User:Marisajones/report

Being a participant in the Wikipedia community these past two months has been very enlightening and informative. I would have never been able to guess all of the work that gets put into each Wikipedia article and all of the different steps taken to make each article live. That being said, as a first time Wikipedia user I have had many instances where I have been confused on how to navigate the site. The instructional videos are helpful, but didn’t fully answer my questions much of the time. Luckily, I was able to ask questions in Discord and talk with classmates when I would get confused. This, unfortunately, is not an option for most people using Wikipedia. That is why I think that the site could largely benefit from a question and answer section where users could communicate with each other on logistics within the site. I believe that making Wikipedia more interactive between users would be very helpful and also could entice people to be more active on the site. If people felt more confident using Wikipedia and knew that other people also had similar questions I think participation within the site would definitely increase. I really enjoyed how some online communities we have viewed this quarter are more interactive and I believe adding a question and answers section to Wikipedia could benefit the site.

I have learned a lot about Wikipedia through this quarter. My main project has been updating a stub page. In order to do this, I began drafting in my sandbox where I added content utilizing appropriate references and navigated how to cite my sources. I also learned how to peer review my classmate’s sandbox article. Providing them with feedback and interacting with my classmates and professor through their talk pages. Lastly, this past week I also learned how to move my article from the sandbox into the live site. All of these projects have allowed me to become comfortable utilizing the Wikipedia site and have made me familiar with Wikipedia’s guidelines.

One of the concepts that we have discussed in class that relates to my experience in using Wikipedia is their community code of conduct. Wikipedia makes it very clear through their training modules what is expected from each user. In order for Wikipedia to be a successful and trustworthy website their code of conduct must be in place and followed by each of their users. Strict copyright policies are in place to ensure that all users are adding work that is completely reliable and credited. It also expected that when you add information to a page that you utilize the talk page and describe what you changed, as well as what your sources are to make the users informed on the activity of the page. Another concept we have talked about in the course is the idea of community presence. Every website has a different online community and different way of communicating. For Wikipedia the users are able to communicate through the Talk Pages. I have been able to utilize this feature when reviewing my classmate’s articles and introducing myself. The community presence is vital to the success of Wikipedia and keeping the articles as good as possible. With that being said, I do believe that the community presence on Wikipedia could be improved by adding a question and answers page where all Wikipedia users can communicate and help each other navigate the site. I believe my recommendations should be taken more seriously than just random advice from a new user for two reasons. One, because I have spent the past two months navigating the ins and outs of Wikipedia. I have had to learn the best ways to participate in the site and believe I have the necessary knowledge to make a helpful recommendation. Two, I have been a part of multiple online communicates and have seen how different communities find success. My range of knowledge in this field could be extremely helpful for a website, such as Wikipedia.

A concept that we have explored during class in many online communities is the idea of rankings within the online community members. This allows for these sites to either reward their loyal members or give them more power within the site. This is something I have not seen within Wikipedia. Anyone can go through and edit or create an article within Wikipedia which I think can be a bit dangerous to have everyone have that ability to do. I think if Wikipedia enacted a rule where new Wikipedia users can access the Talk pages and create articles within their sandbox, but they don’t get published until an experienced Wikipedia user reviews it. Once Wikipedia users participate in creating or editing 3-5 articles then they can be viewed as experienced Wikipedians. I think this would help the credibility and overall functionality of the site.