On 3/29/06, Mark Williamson node.ue@gmail.com wrote:
How can this be fixed? Perhaps a site notice inviting people to write quality pages or register, or a drive to recruit new Wikipedians from the academic community.
The site notice can indeed be a useful instrument, especially when used for specific campaigns, I think. On the English Wikinews I proposed the idea of a community-approved site notice of the week (in this case, it would only be shown to registered users): http://en.wikinews.org/wiki/Wikinews:Site_notice_of_the_week
Make sure there are enough entry points. The hard distinction between "community" and "content" is not as important for a young project -- I think it's fine to have red links on a frontpage of a Wikipedia that is still in the growth stage, for example. Also stuff like "collaboration of the week". Stub notices might also help, though some people hate them.
What also makes a huge difference is press coverage. People who only discover Wikipedia through their regular Internet searches may never understand how it works. The German Wikipedia has had _gigantic_ media coverage in the last few years -- more hype than even the English one, in my opinion. Even events like Wikimania were covered in national newspapers. Arguably, in the case of de, it was even a little too much for the community to deal with.
The new Communications Committee might be able to help with raising Wikipedia-awareness in specific countries: http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Communications_committee
By now, a general "Wikipedia is great, everyone can edit it" story doesn't work so well anymore. ;-) But finding an interesting regional hook should make things interesting -- if there's one thing media everywhere seem to have in common, it's that they will happily accept any excuse to write about Wikipedia. One story angle many media are choosing now is the "Meet the Wikipedians" type, with lots of individual portraits (kudos to Wired for pioneering this form). The community can help in obvious ways in laying the groundwork for such stories.
But, importantly, don't worry too much about these issues. The key factor are likely cultural reasons which we cannot change. Wikimedia is like a forest, and some trees just grow faster than others -- but they all grow. Worry more about the issue of access (both because of censorship and lack of technology). Wikimedia can do a lot more in this area.
Erik