User:Bholmes8/Report

Reflective Essay
Online communities are a vast realm where members can interact with one another using an online space. Throughout this course, I have been introduced to a world I never fully understood or acknowledged as a community. With online communities ranging from Zooniverse to Twitch and everything in between, it is easy for one to find a space where members of the community can share common interests. The online community of Wikipedia has enabled me to contribute to this massive community and gain a better understanding of how people interact and contribute to online communities.

To be completely transparent, I have personally struggled to grasp how to contribute to Wikipedia effectively. From my experience, I have noticed that it is extremely difficult to navigate the user page and make edits to articles that are helpful and structured the way Wikipedia demands without having someone guide you through the process. However, I do believe Wikipedia does a good job of providing modules and directions for how to find articles, make edits, and cite reliable sources. It is however frustrating having to navigate from tab to tab to try and do some of the practices Wikipedia has you work on to learn the actions and various functions of the community. In order to solve this issue, I think it would be helpful to users for Wikipedia to include more step by step instructions with images so the user is able to keep their project and the instruction separate from one another. Some more advice I have for the Wikipedia community and the Wkimedia Foundation would be to update the overall layout or visual design of the online community. I am more of a visual learner, and I find Wikipedia to be plain and with little distinction between functions of certain button and tabs. Everything looks similar on the platform, and it is difficult to navigate the online community. As a new user, I did not find excitement in contributing to Wikipedia because I felt like all I was adding was additional information which is helpful but not fulfilling because there was no feedback that told me what I was doing was beneficial. It could be cool to add some sort of points system where when a user contributed positively to an article or provided feedback, they could receive points and rank up on Wikipedia.

In terms of my experience in Wikipedia, like I said earlier, it was a difficult and frustrating one. I think my experience is unique in the sense that I attempted to go about contributing to Wikipedia completely on my own and with little to no direction. This is definitely my fault given my circumstances and schedule, but I feel as though I was still able to contribute a good amount and follow along with the weekly assignments. What I contributed to Wikipedia and the community itself was find articles that could use some editing, find sources to contribute to an article, edit an article, peer review other's articles, and finally polish up my article to be ready to post for others to learn from. From this process, I learned how to contribute to and interact with an online community where those who take part in it all share a common goal or interest in improving the material within the community. I also leaned how to collaborate with others on the platform and figure out what type of information is important to include in an informative article.

My experience on Wikipedia also helped more better understand and explore topics covered in course material such as the different types of users found within online communities. Everyone who participates within an online community plays a role in the over functionality and direction of the community. My role in Wikipedia this time around was to create or edit an article. Prior to this project, I had only utilized Wikipedia as an encyclopedia when looking up things, places, people, and much more. My experience in Wikipedia opened my eyes to an entire community of users that range from contributors to moderators that ensure what is posted or edited falls in line with Wikipedia's strict rules. My recommendations for change on Wikipedia should be taken more seriously than just random advice from one new user because I have experience making edits, finding articles, and using many more functions of Wikipedia to both contribute to articles and the community. Given my experience with Wikipedia, I feel as though I have a solid understanding of what Wikipedia could change to make it more engaging and easier to navigate. In addition to the types of users found in online communities, we also discussed various motivations for users to utilize or contribute to an online community. After discussing various motivating factors for participating in an online community such as Twitch or Reddit, I definitely have a better understanding of what draws someone to an online community or motivates them to participate. Because of this knowledge and experience, I also believe this provides validation for why my recommendation for a points/ranking system should be taken more seriously than some random advice a new user might give.

When looking back at what was covered in course material while this Wikipedia project was taking place, it would have been nice to have a case that related more so to Wikipedia so we could see another look into an online community that functioned similar to Wikipedia. In addition, given the importance of this assignment, it would have been helpful to have a bigger emphasis on the project in class because I felt like a lot of time was spent talking about similar case studies which did not add many benefits or insights into the Wikipedia assignment. What is unique about Wikipedia is that it commonly has a bad representation because it allows anybody to contribute information. This is concerning to many users and scholars looking in because, in their mind, the information in the articles may be false.