User:Jameshu1/Report

Today, Wikipedia is one of the most prevalent and successful online communities that aims to provide an encyclopedia on just about anything notable. With that being said, I think editing its interface and system can help make the community more attractive to use, and also more accessible. The first change I want to recommend is to include another set of incentives in addition to Wikipedia’s barnstars, which will be giving out badges when users have achieved a specific goal (ex. Improve 10 articles, approved by moderators). Another is to promote the wikiedu training modules that we used within the course to all newcomers to the community and make them accessible from the public. Finally, one change that could be convenient is a chat system where users can communicate without leaving messages on a talk page.

Throughout the last few weeks, I have been able to contribute to a Wikipedia article on the Husky Union Building. I started this process by first getting acquainted with the Wikipedia community and guidelines by learning about talk pages and how to use them to communicate with others, editing within one’s sandbox, citing sources, adding images, and doing all of this without violating any of Wikipedia’s rules on copyright through the Wikiedu modules. After selecting an article to work on, I copied it to my sandbox, and began my research by finding sources, and wrote a draft. The initial draft was a bit messy, and after peer reviews made by classmates who notified me via talk pages, I was able to modify my article to have two sections, more images, and more sources. Finally, I moved my article from the sandbox to a live version, and it is officially up! I did this through editing and using the article talk page to describe my edits. One of the most significant things that I am now fluent with is understanding the talk page and how integral it is to Wikipedians’ communication. Another is understanding how content can be removed when rules are broken. This occurred when I searched for an image to include of the HUB Ballroom, and a day after I uploaded it to my sandbox draft, it was removed and I was notified that the image is not free to use. This shows that Wikipedia, considering its enormous community size, is heavily moderated and able to take care of most, if not all sectors of their articles with swiftness.

Creating a new type of incentives in badges can benefit the community as it provides extrinsic motivation (where the badge qualifies as a sign of status) to contribute to a community. This actually somewhat exists already, but is based on an opt-in system, where you are essentially giving these badges to yourself, whereas the proposed system will be completely managed by the Wikipedia system and automatically given when an achievement is reached. Rewards from others are proven to further enhance motivation, and can be interpreted as positive feedback that encourages users to keep up the good work and aim for another badge. This will differ from the act of users giving barnstars to each other because barnstars are not given for a specific achievement (ex. Comment on 20 talk pages) but rather a more general contribution that serves as a “thank you” (ex. Contributing a large body of high quality work) and these badges will be given as an acknowledgement from Wikipedia’s administrative system rather than one user. Thus, the act of adding badges will serve as a new form of incentive and motivation for users within the Wikipedia community. Some folks may worry about users gaming the system and making very small contributions and getting the same rewards, which is why I would recommend that all contributions be judged by administrators or moderators before being counted as a “significant” contribution.

In addition, by promoting the modules within the Wikiedu guide we have been following throughout the course, the norms and regulations of Wikipedia will become more well known by newcomers. Wikiedu educates users on both descriptive norms (beliefs about typical behavior) and injunctive norms (approved and disapproved behaviors) within the online community by providing examples of acts and also general guidelines to follow when participating in editing or writing an article, all within an easily consumable lesson format. Currently, this course is only regularly used in more formal settings within predominantly college classes. By using the course, or some kind of substitute, as a code of conduct available from the Wikipedia website, the process of learning community norms will become easier. At the same time, this will decrease the number of poor contributions made by newcomers with good intentions.

Finally, by adding a new form of direct communication between users in the form of a chat system, users are no longer restricted to exclusively writing on talk pages, where searching for the appropriate talk page to write on may prove occasionally bothersome. In addition to adding a new useful functionality, using this chat system can allow users to give performance feedback, which can enhance motivation. The purpose of the chat system is not to eliminate the need for talk pages, but provide a method to give small messages that can be reminders to refer to a talk page, and be of general use. This could be useful in times where if my classmates wanted to notify me of a peer review, they could easily ping me with a chat rather than having to edit my talk page.

As discussed above, many of the concepts we covered while going over the motivations and incentives, norms and regulations, and newcomers apply to Wikipedia. There was less relevance in this reflection covering the units on commitment and creating new communities, mostly because Wikipedia is already very well established and has many committed members. Besides finding different forms of incentives to contribute and making learning norms even more accessible, Wikipedia excels at remaining a relevant and prominent online community even at its old age compared to other communities.