This sort of thing happens all the time in the research world. Someone publishes a paper about some new topic, in this case Wikipedia. Everyone else says "hey, maybe I can apply my usual research techniques that I use to study frog mating to Wikipedia instead, hmm, how about the ways editors find collaborators to work on articles?". A rash of papers then follows where people apply their usual research interests to Wikipedia in some way. But once you've got a few papers on any particular aspect, the low-hanging fruit dries up. "Hmm, I've already written papers studying women and Wikipedia, gay women and Wikipedia, mothers and Wikipedia, post-menopausal women and Wikipedia, and I'm running out of ideas, pregnant women and Wikipedia, maybe?" So people move on to the next new thing, "hmm, how can I apply frog mating to the war in Iraq? maybe something in relation to the recruitment of foreign fighters, that's topical!". After the initial flush of enthusiasm for anything new, the long term researchers have to dig deeper and harder for a new publishable result. In a world where the phrase "smallest unit of publishable research" has entered our language, Wikipedia may have become a barren well, left to those who genuinely care about the topic. In this regard, I note Aaron's recent comment about it being the time to tackle the "hard problems". Hard problems tend to need lots of work, often produce marginal results (they are usually highly complex so working on any aspect in isolation often produces marginal improvement), but if you crack them, you might get a Nobel prize. Or you might not. That's not too appealing to the researchers trying to bulk up their publication list for that elusive next job, tenure or promotion. I think we may just be seeing a natural cycle (or unnatural, depending on how you view these things). Kerry