Hi all,
I was wondering if anyone has tried to re-run the 'why people read wikipedia' survey (ideally with the same design as the MC survey etc) after the original wave, or something that looks similar enough that it could be used to validate how relevant the numbers are over time?
Warmly, Lodewijk
cc'ing Debra, who I think can help answer your question Lodewijk!
For context for other folks, the referenced surveys were the ones described here: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Research:Characterizing_Wikipedia_Reader_Beh... .
Best, Isaac
On Thu, May 14, 2026 at 12:50 PM effe iets anders via Wiki-research-l < wiki-research-l@lists.wikimedia.org> wrote:
Hi all,
I was wondering if anyone has tried to re-run the 'why people read wikipedia' survey (ideally with the same design as the MC survey etc) after the original wave, or something that looks similar enough that it could be used to validate how relevant the numbers are over time?
Warmly, Lodewijk _______________________________________________ Wiki-research-l mailing list -- wiki-research-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe send an email to wiki-research-l-leave@lists.wikimedia.org
Hi Lodewijk! The Global Readers Survey has been the yearly followup to the Why We Read Wikipedia survey - in that it's been asking the motivation question year over year, though with some tweaks to the question over time which limits the ability to compare over time (changing from single-select to multi-select). The 2025 Global Reader Survey was just published to Meta recently, and you can find it here: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Research:Knowledge_Gaps_Index/Measurement/Re...
Best, Debra
On Fri, May 15, 2026 at 10:46 AM Isaac Johnson isaac@wikimedia.org wrote:
cc'ing Debra, who I think can help answer your question Lodewijk!
For context for other folks, the referenced surveys were the ones described here: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Research:Characterizing_Wikipedia_Reader_Beh... .
Best, Isaac
On Thu, May 14, 2026 at 12:50 PM effe iets anders via Wiki-research-l < wiki-research-l@lists.wikimedia.org> wrote:
Hi all,
I was wondering if anyone has tried to re-run the 'why people read wikipedia' survey (ideally with the same design as the MC survey etc) after the original wave, or something that looks similar enough that it could be used to validate how relevant the numbers are over time?
Warmly, Lodewijk _______________________________________________ Wiki-research-l mailing list -- wiki-research-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe send an email to wiki-research-l-leave@lists.wikimedia.org
-- Isaac Johnson https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Isaac_(WMF) (he/him) -- Senior Research Scientist -- Wikimedia Foundation
Hoi, My last blog was about my disappointment about that last survey [1].
I do understand the value of repeated surveys; it provides understanding of the trends related to the subject that is researched. However, given that Wikimedia is more than just Wikipedia and Wikipedia is more than just the English Wikipedia and its biases the point to expanding a potential survey to include all of Wikimedia and seeking out all the avenues for more public to and contributors for what we aim to achieve; access to the sum of all knowledge.
When we want to know what it is a public seeks and what triggers a visit, limiting the scope is exactly what holds us back.
Thanks, GerardM
[1] https://ultimategerardm.blogspot.com/2026/04/what-is-utility-of-wikimedia-pr...
On Mon, 18 May 2026 at 15:25, Debra Kumar via Wiki-research-l < wiki-research-l@lists.wikimedia.org> wrote:
Hi Lodewijk! The Global Readers Survey has been the yearly followup to the Why We Read Wikipedia survey - in that it's been asking the motivation question year over year, though with some tweaks to the question over time which limits the ability to compare over time (changing from single-select to multi-select). The 2025 Global Reader Survey was just published to Meta recently, and you can find it here:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Research:Knowledge_Gaps_Index/Measurement/Re...
Best, Debra
On Fri, May 15, 2026 at 10:46 AM Isaac Johnson isaac@wikimedia.org wrote:
cc'ing Debra, who I think can help answer your question Lodewijk!
For context for other folks, the referenced surveys were the ones described here:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Research:Characterizing_Wikipedia_Reader_Beh...
.
Best, Isaac
On Thu, May 14, 2026 at 12:50 PM effe iets anders via Wiki-research-l < wiki-research-l@lists.wikimedia.org> wrote:
Hi all,
I was wondering if anyone has tried to re-run the 'why people read wikipedia' survey (ideally with the same design as the MC survey etc) after the original wave, or something that looks similar enough that it could
be
used to validate how relevant the numbers are over time?
Warmly, Lodewijk _______________________________________________ Wiki-research-l mailing list -- wiki-research-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe send an email to
wiki-research-l-leave@lists.wikimedia.org
-- Isaac Johnson https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Isaac_(WMF)
(he/him)
-- Senior Research Scientist -- Wikimedia Foundation
-- *Debra Kumar* (she/her) Manager, User Experience Research Wikimedia Foundation https://wikimediafoundation.org/ _______________________________________________ Wiki-research-l mailing list -- wiki-research-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe send an email to wiki-research-l-leave@lists.wikimedia.org
Good morning: I don´t know why people read Wikipedia, pero creo que sé por qué la gente lee Wikipedia en español.
As someone said: Wikipedia is more than just the English Wikipedia. A survey like this is only valid if it includes more languages.
Rgrds
-----Mensaje original----- De: Gerard Meijssen via Wiki-research-l wiki-research-l@lists.wikimedia.org Enviado el: martes, 19 de mayo de 2026 20:51 Para: wiki-research-l@lists.wikimedia.org CC: Isaac Johnson isaac@wikimedia.org; effeietsanders@gmail.com; Debra Kumar dkumar@wikimedia.org; Gerard Meijssen gerard.meijssen@gmail.com Asunto: [Wiki-research-l] Re: Why people read Wikipedia - the question returns
PRECAUCIÓN: Este mensaje proviene de un remitente EXTERNO a UDIT. No haga clic en enlaces ni abra archivos adjuntos a menos que reconozca al remitente y sepa que el contenido es seguro.
Hoi, My last blog was about my disappointment about that last survey [1].
I do understand the value of repeated surveys; it provides understanding of the trends related to the subject that is researched. However, given that Wikimedia is more than just Wikipedia and Wikipedia is more than just the English Wikipedia and its biases the point to expanding a potential survey to include all of Wikimedia and seeking out all the avenues for more public to and contributors for what we aim to achieve; access to the sum of all knowledge.
When we want to know what it is a public seeks and what triggers a visit, limiting the scope is exactly what holds us back.
Thanks, GerardM
[1] https://ultimategerardm.blogspot.com/2026/04/what-is-utility-of-wikimedia-pr...
On Mon, 18 May 2026 at 15:25, Debra Kumar via Wiki-research-l < wiki-research-l@lists.wikimedia.org> wrote:
Hi Lodewijk! The Global Readers Survey has been the yearly followup to the Why We Read Wikipedia survey - in that it's been asking the motivation question year over year, though with some tweaks to the question over time which limits the ability to compare over time (changing from single-select to multi-select). The 2025 Global Reader Survey was just published to Meta recently, and you can find it here:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Research:Knowledge_Gaps_Index/Measurem ent/Readers_Survey_2025
Best, Debra
On Fri, May 15, 2026 at 10:46 AM Isaac Johnson isaac@wikimedia.org wrote:
cc'ing Debra, who I think can help answer your question Lodewijk!
For context for other folks, the referenced surveys were the ones described here:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Research:Characterizing_Wikipedia_Read er_Behaviour
.
Best, Isaac
On Thu, May 14, 2026 at 12:50 PM effe iets anders via Wiki-research-l < wiki-research-l@lists.wikimedia.org> wrote:
Hi all,
I was wondering if anyone has tried to re-run the 'why people read wikipedia' survey (ideally with the same design as the MC survey etc) after the original wave, or something that looks similar enough that it could
be
used to validate how relevant the numbers are over time?
Warmly, Lodewijk _______________________________________________ Wiki-research-l mailing list -- wiki-research-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe send an email to
wiki-research-l-leave@lists.wikimedia.org
-- Isaac Johnson https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Isaac_(WMF)
(he/him)
-- Senior Research Scientist -- Wikimedia Foundation
-- *Debra Kumar* (she/her) Manager, User Experience Research Wikimedia Foundation https://wikimediafoundation.org/ _______________________________________________ Wiki-research-l mailing list -- wiki-research-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe send an email to wiki-research-l-leave@lists.wikimedia.org
_______________________________________________ Wiki-research-l mailing list -- wiki-research-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe send an email to wiki-research-l-leave@lists.wikimedia.org
Happily, the survey was translated into 11 languages and you can see the breakdown of how many respondents answered per language edition, here: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Research:Knowledge_Gaps_Index/Measurement/Re...
tl;dr, the survey design cleverly balances the sampling rate and date range in some kind of rough inverse to the traffic on each wiki, so response rates are comparable across languages.
There are some thoughtful questions in this thread, it would be great to see constructive engagement around how to broaden the audience. Please consider that a survey would need to be developed from scratch once you expand to other projects beyond Wikipedia, so it would take some time and will probably require ground work to find the correct assumptions to test.
My armchair 2¢.
-[[mw:User:Adamw]]
On 5/20/26 9:58 AM, Rafael Conde Melguizo via Wiki-research-l wrote:
Good morning: I don´t know why people read Wikipedia, pero creo que sé por qué la gente lee Wikipedia en español.
As someone said: Wikipedia is more than just the English Wikipedia. A survey like this is only valid if it includes more languages.
Rgrds
-----Mensaje original----- De: Gerard Meijssen via Wiki-research-l wiki-research-l@lists.wikimedia.org Enviado el: martes, 19 de mayo de 2026 20:51 Para: wiki-research-l@lists.wikimedia.org CC: Isaac Johnson isaac@wikimedia.org; effeietsanders@gmail.com; Debra Kumar dkumar@wikimedia.org; Gerard Meijssen gerard.meijssen@gmail.com Asunto: [Wiki-research-l] Re: Why people read Wikipedia - the question returns
PRECAUCIÓN: Este mensaje proviene de un remitente EXTERNO a UDIT. No haga clic en enlaces ni abra archivos adjuntos a menos que reconozca al remitente y sepa que el contenido es seguro.
Hoi, My last blog was about my disappointment about that last survey [1].
I do understand the value of repeated surveys; it provides understanding of the trends related to the subject that is researched. However, given that Wikimedia is more than just Wikipedia and Wikipedia is more than just the English Wikipedia and its biases the point to expanding a potential survey to include all of Wikimedia and seeking out all the avenues for more public to and contributors for what we aim to achieve; access to the sum of all knowledge.
When we want to know what it is a public seeks and what triggers a visit, limiting the scope is exactly what holds us back.
Thanks, GerardM
[1] https://ultimategerardm.blogspot.com/2026/04/what-is-utility-of-wikimedia-pr...
On Mon, 18 May 2026 at 15:25, Debra Kumar via Wiki-research-l < wiki-research-l@lists.wikimedia.org> wrote:
Hi Lodewijk! The Global Readers Survey has been the yearly followup to the Why We Read Wikipedia survey - in that it's been asking the motivation question year over year, though with some tweaks to the question over time which limits the ability to compare over time (changing from single-select to multi-select). The 2025 Global Reader Survey was just published to Meta recently, and you can find it here:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Research:Knowledge_Gaps_Index/Measurem ent/Readers_Survey_2025
Best, Debra
On Fri, May 15, 2026 at 10:46 AM Isaac Johnson isaac@wikimedia.org wrote:
cc'ing Debra, who I think can help answer your question Lodewijk!
For context for other folks, the referenced surveys were the ones described here:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Research:Characterizing_Wikipedia_Read er_Behaviour
.
Best, Isaac
On Thu, May 14, 2026 at 12:50 PM effe iets anders via Wiki-research-l < wiki-research-l@lists.wikimedia.org> wrote:
Hi all,
I was wondering if anyone has tried to re-run the 'why people read wikipedia' survey (ideally with the same design as the MC survey etc) after the original wave, or something that looks similar enough that it could
be
used to validate how relevant the numbers are over time?
Warmly, Lodewijk _______________________________________________ Wiki-research-l mailing list -- wiki-research-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe send an email to
wiki-research-l-leave@lists.wikimedia.org
-- Isaac Johnson https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Isaac_(WMF)
(he/him)
-- Senior Research Scientist -- Wikimedia Foundation
-- *Debra Kumar* (she/her) Manager, User Experience Research Wikimedia Foundation https://wikimediafoundation.org/ _______________________________________________ Wiki-research-l mailing list -- wiki-research-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe send an email to wiki-research-l-leave@lists.wikimedia.org
Wiki-research-l mailing list -- wiki-research-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe send an email to wiki-research-l-leave@lists.wikimedia.org _______________________________________________ Wiki-research-l mailing list -- wiki-research-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe send an email to wiki-research-l-leave@lists.wikimedia.org
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