User:Huskyhero/report

Learning how to use Wikipedia properly has helped me a lot in understanding how the virtual world works in terms of connecting with people from around the world. In our current digital age, knowing how to have proper etiquette on how online communities operate is crucial in order to progress as a modern-day human if you have the opportunities to do so. Growing up I used Wikipedia a lot to learn in order to learn about random topics on health studies, to even more in-depth research on history in order to learn about my own family’s background. Little did I know at the time, but it’s because of websites like Wikipedia that I’ve been able to study extremely important topics that matter to me in my personal life. It’s because of our class and our most recent project that I’ve finally been able to see how these websites come to fruition for the average consumer and user to benefit from.

Using Wikipedia was a lot harder than I had expected. I didn’t know that there had to be so much formal training in order to be a part of this database. While I didn’t put it together before, I now can see that all of the information that I had been learning from all of these years, were only there because well-educated internet users took the proper time to make sure that all of the information on the website was accurate. We learned in class that this truly is an encyclopedia, so the information needs to be fact checked so that people know that this website is a place that they can go to for real research and learning. As opposed to other online community services that we studied such as Yelp and Reddit, Wikipedia is a place where you go to skip all opinions and places to be convinced about a topic. Some advice that I have from using this platform is first on the user layout. I believe that Wikipedia has a simple looking platform for consumers to easily digest new information without getting confused by any sort of unnecessary stimulation. At the same time however, I do think that the overall appearance of the website could use some sort of renewal so that it doesn’t appear as if it’s a page off of Craigslist. Whether this means a few more colors, or just text boxes that make the main page look marketable in today’s time, the website needs some professionals to revamp it so that we can see progression in the appearance of the overall website itself. More importantly, I think that the user interface as an editor is really hard to follow until you take the time to formally learn about it. For example, we had Wiki-Edu, which helped me learn about the ins and outs of the site and how to edit and create new articles from scratch without damaging prior work that other users have submitted. While this helped me as it was needed for this project, I just think that all of the modules and source editing processes are a bit unnecessary. I can completely understand if these need to be barriers so that lets say a kid doesn’t make an account and starts trolling articles, but there has to be some sort of middle ground that the company’s programmers can come to agree on. There should be a way where we can utilize the new innovations in computer programming so that editors at home can have an easier way to share valuable information without having to partially program into the database itself.

I think that the community that helps run Wikipedia can be a bit too judgmental and not welcoming to new users. For example, I ended up posting my own edits on a state park that’s very close to my home. I grew up going to this park, actively use it to this day, and have taken a solid number of hours of my time to help volunteer at the park and work with local community members that are a part of keeping the park running in the city. With all of this being said, I think that I’m a somewhat knowledgeable member of this park and can give good insight and important information about it that the world can benefit from. I did private research on the park, and as you know from what I mentioned prior, I’ve formally been educated now in this university course and through Wiki-Edu, on how to contribute effectively to Wikipedia. Even after all of this and knowing my background in the park, I was immediately turned down by another user. Now I know that they’re just looking out for the credibility of the website and want to keep it running as well as it has been all of these years, it still felt like I was shut down and not able to express myself even if it was for the good of future consumers for the article. The user told me that there was formal etiquette that needed to be followed, and that I should go back to the basic steps and introductions for all new users on how to properly contribute to an article. To me this sounded condescending and as if this user had a superiority complex to others that would like to use the site that may have a different style of wording than them. Little did the person know that I’ve been training in college on how to properly edit an article, but they still spoke to me as if I was just a beginner in my home randomly adding things to a page. We need to learn how to make sites like Wikipedia more of a community for editors to connect with each other. Without actually getting to have any emotional connections or understanding where each other is coming from, we lose the social and emotional components of teamwork that come into play with real life human interactions.