User:Seobinyoon/Reflections

Reflection Essay

While I did my Wikipedia tasks, I learned more about KO-AM TV which was my topic. First, I searched KO-AM TV on Wikipedia and I could know that it was a stub article. After that, I looked over KO-AM TV’s website to know what kind of programs they have, who work there, and where it is. On that website, they introduce themselves as they are the only Korea American broadcasting company in Seattle which is true, but they also elaborate their programs are very qualified and various so that it can satisfy many viewers appetites. One thing that I realized was that I could use some information about KO-AM TV such as its location, or channel number. However, I thought their introduction was not neutral. Thus, I only used the facts of KO-AM TV on that website to make an unbiased article.

When I tried to get some information about how people outside of KO-AM TV judge KO-AM TV, I read some articles about it. They described what KO-AM TV broadcast on TV, and what prizes they got. I also tried to look over the articles that are from famous Korean Newspaper companies. At that time, I learned how to pick reliable sources among all different types of sources.

Moreover, I learned numerous Wikipedia policies. For example, I learned how to cite sources on Wikipedia. It was somewhat different compared to other references that I did before. I also learned how to edit and polish my article by using different codes. For example, I underlined some specific terms that were already described on Wikipedia, so people can know more information about it by clicking it.

Three concepts that we covered in the lecture can be connected to my Wikipedia experience. The first concept is identity based commitment. According to the lecture, it means that people feel that they are part of a community and want to help and accomplish missions. In the past, I sometimes used Wikipedia to search some terms so that I can get its basic information quickly. However, I never thought to write articles on Wikipedia by myself. After I started creating my own article on Wikipedia, I felt that I was one of the members of Wikipedia instead of only using Wikipedia when it is needed. This identity based commitment helped me contribute to work on my article.

In addition, I felt intrinsic motivation. Intrinsic motivation is coming from inside of the person. The reason why I chose KO-AM TV for my topic was because I am doing internship there right now. Since I am one of the interns there, I wanted people to know more about KO-AM TV. For this reason, it made me decide my topic to KO-AM TV and motivated me to work hard. This shows that I had intrinsic motivation when working on my Wikipedia tasks.

Furthermore, extrinsic motivation can be connected to my experience. According to the lecture, extrinsic means that it is coming from outside. Wikipedia tasks were one of the things that I had to do to fulfill my goal which is getting a good grade in COM 482. Thus, my extrinsic motivation was successfully completing my Wikipedia tasks and achieving a good grade.

While I did my Wikipedia tasks, I noticed that the necessity of norms that we covered in the lecture applied to this task. According to BSOC, failing to understand norms of community can cause many different results. In the lecture, I learned that unclear norms can make communities unfocused or ineffective. For example, it is required for all editors to use reliable sources when writing articles on Wikipedia. It is one of the things that Wikipedians have to keep in mind. If there are articles that are biased or false, it can make readers confused. This can happen especially when editors are not aware of Wikipedia norms and do not have lots of knowledge about the topic that they are writing. Eventually, this can make the community’s atmosphere unfocused or ineffective. Thus, this case can be applied to the concept which is the necessity of clear norms. In my opinion, I believe that it is better to give permission to write articles on Wikipedia to specific people who pass Wikipedia norms test. If we do this, it will give fewer opportunities to people who are willing to write articles on Wikipedia. However, Wikipedia readers will only see trustworthy articles on Wikipedia. Hence, Wikipedia will be developed as a reliable website which gives accurate information to users.