User:Ajtantico/Report

The experience of being on WikiEDU was a very good way to get into the Wikipedia community. It allows freedom to express ideas and regulation is done very constructively. Staying within guidelines is very beneficial and is easy to do, however I did feel some extrinsic motivators in the community could assist a newcomer feeling better on Wikipedia. Based on my experience, I do feel like Wikipedia could use defined social spaces outside of the article Talk pages to help conversation flow.

Through my time outside of the WikiEDU modules, I felt like navigating Wikipedia itself was a little confusing. Wikipedia rules were very simple to me and well detailed, so contributing became easy to partake in. What I found difficult was deciding the format of my article myself. Something I thought would have been useful was a clear way to reach users who particularly know how to make a certain type of article. I know that there are Wikiprojects, but from what I saw they were more dedicated to subjects rather than types of articles. I had an idea of what to type because I browse album articles mostly, however someone who did not use Wikipedia the way I do might find it less natural if they particularly wanted to contribute a specific album.

My task on Wikipedia was wanting to write on a 2019 extended play by an artist I am passionate about. It was a little odd trying to gauge the notability of the artist I picked. My system was basically assessing that the EP had several million Spotify streams, and albums with less streams had articles already. I did learn a lot about formatting Wikipedia, as I used coding that I saw on other pages to help make my article. I saw there was a collaborative element in editing Wikipedia by using other people’s format to help. Even in the stage of me drafting the article by myself there was connection to other users.

Contributing to Wikipedia mostly reminded me of the concepts around compliance in online communities. In this situation I saw that some classmates had photos deleted because they did not comply with Wikipedia rules of common use. Another example was seeing the edit history on articles to know that undesirable content existed and could get modified or erased by administrators/peers at any time. Part of that is also that people do not necessarily violate rules with bad intentions. Keeping good faith toward people is important, sometimes folks are just eager to contribute and might not do so properly. I sort of did an action against rules on Wikipedia when I accidentally created the page for my article prematurely. I blanked the page and eventually it was just deleted because people did not understand why it existed. My peers also did not mean to upload photos that violated rules, but there was still a consequence to it.

From the recommendation I had about having an easy way to talk to others about specific article formatting, I think it could have some form of use outside of my format. This would make it easy for someone wishing to start an article get a sense of community by immediately knowing people who edit similar topics. The guidance would help recruitment for people who feel intimidated tackling a big task like article editing/creation. Quick access to informative resources would assist in helping a member know what contributions are good to add and which are not. An average editor may not access WikiEDU, so this would also be a good help to the general public. However I do see that this could be difficult to implement if there are volunteers who must check on new members at a high frequency.

The concepts of newcomers and motivation applied in the Wikipedia lessons. The newcomer experience in Wikipedia is very individualized and likely driven by intrinsic motivations. You immediately dive into editing, in isolation and training on the job. In a sense our classroom gave us a collective experience while we did the same training and had small interactions. I do wonder if Wikipedia experiences could differ if they had a similar way of incorporating newcomers regardless of them being in an educational institution program. WikiEDU gave little expectations through training tasks, but really did not restrict people’s choice of article. It was a sense of commitment and I think that would be helpful to all newcomers. Solid peer groups could effectively enlist more editors. There would be some identity-based contribution in the community and a slightly more social/extrinsic appeal could be more pleasing to others.

Based on my experience I would only want to add some form of peer groups outside of Wikiprojects, like some social forum that does not have to exist on an article. The actual Wikipedia website can feel lonely/intimidating in some ways. I think Wikipedia is unique in how vast it is, because there can be educational or project passions everywhere and you don’t always know the intentions. Anyone can edit an article because they must research it, but also someone could be enthusiastic about a subject and write on it for fun in their downtime.

As a community, it could be beneficial if Wikipedia had social spaces outside of Talk pages to form discussions. The current interface is good for forming ideas freely, while having limited forms of interaction in community. The importance of writing an article that stays within the rules is easy to see on the site. Overall, Wikipedia is a very individualized experience and having social interaction like WikiEDU was a stronger way to get into the community.