
On 13 September 2014 20:52, James Salsman jsalsman@gmail.com wrote:
Pine wrote:
I agree that the shift to mobile is a big deal;
I do not agree: Active editor attrition began on its present trend in 2007, far before any mobile use was significant.
I'm not seeing how that means it's not a big deal. Mobile now makes up 30% of our page views and its users display divergent behavioural patterns; you don't think a group that makes up 30% of pageviews is a user group that is a 'big deal' for engagement?
I remain concerned that tech-centric approaches to editor engagement like VE and Flow, while perhaps having a modest positive impact, do little to fix the incivility problem that is so frequently cited as a reason for people to leave.
I agree that VE has already proven that it is ineffective in significantly increasing editor engagement. And I agree that Flow has no hope of achieving any substantial improvements. There are good reasons to believe that Flow will make things worse. For example, using wikitext on talk pages acts as a pervasive sandbox substitute for practicing the use of wikitext in article editing.
And I do not agree that civility issues have any substantial correlation with editor attrition. There have been huge civility problems affecting most editors on controversial subjects since 2002, and I do not see any evidence that they have become any worse or better on a per-editor basis since.
My opinion is that the transition from the need to create new articles to maintaining the accuracy and quality of existing articles has been the primary cause of editor attrition, and my studies of Short Popular Vital Articles (WP:SPVA) have supported this hypothesis.
Therefore, I strongly urge implementation of accuracy review systems:
https://strategy.wikimedia.org/wiki/Proposal:Develop_systems_for_accuracy_re...
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Hoi, The numbers quoted are interesting but hardly relevant in this context.They show how total editor activity is going down. We know that editors are mainly editing from computers and Oliver states that 30% of our page views is from mobiles. CONSEQUENTLY, all efforts intending to enable mobile editors enable a latent potential of editors. When this is deemed insignificant, fine but than my sense of proportions is "obviously" wrong.
Flow and VE are not intended as tools to instill more civility. When there is an occasional increase of vandalism as a result, it is actually a reason to be cheerful; it shows that all the efforts to bring people from the mobile cohorts into our editor communities is having an effect.
The problem with previous studies about editors is that they only reflect the past. When something truly new happens like bringing in an important percentage of our readers into our editor communities that were previously hardly able to edit, comment the validity of those arguments is largely gone. For instance, when the number of editors is down and there is no conversion from mobiles and tablets, it may mean that given the group of computer users the number of editors is actually up seen in that light...
Arguments like "wiki pages are a training ground for Wiki editing" are hopeless. The visual editor has as a side benefit that we will be moving away from Wiki editing. This invalidates largely the argument that we need Wiki editing in Flow.
The problem with quoting research for having your way is demonstrated for me in the argument used to hide the Font functionality. The argument is that research shows that clutter is detrimental. This is arguably true. However, as a consequence the 5 to 7% of all readers who are dyslexic have no chance to find the font that will help them. This is how research is abused and the most wonderful part of it is that it is considered a community decision.
My point is very much that we have to be more clean in brandishing arguments when we consider post on this list to be about "research". If anywhere, this is the place to call BS on flaky arguments and points of view that have little to do with the point under consideration. Thanks, GerardM
<quote who="James Salsman" date="Sat, Sep 13, 2014 at 02:52:54PM -1000">
My opinion is that the transition from the need to create new articles to maintaining the accuracy and quality of existing articles has been the primary cause of editor attrition, and my studies of Short Popular Vital Articles (WP:SPVA) have supported this hypothesis.
My understanding is that we've seen similar trends in attrition across many (but not all) language Wikipedias despite the fact that number of articles varies quite a lot across these languages languages. Do your studies address this issue?
Regards, Mako
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