User:Khuynh96/Report

= Wikipedia Reflection Essay =

Wikipedia is a free site, where people around the world are collectively written by the people who used it. They are constantly contributing and improving articles. Like many people around the world, I used Wikipedia as an information resource for research purposes or just to gain some knowledge. Wikipedia serves as a stable for quick knowledge in today’s worlds. I found this assignment to be useful in many ways. At first, I didn’t know anything about editing or contributing to Wikipedia, or what guidelines I had to follow on this platform. I had to find reliable, unbiased sources in order to start on my article.

Wikipedia has a strong sense of community among its members. This community acts like a social networking place, where people can collaborate on projects and issues. Though this concept gives way to some problems of its own. A common belief I found before I started this project, was that I need to create a brand-new article that no one had thought about, rather than fixing a simple typo or fixing a grammar mistake. Additionally, Wikipedia doesn’t have the best user interface for newcomers. Wikipedia doesn’t do a good enough job guiding newcomers into Wikipedia’s own world. As an inexperienced new user editing a Wikipedia article for the first time, I had trouble using the correct format and adding links within an article. Wikipedia is hitting a plateau, in terms of new users joining Wikipedia. If they want to attract more newcomers, Wikipedia has to significantly improve its user interface, especially within editing and formatting an article. Wikipedia already has an incentive system, although it can be improved. Its current incentive system mainly attracts people from the scientific community, where new researches are constantly being done. I believe creating a new incentives structure will help greatly in attracting new users.

Knowing how to format and adding links within articles were the most challenging aspect for me. I looked at examples from other articles and thought I had to learn how to code in order to contribute to Wikipedia. I focused on writing my article first, then focused on having the correct format. I referred to a similar article in order to have the correct format for my article. Writing a Wikipedia article is more or less similar to writing a research paper for a class. By following along on WikiEdu and getting into the habit of using the Talk page, I began to feel more comfortable on Wikipedia. Several assignments in class required me to give a feedback on another student’s article, which in turn help me getting used to interacting with other users.

Overall, I had a positive experience editing a Wikipedia article. I struggled at first, since I didn’t know what topic interested me the most and that most articles, I thought of were already well established. Also, during this time I began to familiarize myself with WikiEdu. This helped me in getting to know Wikipedia more and made my experience a positive one. If I had to change one part in editing Wikipedia is adding a picture profile of the user. By adding a picture on a user’s profile, we can connect and associate their contributions to the person making that contributions. It makes the user experience that much more enjoyable knowing who is behind the text.