Talk:Wikipedia/Archive 25

Just saying, right?

A 2008 study found that Wikipedians were less agreeable, open, and conscientious than others…

We seem plenty conscientious—otherwise why would we be here? :?) And I feel it's important to be "open" to being wrong (as long as it's verifiable). But why would anyone expect a good editor to be "agreeable"? It's like expecting police to be forgiving. – AndyFielding (talk) 11:34, 18 August 2021 (UTC)

Yes Seh anayat (talk) 16:41, 22 September 2021 (UTC)

Article of itself?

Should Wikipedia really have an article of itself? There is a help page for Wikipedia explaining what it is. Twilight Sparkle 222 (talk) 08:47, 23 August 2021 (UTC)

The help page is for editors. This page is for readers. —valereee (talk) 15:43, 23 August 2021 (UTC)

Why wouldn't the ~13th most popular website in the world have its own Wiki entry? Meta as it is. VF01 (talk) 04:44, 11 October 2021 (UTC)

Negative and Out of date, Plus misc. in comments

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

---

So much of the article listing others' opinions about Wikipedia is of a negative tone, with very little of a positive tone. It also uses questionable words like "many" which is pretty vague. And when it is doing these things, it is often quoting opinions from the early years of Wikipedia, like more than 10 years ago. While we all appreciate the honesty of the negative, what about honesty of the positive? Many have worked to improve the articles, too, and so more-recent opinions and reviews would be far more relevant to today, and might show whether many of those negatives have improved—or not.

I remember reading opinions of a positive nature that mentioned a good level of accuracy, compared with other encyclopedias. It basically said that Wikipedia was as good as (if not better than) printed encyclopedias. (I only skimmed this article here, so I don't know whether that comparison was made.)

Mentioning that colleges would not – at some class levels – allow Wikipedia to be quoted is fine, but what about today? what about other levels? What about high schools? Many of us used encyclopedias in high school and elementary school. Further, while colleges may at times prefer sources other than encyclopedias, who in college has time to actually go read a bunch of books for some lower-numbered class that isn't primarily a research-oriented class? In other words, this detail may not be as relevant as it may seem, and, again, leaves out situations where it is not only appropriate but perhaps preferable that one at times reference encyclopedias; though, fortunately, with citations and references, one might be able to go directly to some of the sources for quotations, for college papers, etc.

Lastly, what about the many who do use Wikipedia as a source, and reference it?

In my opinion, the article needs to move from the far side of negative towards a more-neutral position, and should include more of the positive. It should also include more-current information, as the much-older information may be outdated regarding its condition today. And, it should include a balance of information from opposing sides of the mysterious sides of life vs. labeling such as fringe or pseudoscience or worse. This would be more-balanced, and, ironically, more-encylopedia-like. (Ha.)

Misty MH (talk) 13:32, 27 August 2021 (UTC)

Along similar lines, in some topics – such as in mysteries, religion, ufology, supernatural, etc. – there often seems to be a heavy skeptical-bias that allows "skeptic sources" but disallows "believer sources". Articles frequently label such as pseudoscience or fringe instead of labeling them as "beyond current science", as even some scientific theories and hypotheses may be beyond proving or disproving, at this time. Such articles – or portions of articles – are not "agnostic", and are not balanced, but are often written more from a disbeliever position, which many who are investigating these topics find very disturbing, any may be misled.

Articles might also say things like "most scholars", which – even if it were from some book – is possibly a lie. For unless one has a huge survey of nearly all scholars, such is more like someone's propaganda than known fact. This "most scholars" thing is done a lot. And it needs to stop. Other phrases are used that are similar. I suggest a side-wide purge of all such. Also, whom they or their sources are choosing as their scholars also represents bias – in Marketing, we learned that there are three types of lies, one of which was "statistics"! – which bias often leaves out entire bodies of scholars: This happens especially in religious debates where they quote academics, which side may be far-more critical of the religion vs. the many scholars (even degreed scholars) who may be far-more positive about the religion. Wikipedia should not be taking sides.

Speaking of negative, how about articles that may appear to have people camping on them – perhaps with political, religious, or other biases – to make sure an article doesn't say what they don't want it to say, or to make sure that it does keep saying what they do want it to say? I've seen articles that looked a lot like they contained such, where certain editors wouldn't allow changes to be made to such, even when it improved the accuracy or balance by a lot. This, effectually, would let such organizations or persons control certain articles, so that the article would, in effect, stand as "propaganda", because many people in the world might not look beyond Wikipedia, and would accept such imbalanced information.

Misty MH (talk) 14:10, 27 August 2021 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Stylised as WikipediA

Should the article note that Wikipedia, in its logo, is stylised as WikipediA? Xx78900 (talk) 13:37, 13 December 2022 (UTC)

Good question, see Wikipedia logo. It won a 2001 logo contest. The Cunctator (the logo designer), does the uppercase 'A' have a backstory? Thanks. Randy Kryn (talk) 13:47, 13 December 2022 (UTC)

It's not styled as "WikipediA" though, its styled as something more like WIKIPEDIA, with all the letters capitalized but the first and last simply larger. Aza24 (talk) 04:28, 14 December 2022 (UTC)

Updating "Coverage of topics and systemic bias"

Hey everyone. I see the banner on the section says we need to update the information about topic distribution across Wikipedia, but I'm having a hard time finding any recent information/studies about this. Google Scholar isn't yielding recent results, nor is JSTOR, ResearchGate, or Academia.edu. Can anyone help me find recent information about this? If there is none, how can we improve that section? MyCatIsAChonk (talk) 23:08, 30 January 2023 (UTC)

Have you heard about the holocaust distortion study? That may be something to look at. 63.92.71.67 (talk) 05:05, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

Spelling error in "sumarrizing".

This article is semi-protected, and I've yet to make 10 edits, as such I cannot edit it. If you're verified, please edit the misspelling "sumarrizing" to "summarizing" in the last sentence of the 3rd paragraph under "Accuracy of content". It goes as such:

Mannix further discussed the multiple studies that have proved Wikipedia to be generally as reliable as Encyclopedia Britannica, sumarrizing that, "...turning our back on such an extraordinary resource is… well, a little petty." Drunk Experiter (talk) 07:59, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

@Drunk Experiter: Fixed. Thanks for pointing that out. —Bruce1ee^talk 08:04, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

Of course! Sorry, I was not aware of the template prior. I'm very new. Glad it got fixed! Thanks for the help! Drunk Experiter (talk) 08:07, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

anyone know how to fix the google result? it's kind of a problem

if you google wikipedia and scroll down to the result for this page, it shows up as PEE-Wikipedia.

i tried to find where in the wikitext the title was so i could fix it, but i'm not a programmer. if anyone could fix this, that would be great. IHaveAVest talk 19:57, 11 November 2022 (UTC)

@IHaveAVest: Unfortunately this is something that is out of our control. You'll just have to wait for Google to fix it. ― Blaze Wolf^Talk_{Blaze Wolf#6545} 20:01, 11 November 2022 (UTC)

I wonder if Google is pulling the title tag from this html that shows pronunciation as Wiki-PEE-dia:

title="English pronunciation respelling">wik-ih-<span style="font-size:90%">PEE</span>-dee-ə</i></a>}} Pyrrho the Skipper (talk) 20:10, 11 November 2022 (UTC)

The strange thing is that should be ignored like in every other article, and it's just the "PEE-" and not the "dee-ə" ― Blaze Wolf^Talk_{Blaze Wolf#6545} 20:16, 11 November 2022 (UTC)

I hereby coin PEEGATE. Let the record show. Pyrrho the Skipper (talk) 20:17, 11 November 2022 (UTC)

insert confused face here ― Blaze Wolf^Talk_{Blaze Wolf#6545} 20:18, 11 November 2022 (UTC)

hope this helps Pyrrho the Skipper (talk) 20:23, 11 November 2022 (UTC)

I tried commenting out <i title="English pronunciation respelling">wik-ih-<span style="font-size:90%">PEE</span>-dee-ə</i> but it didn't work. I did send feedback on this to google, so hopefully they'll fix it. IHaveAVest talk 16:33, 13 November 2022 (UTC)

It seems to be fixed, sort of. It now says Article Talk - Wikipedia. IHaveAVest talk 00:14, 18 November 2022 (UTC)

Better than PEE. Pyrrho the Skipper (talk) 01:01, 19 November 2022 (UTC)

It's completely fixed now. IHaveAVest talk 00:56, 4 April 2023 (UTC)

As for 1,000,000,000 times

This article doesn't meet Wikipedia:Notability QarryMotter (talk) 18:42, 31 March 2023 (UTC)

@QarryMotter: The 460 sources cited in the article disagree with you. ― Blaze Wolf^Talk_{Blaze Wolf#6545} 18:45, 31 March 2023 (UTC)

Bit early for April fools? Schminnte (talk • contribs) 07:17, 1 April 2023 (UTC)

Nope. Just a Wikipedia hater. ― Blaze Wolf^Talk_{Blaze Wolf#6545} 12:28, 1 April 2023 (UTC)

Malfunctioning pie chart Artful Singer ☾ 18:09, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

Malfunctioning pie chart

For some reason the pie chart of most articles language editions is multiplying the number for Egyptian arabic wiki by 10. Thought Id let experienced editors know Artful Singer ☾ 18:12, 7 April 2023 (UTC)

"Wikipedia and public opinion" listed at Redirects for discussion

The redirect Wikipedia and public opinion has been listed at redirects for discussion to determine whether its use and function meets the redirect guidelines. Readers of this page are welcome to comment on this redirect at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2023 June 17 § Wikipedia and public opinion until a consensus is reached. Dawnbails (talk) 23:52, 17 June 2023 (UTC)

"Pediawiki" listed at Redirects for discussion

The redirect Pediawiki has been listed at redirects for discussion to determine whether its use and function meets the redirect guidelines. Readers of this page are welcome to comment on this redirect at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2023 June 27 § Pediawiki until a consensus is reached. 8ID (talk) 00:38, 27 June 2023 (UTC)

Wikipedia article lead

Is the content below suitable for being the lead of the Wikipedia article?

Wikipedia is a multilingual crowdsourced online encyclopedia. The content on Wikipedia is available without charge and is distributed under free content licenses (CC BY 3.0 and GDFL for texts), allowing for widespread use and furthering its goal of democratizing knowledge. At its core, Wikipedia aims to cover any topic that is above a notability threshold, based on external reliable sources, and its content must not contain original research by its editors. Wikipedia is available in 352 languages and features a total of 61 million articles across all languages. Among them, the most popular language edition is the English Wikipedia with 6,912,964 articles. Wikipedia as a whole is the most widely read reference work in history.

Almost all articles on Wikipedia are available for editing by registered editors and visitors. These articles are collectively written via a wiki system; as such articles on Wikipedia generally provide more up-to-date information and have a wider range in reliability than paper encyclopedias. Though the Wikipedia community is popularly known by its anarchical structure, the community has adopted elements of democratic and bureaucratic systems, as demonstrated by the establishment of user rights, policies, guidelines, and the final avenue of dispute resolution – the Arbitration Committee.

Wikipedia was launched by Jimmy Wales and Larry Sanger on January 15, 2001, as a publicly editable encyclopedia initially associated with Nupedia. Both of these projects were owned by the Bomis company. As Wikipedia became increasingly more popular than Nupedia, its website experienced a rapid growth in content, editors, and language availability. In 2003, Wikipedia was transitioned from a commercial to a non-profit encyclopedia and is now hosted by the Wikimedia Foundation, based in the United States. Around late 2000s, as Wikipedia became one of the most visited websites in the world, the number of active editors reached its peak and has since remained stable. Throughout its existence, Wikipedia consistently faced concerns about its reliability, systemic bias and its editor base, though over time the website began to be viewed more positively, largely due to the overall improvement in the quality of its articles.

– CactiStaccingCrane (talk) 05:26, 24 May 2023 (UTC)

References

• (summoned by the bot) At first glance, I think this looks better than the current lead. In particular, it's good to give a clearer understanding of how Wikipedia operates, and to remove the specific details like the Russian invasion of Ukraine and social media fact-checking (those details can be covered elsewhere in the article, but don't need to be in the lead). —Mx. Granger (talk · contribs) 13:42, 24 May 2023 (UTC)
  • At second and third glance, it still looks better, so support. —Mx. Granger (talk · contribs) 02:24, 25 May 2023 (UTC)
• Strong support (summoned by the bot) I do, however, agree with Mx. Granger's qualms. Best, ~ HAL333 13:51, 24 May 2023 (UTC)
• Strong Oppose to replacing the long-term lead, especially to the concise first paragraph (the present lead, and first paragraph, are long-term and crafter over many years). Mx. Granger and HAL333, good points about the recentism, but have you actually read the "lead" we are being asked to use? It has many mistakes, seems to have been quickly written without regard to proper language, and removes many key points. Randy Kryn (talk) 15:35, 24 May 2023 (UTC)

  Perhaps my coffee hasn't quite kicked in yet, but what are the major mistakes? (besides some minor copy-editing that can be easily done) ~ HAL333 15:58, 24 May 2023 (UTC)

  Mainly in emphasis and placement, please read the concise first few sentences of the present lead which summarize the encyclopedia. The term 'Wikipedians' has also been removed, while in the present lead it is used as a reflection of its closest historical and literal comparison, the Encyclopédistes who wrote the Encyclopédie. Randy Kryn (talk) 16:04, 24 May 2023 (UTC)

  I must say that while it might be interesting to get into the "Wikipedians"-"Encyclopedists" reference, I do find it quite overwhelming and too much of only a hint as one of the first sentences and only touching on it. A more in depth mention of this at a later point is better imho. Nsae Comp (talk) 21:45, 24 May 2023 (UTC)

  I took now the "recentism" out, since it seems everyone agrees that it is too particular. Nsae Comp (talk) 21:46, 24 May 2023 (UTC)

• Support, suggesting a collaborated/merged third version, while I think I like the new one better the old one has its streangths too. Here once more the excerpt of the lead as it stands, to get the work done, maybe para by para. The first step I have allready proposed in the previous topic, is to cut the first sentence from the part about Wikipedians, which would improve readability and help the first sentence to give a first concise understanding of what WP is.

Here my proposal for the first sentence:"Wikipedia is a free and open collaborative multilingual online encyclopedia." ... I personally find "multilingual" also too much for the first sentence, and given the seperation between the languages in WP I dont see why it needs to be described right away with multilingual (though I get it, since it is a common way to introduce a text stating its language, but I dont think it is necessary here).

Then I would continue with neither how much it is read or who edits (both important would follow with readership in a more contextual second para), but rather the later two sentences of the revision about it being "At its core, Wikipedia's content aims to cover any topic that [can be sufficiently referenced with] external reliable sources, and must not contain original research by its editors." ... WP is so often critizesed for being just original research or personal point of view, that I would argue it is one of the most important things to mention right away.

Furthermore WPs own history doesnt need to start with Jimmy for my taste, but rather with collaborative culture and its advances, resulting in Jimmy and Co making Wikip. Its own history can then be followed by a para about its presence/viewership, context and criticism/biases.

Wikipedia is a free multilingual online encyclopedia written and maintained by a community of volunteers, known as Wikipedians, through open collaboration and using a wiki-based editing system called MediaWiki. Wikipedia is the largest and most-read reference work in history. It is consistently one of the 10 most popular websites ranked by Similarweb and formerly Alexa; as of 2023, Wikipedia was ranked the 5th-most-popular site in the world, according to Semrush. It is hosted by the Wikimedia Foundation, an American non-profit organization funded mainly through donations.

Wikipedia was launched by Jimmy Wales and Larry Sanger on January 15, 2001. Sanger coined its name as a blend of wiki and encyclopedia. Wales was influenced by the "spontaneous order" ideas associated with Friedrich Hayek and the Austrian School of economics after being exposed to these ideas by the libertarian economist Mark Thornton. Initially available only in English, versions in other languages were quickly developed. Its combined editions comprise more than 61 million articles, attracting around 2 billion unique device visits per month and more than 15 million edits per month (about 5.7 edits per second on average) as of January 2023. In 2006, Time magazine stated that the policy of allowing anyone to edit had made Wikipedia the "biggest (and perhaps best) encyclopedia in the world".

Wikipedia has been praised for its enablement of the democratization of knowledge, extent of coverage, unique structure, culture, and reduced degree of commercial bias. It has been criticized for exhibiting systemic bias, particularly gender bias against women and ideological bias. While the reliability of Wikipedia was frequently criticized in the 2000s, it has improved over time, receiving greater praise in the late 2010s and early 2020s. The website's coverage of controversial topics has received substantial media attention. It has been censored by world governments, ranging from specific pages to the entire site. On 3 April 2018, Facebook and YouTube announced that they would help users detect fake news by suggesting fact-checking links to related Wikipedia articles. Articles on breaking news are often accessed as a source of frequently updated information about those events.

Nsae Comp (talk) 22:07, 24 May 2023 (UTC)

Frankly I think User:CactiStaccingCrane's draft is still quite a bit better. For example, The website's coverage of controversial topics has received substantial media attention. jumps out at me as a sentence that takes up valuable space in the lead without conveying any substantive information. As I alluded to in my comment above, I also support removing the sentence about Facebook and YouTube. I don't think Friedrich Hayek, Mark Thornton, or Time magazine need to be mentioned in the lead, but I do think it makes sense to mention Nupedia. In CactiStaccingCrane's version, the explanation of Wikipedia's relationships with Nupedia, Bomis, and the Wikimedia Foundation is clear and informative. —Mx. Granger (talk · contribs) 02:23, 25 May 2023 (UTC)

• Support the rewrite as a starting point for future changes, though there's certainly still room for tweaks and improvements. Too much cruft and trivia has accumulated in the old lead. Stuff like Sanger coined its name as a blend of wiki and encyclopedia. Wales was influenced by the "spontaneous order" ideas associated with Friedrich Hayek and the Austrian School of economics after being exposed to these ideas by the libertarian economist Mark Thornton is pure trivia and simply not leadworthy, being neither a major part of coverage nor a major source of notability nor something that someone needs to understand to follow the topic. And the existing praise-and-criticism sentence is unbelievably awkwardly worded, reading like a back-and-forth between angry editors rather than an actually WP:DUE summary of what sources say about the topic. The rewrite does need tweaks and polish but overall it's an improvement. --Aquillion (talk) 03:06, 25 May 2023 (UTC)
• Weak oppose (keep current lead) I don't think either lead is great. Since everyone seems to agree that both will need work, it seems more intuitive and less contentious to incrementally work on the current lead. I agree with Mx. Granger that the sentence The website's coverage of controversial topics has received substantial media attention doesn't really say much, so I'm going to take it out. And both Mx. G and Aquillion have suggested removing Hayek and Thornton, so I'm going to take that out too. Larataguera (talk) 01:49, 26 May 2023 (UTC)
• Oppose for now, but move this proposal to a sandbox page and workshop it. voorts (talk/contributions) 00:32, 29 May 2023 (UTC)
• Support as an improvement: the narrative/structure is slightly clearer to me than the current version, and the current second paragraph's statistics are not going to be meaningful to most readers. I've made some hopefully uncontroversial grammatical changes to the proposal. I think all my concerns can be addressed through normal editing, after implementation. To list them: I'd like to keep links to Wikipedian, Criticism of Wikipedia and Censorship of Wikipedia. I think the references to anarchy, democracy and bureaucracy are potentially contentious as we claim to be none of these things (but it's secondary sources that determine what to say in mainspace)—I can see the sources for this in the body but I would like it to be expanded upon to show due weight for the lead. — Bilorv (talk) 19:47, 29 May 2023 (UTC)

  Also agree with the assessment here about those three missing links. Aza24 (talk) 23:43, 29 May 2023 (UTC)

  I mean, all of us have a COI with the article here. I tried to write the lead as if I'm not a Wikipedian and this is the best that I can do. CactiStaccingCrane (talk) 06:37, 30 May 2023 (UTC)

I have now given it a try, to consolidate what we have. Main changes are to the structure, merging statements where I think they relate, and giving multilingual an own sentence because it is imho cumbersome in the first sentence and is nicely addressable through the sentence by CactiStaccingCrane, as well as adding their sentence about notability threshhold and referencing, since they are the main criteria for how WP works. Other than that I took a sentence about WPs etymology out, since it is not crucial and even somewhat better hinted towards by the "wiki-based" mention. For my taste we could skip the current second para, about Jimmy and overall stats, as a whole. Ill try now to move the refs into the body of the article, as it should be. Nsae Comp (talk) 21:46, 29 May 2023 (UTC)

Here my, now reverted, version which tried to take imho useful parts of both versions consolidate its statements:"Wikipedia[note 3] is a free and open online encyclopedia. With currently 333 language editions, and its largest and most popular edition in English having 6,662,196 articles it is since 2006, after its launch in 2001, the largest and most-read reference work in history,[3][4] as well as one of the 10 most popular websites in the world.[5] Its free content is added and edited by its users (crowdsourced) through open collaboration and a wiki-based editing software called MediaWiki. Articles are being added based on a notability threshold and written by citing reliable external sources, instead of original research by its editors. Since 2003 it has been hosted, along with related other Wikimedia projects, by the Wikimedia Foundation, an American non-profit organization which is funded mainly through donations.

Initially launched by Jimmy Wales and Larry Sanger in English other language editions and its content quickly developed. Its combined editions now comprise more than 61 million articles, attracting around 2 billion unique device visits per month and more than 15 million edits per month (about 5.7 edits per second on average) as of January 2023.[6][7]

Wikipedia has been praised, beside for its extend and frequently updated coverage,[8][9] particularly for enabling the democratization of knowledge, having a unique structure, community and culture, under a reduced commercial bias, while at the same time some countries have blocked the entire site or specific pages.[10][11] That said systemic bias has been critically identified and worked on, such as gender bias or ideological bias.[12][13] While the reliability of Wikipedia was frequently criticized in the 2000s, it has improved over time, receiving greater praise in the late 2010s and early 2020s,[3][12][14][note 4] having become an important fact-checking site."

Nsae Comp (talk) 19:13, 30 May 2023 (UTC)

• Support as means for further improvement. Definitely better than the current lead, which is rather obsessed with lists and statistics (though is being refined as we speak, so hard to properly judge). Some specific details can still be lessened/removed , such as the types of copyright used—even in parentheses, the detail is unnecessary for such a broad overview section. Aza24 (talk) 23:40, 29 May 2023 (UTC)
• As all of this is being bounced around on the fly during this discussion, and I've reverted another total rewrite, I'd suggest that, at a minimum, the first long-term sentence stay the same. Please read it word-for-word, and weigh how much information is included in that sentence (hint: a ton). Randy Kryn (talk) 00:08, 30 May 2023 (UTC)

  Are you talking about that long-run on sentence that is needlessly complex? It is certainly not inherently better for a single sentence to include "a ton" of information. We should include readability as key goal of ours—currently it is entirely unfulfilled. Aza24 (talk) 01:46, 30 May 2023 (UTC)

  Agree on that. CactiStaccingCrane (talk) 06:35, 30 May 2023 (UTC)

  I completely and strongly agree. Therefore I am for opening a more constructive (non-vote like) discussion focusing on the first sentence and find for starters agreement on a (in my opinion straight forward short) first sentence. Then other things will probably fall easier into place! Nsae Comp (talk) 19:05, 30 May 2023 (UTC)

• Oppose the lead sentence: "Wikipedia is a multilingual crowdsourced online encyclopedia." This incorrectly implies it's just one encyclopedia which is translated into (333) different languages. It's actually 333 independently-edited editions hosted by a single Foundation. – wbm1058 (talk) 16:09, 30 May 2023 (UTC)

  This is just some technicality stuff that ultimately confuses the readers. Should we say that Unencyclopedia are... or RationalWiki are... simply because they host content from many languages? CactiStaccingCrane (talk) 16:16, 30 May 2023 (UTC)

  You started this off saying there's not "much detail on how Wikipedia actually works" – I took that to mean you think there should be more detail. Go figure. I don't see how we confuse readers by simply explaining that each language edition's content is independently written by local-language editors. This in contrast to Foundation communications which are usually centrally-written in English and then straight-translated to other languages. – wbm1058 (talk) 17:07, 30 May 2023 (UTC)

  Wbm1058, how about this:

  Wikipedia is available in 333 language editions, which operate with some autonomy from each other, and features a total of 61 million articles across all languages.

  CactiStaccingCrane (talk) 09:33, 4 June 2023 (UTC)

  I don't follow the reasoning for linking to a term used in developmental psychology and moral, political, and bioethical philosophy. Just say that editorially, they operate independently from each other. Well-understood English, so no need for (over-)linking. – wbm1058 (talk) 13:31, 4 June 2023 (UTC)

  Good point :) CactiStaccingCrane (talk) 13:33, 4 June 2023 (UTC)

  Is English your first language? John Mark Wagnon (talk) 04:17, 17 June 2023 (UTC)

  I agree, thats the reason why I am for seperating the first sentence and at the same time gain some readability through shorter sentences. Though I agree that the second sentence is long. I reiterate that seperating out the language and wikipedians part and give a very short and simple first sentence allows us to find a better paragraph structure, with such a long first sentence it sets too much the tone for how the paragraph is structured. Here my edit/proposal for the first (and second) sentence, taking the language part out:"Wikipedia is a free and open online encyclopedia. With currently 333 language editions, and its largest and most popular edition in English having 6,662,196 articles it is since 2006, after its launch in 2001, the largest and most-read reference work in history, as well as one of the 10 most popular websites in the world." Nsae Comp (talk) 19:01, 30 May 2023 (UTC)

  Or is this any better?

  "Wikipedia is a free and open online encyclopedia. The English edition was launched in 2001 and remains the largest and most popular of 333 language editions. Wikipedia as a whole is the largest and most-read reference work in history since 2006. It is one of the 10 most popular websites in the world." Larataguera (talk) 20:24, 30 May 2023 (UTC)

  Larataguera (talk) 20:24, 30 May 2023 (UTC)

  Thanks! I like the simple sentences. Like this the sentences can better fitted to the paragraph; the first sentence is the most important (imho). Nsae Comp (talk) 01:05, 31 May 2023 (UTC)

• Generally support this version as an improvement over the current version. (t · c) buidhe 17:01, 3 June 2023 (UTC)

  According to the consensus, I will boldly copy paste my proposed lead to the article itself and make changes suggested in the RfC. Doing so would save everybody's time. CactiStaccingCrane (talk) 17:46, 3 June 2023 (UTC)

• Please stop adding your rewrite, there is no consensus. At a bare minimum the first sentence should continue to contain "...is an online encyclopedia written and maintained by a community of volunteers, known as Wikipedians, through open collaboration and using a wiki-based editing system called MediaWiki." Randy Kryn (talk) 09:28, 4 June 2023 (UTC)

  Per discussion above, this is not an ideal opening sentence due to run-ons. Instead of giving actual arguments detailing why my proposal is bad, I suspect that you just don't like change. CactiStaccingCrane (talk) 09:32, 4 June 2023 (UTC)

See Encyclopédie where the writers are prominent in the lead paragraph, as they should be here (this also provides site consistency, please also realize that Encyclopédie is the closest thing to Wikipedia ever written, these two are tied-together through historical precedent. I edited the first sentence to better fit the seemingly consensus here, so it's shorter and no longer a run-on. But realize that an RfC is generally a month long before drastic changes are implemented. As for me not liking change, change is fine when done well - but you seem to forget that this article has had long-term consensus. Is the first sentence better now, Wbm1058 and others? Randy Kryn (talk) 09:42, 4 June 2023 (UTC)

If you say that we should add "Wikipedians" to the lead just like in Encyclopédie's "Encyclopédistes". I'm not opposed to that change really. The term Wikipedian is mentioned enough in third-party sources that it doesn't really matter to add it in the lead.

However, if you're arguing that "At a bare minimum the first sentence should continue to contain..." and cite that "this article has had long-term consensus", then this is a problem for me. Multiple editors have pointed out the current lead's flaws. If the suggested lead is considered better than the current one by other editors, and the current opposes to the proposal can be easily fixed by tweaking the lead, then why should we keep the current lead online? Is this what the WP:Be bold policy is encouraging us to do and the wiki philosophy is meant to represent? CactiStaccingCrane (talk) 09:57, 4 June 2023 (UTC)

The lead sentence has been edited per concerns to "Wikipedia is an online encyclopedia written and maintained by a community of volunteers, known as Wikipedians, through open collaboration and using a wiki-based editing system called MediaWiki." That stays consistent with the earlier similar project and long-term use. You somehow misunderstand being bold, that means, yes, you can wipe a lead clean of what it used to be but when it is reverted you do not put it back in the midst of an RfC addressing the concern. Randy Kryn (talk) 10:18, 4 June 2023 (UTC)

I agree that it's awkward for CSC to replace the lead before the RFC closes, but I'm also concerned that Randy seems too attached to the current lead. I had hoped to be able to make incremental changes to the current lead (as I said in my !vote above). Randy, why did you revert my edit here to remove redundancy? Why must it say 'largest in the world' twice in the first paragraph?? And give the 2001 launch date twice? If you can't accept reasonable changes like this, then I would change my vote so we can work with a new lead that no one has developed undue attachments to. Larataguera (talk) 10:36, 4 June 2023 (UTC)

Agreed, Larataguera, those were good changes, have returned it amongst trying to fix the full rewrite once again put back without consensus. Thanks. My main concern is that first sentence or two, which seem fine now and without the problem with it being a run-on sentence. Randy Kryn (talk) 11:03, 4 June 2023 (UTC)

Thanks. The 2001 launch should go in the first sentence instead of the 2nd paragraph (MOS:FIRST). Larataguera (talk) 11:16, 4 June 2023 (UTC)

Good point, have moved it and the creators to the first paragraph. As it looks now, the first paragraph is fine, and the major lead changes should go towards the second and third lead paragraph. When an entire long-term lead is rewritten and then completely added, and some points of that rewrite work while others don't, it turns into a scrum but right now the first paragraph is better for this discussion but still holds up, probably even better now, as a good lead paragraph. Randy Kryn (talk) 11:26, 4 June 2023 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 15 July 2023

Hi there, are you going to add images and pictures from Wikimedia sister project? If they are added, can you even please add each description from the about info wikis to the images of sister projects?

When are you going to update the history of Wikipedia with current events at? In the near future or today? ~WikiCoverings11111 (message) 08:33, 15 July 2023 (UTC)

 Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format and provide a reliable source if appropriate. Cannolis (talk) 08:55, 15 July 2023 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 23 July 2023

At the end:

We hope this page helped you! Pippoosh (talk) 12:22, 23 July 2023 (UTC)

 Not done: This is not an appropriate addition for Wikipedia. —k6ka 🍁 (Talk · Contributions) 12:26, 23 July 2023 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 1 August 2023

Change this sentence from:

“Created by Jimmy Wales and Larry Sanger on January 15, 2001, it is hosted by the Wikimedia Foundation, an American non-profit organization.“

To this one:

“Created by Jimmy Wales (an American-British founder) and Larry Sanger on January 15, 2001 after a start of new millennium, Wikipedia is completely hosted by the Wikimedia Foundation, which is an American non-profit organization, designed to cater to students and readers.“

This would help the lead section to improve effectiveness and readability. 2600:1010:B193:5833:D8FF:697D:509D:AB4D (talk) 03:24, 1 August 2023 (UTC)

 Not done for now: please establish a consensus for this alteration before using the {{Edit semi-protected}} template. This does not appear to be an improvement to me, and I would not support it. Meters (talk) 03:31, 1 August 2023 (UTC)

Revising lead

The current lead focuses too much on Wikipedia's accomplishments and praise, without much detail on how Wikipedia actually works. Here's my attempt to make the lead more balanced:

Wikipedia is a multilingual free online encyclopedia that is written by volunteers and is the most-read reference work in history. Almost all articles on the website is available for edit by registered editors and visitors, though from time to time vandalism to its content does occur. Wikipedia is available in 352 languages and has 61 million articles in all languages, with the most popular among them is the English Wikipedia with 6,912,964 articles. The content on Wikipedia is under free content licenses (CC BY 3.0 and GDFL for texts), which enable its widespread use and furthering its goal of democratizing knowledge.

At its core, Wikipedia's content aims to cover any topic that is above a notability threshold and is collectively written via a wiki system, therefore no article is exclusively owned by an editor. Content on the website must be based on external reliable sources and must not contain original research by its editors. Because of the nature of the wiki system, articles on Wikipedia usually contain more up-to-date information than paper encyclopedia counterparts. Though the Wikipedia community is popularly known by its anarchical structure, the community has adopted elements of democratic and hierarchical systems as shown in its establishment of user rights, policies and guidelines, and the final avenue of dispute resolution – the Arbitration Committee.

Wikipedia was launched by Jimmy Wales and Larry Sanger on January 15, 2001, as a publicly editable article platform for Nupedia. Both of these projects were owned by the Bomis company. As Wikipedia became increasingly more popular than Nupedia, its website experienced a rapid growth in content, editors and language count. In 2003, Wikipedia was pivoted from a commercial to a non-profit encyclopedia and is now hosted by the Wikimedia Foundation, based in the United States. Around late 2000s, as Wikipedia became one of the most visited websites in the world, the number of active editors has peaked in growth and has remained steady since then. From its existence, Wikipedia persistently has been raised concerns about its reliability, systemic bias and its editor base, though over time the website had been viewed more positively due to its overall gradual increase in article quality.

— CactiStaccingCrane (talk) 10:49, 20 May 2023 (UTC)

CC: Randy Kyrn. CactiStaccingCrane (talk) 10:50, 20 May 2023 (UTC)

• The present lead is fine, has been refined over many years, especially the first lead paragraph, and reads much better than your good faith request. What caught my attention in reversing your drastic edits a couple days ago was that you removed 'Wikipedians' from the opening, which was added to directly reflect Encyclopédistes, the equivalent of Wikipedians, which is correctly prominent in the lead paragraph of Encyclopédie. Randy Kryn (talk) 13:18, 20 May 2023 (UTC)

  Well, how about this: Though the Wikipedia community is popularly known by its anarchical structure -> Though the Wikipedia community (to which its members are called Wikipedians) is popularly known by its anarchical structure CactiStaccingCrane (talk) 13:22, 20 May 2023 (UTC)

  As mentioned, the present long-term lead paragraph seems fine and complete, and contains much more information in briefer form. Randy Kryn (talk) 13:57, 20 May 2023 (UTC)

  I'm sorry to disagree with you, but this is not the case here. The first paragraph talks about what Wikipedia is, how popular is it, and who hosts Wikipedia; the second paragraph talks about the history of Wikipedia and its pageviews; and the third paragraph talks about its reception by the general public. There's no information about the structure of Wikipedia's operations, nor is there any info about Wikipedia's free content license, nor is there any info about why Wikipedia is superior to other paper encyclopedias. Plus, like I've said above, the lead focuses too much on recent events (On 3 April 2018, Facebook and YouTube announced...) and its viewcount/usage.

  As for "... in briefer form", the current lead contains 366 words, while my proposed lead contains 363 words. Technically, my lead is shorter, but really they are of about the same size. CactiStaccingCrane (talk) 14:07, 20 May 2023 (UTC)

  @Randy Kryn, If you're thinking of my user page, of course I won't just add that vastly oversimplified lead here. It is used to prove a completely different point, that WP:ACCESSIBILITY matters. CactiStaccingCrane (talk) 14:57, 20 May 2023 (UTC)

  @Randy Kryn It appears from your silence that you no longer object to the edit. If that's not the case, please reply to me in 3 days. CactiStaccingCrane (talk) 04:07, 24 May 2023 (UTC)

• Will reply in minutes - I've said my comments and of course still object (why would you think not continuing a discussion means that an editor has changed their mind?). It's just that I've made my comments and left it at that. The lead is doing well and has been substantially stable for a long time. Nothing seems broken here. Randy Kryn (talk) 04:14, 24 May 2023 (UTC)

  Because essentially what you have done is reverted my edit due to "no consensus" and didn't give a better explanation than that. If you objects to my edit, please give a more substantial reason why. CactiStaccingCrane (talk) 04:16, 24 May 2023 (UTC)

• You come to one of the most viewed articles on English Wikipedia, do a full rewrite of the lead, and then complain because I reverted it and won't go into a full thousands-of-words discussion with you. Other comments will come and then maybe I'll add back in. Randy Kryn (talk) 04:23, 24 May 2023 (UTC)

  Fine. I will make an RfC that is what you sought after. CactiStaccingCrane (talk) 04:25, 24 May 2023 (UTC)

• All I did as one editor was revert a bold edit that you made which, as mentioned, totally rewrote the lead of one of the most viewed articles on English Wikipedia. No, I'm not seeking an RfC on this, although I'll probably follow it if you create one. Randy Kryn (talk) 04:36, 24 May 2023 (UTC)

• Well, if you revert an edit, then please, please, give a better reason than "it has always been this way". CactiStaccingCrane (talk) 05:05, 24 May 2023 (UTC)

• It hasn't always been this way, but incremental edits did form the wording over time. You seem to be seeking an either/or replacement of the entire text and direction of the long-term lead with your rewrite. That would, and should, take more than a couple editors discussing it to make such a change (I don't know why more people aren't chiming in, although you seem to be focusing inordinately on me). Randy Kryn (talk) 05:18, 24 May 2023 (UTC)

  I can agree on that. I was hoping that you would give feedback on content or spelling or such, but I do agree with the sentiment that there should be more people that discussing about the change. I think that an RfC is the best use of our time because they would notify other editors to come and give feedback. CactiStaccingCrane (talk) 05:21, 24 May 2023 (UTC)

Two things:

1) can you post the version how it was, next to what you see better fit, and maybe have also an {{excerpt}} of the current so that collaboratively working on it is better facilitated

2) the ", free," in the first sentence is too vague and awkward to read, but most of all redundant since open-collaboration is mentioned further on in the sentence. I get that it is so crucial to mention it right away, but then I would take the open-collaboration and put it somewhere near and instead of the "free". Nsae Comp (talk) 05:18, 22 May 2023 (UTC)

Nsae Comp, 'free' means that Wikipedia is free, that nobody has to pay to view it. Agree that's it's a bit awkward and I'd suggest starting off with 'free' and remove the commas ("Wikipedia is a free multilingual online encyclopedia..." seems to flow better). Randy Kryn (talk) 04:47, 24 May 2023 (UTC)

Nsae Comp, have made the edit, thanks for bringing this up. Unless I'm missing something it seems better, but let's see if it sticks. Randy Kryn (talk) 05:05, 24 May 2023 (UTC)

"Almost all articles on the website is available..."

Isn't this grammatically incorrect? John Mark Wagnon (talk) 01:26, 30 July 2023 (UTC)

@Nsae Comp Previous version:

This section is an excerpt from Wikipedia.[edit]

Wikipedia is a free content online encyclopedia written and maintained by a community of volunteers, known as Wikipedians, through open collaboration and the wiki software MediaWiki. Wikipedia is the largest and most-read reference work in history, and is consistently ranked among the ten most visited websites; as of August 2024, it was ranked fourth by Semrush, and seventh by Similarweb. Founded by Jimmy Wales and Larry Sanger on January 15, 2001, Wikipedia has been hosted since 2003 by the Wikimedia Foundation, an American nonprofit organization funded mainly by donations from readers.

Initially only available in English, editions of Wikipedia in more than 300 other languages have been developed. The English Wikipedia, with its over 6.9 million articles, is the largest of the editions, which together comprise more than 63 million articles and attract more than 1.5 billion unique device visits and 13 million edits per month (about 5 edits per second on average) as of April 2024. As of November 2024, over 25% of Wikipedia's traffic was from the United States, followed by Japan at 6.2%, the United Kingdom at 5.6%, Russia at 5.0%, Germany at 4.8%, and the remaining 53.3% split among other countries.

Wikipedia has been praised for its enablement of the democratization of knowledge, extent of coverage, unique structure, and culture. It has been criticized for exhibiting systemic bias, particularly gender bias against women and geographical bias against the Global South (Eurocentrism). While the reliability of Wikipedia was frequently criticized in the 2000s, it has improved over time, receiving greater praise from the late 2010s onward while becoming an important fact-checking site. Wikipedia has been censored by some national governments, ranging from specific pages to the entire site. Articles on breaking news are often accessed as sources for frequently updated information about those events.

---

Revised version:

Wikipedia is a multilingual crowdsourced online encyclopedia and is the most widely read reference work in history. The content on Wikipedia is available without charge and is distributed under free content licenses (CC BY 3.0 and GDFL for texts), allowing for widespread use and furthering its goal of democratizing knowledge. Almost all articles on Wikipedia is available for editing by registered editors and visitors. Wikipedia is available in 352 languages and features a total of 61 million articles across all languages. Among them, the most popular language edit is the English Wikipedia with 6,912,964 articles.

At its core, Wikipedia's content aims to cover any topic that is above a notability threshold. These articles are collectively written via a wiki system; as such articles on Wikipedia generally provide more up-to-date information and have a wider range in reliability than paper encyclopedias. Content on the website must be based on external reliable sources and must not contain original research by its editors. Though the Wikipedia community is popularly known by its anarchical structure, the community has adopted elements of democratic and bureaucratic systems, as demonstrated by the establishment of user rights, policies, guidelines, and the final avenue of dispute resolution – the Arbitration Committee.

Wikipedia was launched by Jimmy Wales and Larry Sanger on January 15, 2001, as a publicly editable encyclopedia initially associated with Nupedia. Both of these projects were owned by the Bomis company. As Wikipedia became increasingly more popular than Nupedia, its website experienced a rapid growth in content, editors, and language availability. In 2003, Wikipedia was transitioned from a commercial to a non-profit encyclopedia and is now hosted by the Wikimedia Foundation, based in the United States. Around late 2000s, as Wikipedia became one of the most visited websites in the world, the number of active editors reached its peak and has since remained stable. Throughout its existence, Wikipedia consistently faced concerns about its reliability, systemic bias and its editor base, though over time the website had been viewed more positively, largely due to the overall improvement in the quality of its articles.

To get away from who said/did what and why, Ill get into the content and state that I think that both versions have their streangths.

I concur for starters with the revised version to make two sentences out of the current first for readability and give a strong defining first impression, but most of all it gives us more freedom to think about what follows it:

"Wikipedia is a multilingual, free and open collaborative online encyclopedia."

This and the link helps also to make it clearer that free and open are two different concepts.

Then I would continue with neither how much it is read or who edits (both important would follow with readership in a more contextual second para), but rather the later two sentences of the revision about it being "At its core, Wikipedia's content aims to cover any topic that [can be sufficiently referenced with] external reliable sources, and must not contain original research by its editors."

The rest is for me secondary. Though I would argue that Wikipedia is old enough that it doesnt need contemporary events mentioned (eg. COVID, RU, US,..).

It is completely enough to contextualize it with that criticism and bias exists, but that it is in the end about facts and against made up content (like for eg fakeing something).

Its own history doesnt need to start with Jimmy for my taste, but rather with collaborative culture and its advances, resulting in Jimmy and Co making Wikip.

Nsae Comp (talk) 05:36, 24 May 2023 (UTC)

Thanks for your feedback! I revised the lead at the RfC section below. CactiStaccingCrane (talk) 05:39, 24 May 2023 (UTC)

Nsae Comp, I appreciate your edits to make the existing lead more concise. I had some additional similar edits, but I am having technical issues and cannot edit this page. I Don't know why – maybe due to its size and my poor internet connection? Anyway, I have placed the revised lead in my sandbox. If you (or any other editor) agree with these changes, could you please make them for me? Intended edit summary: Concise lead; reorder sentences in first paragraph to locate in time and quickly establish notability (MOS:LEAD). Remove redundancy (don't need to give launch date twice, don't need to say 'largest in the world' twice in first paragraph).

I think these are uncontroversial changes, and it's frustrating that I can't make them. Thank you! Larataguera (talk) 11:00, 29 May 2023 (UTC)

 Done Nsae Comp (talk) 18:53, 29 May 2023 (UTC)

References

Semi-protected edit request on 6 August 2023

Would you please add the information about the newest appearance about Vector 2022? Vector 2022 is one of the latest designs of Wikipedia history and its contemporary. 2600:1010:B193:5833:D57A:88E0:EF64:685A (talk) 18:04, 6 August 2023 (UTC)

 Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format and provide a reliable source if appropriate. --Pinchme123 (talk) 21:32, 6 August 2023 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 29 August 2023

May I please edit I need to change something 2001:8003:B10F:2500:4159:FC45:1C33:6ADF (talk) 08:41, 29 August 2023 (UTC)

 Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format and provide a reliable source if appropriate. —k6ka 🍁 (Talk · Contributions) 10:40, 29 August 2023 (UTC)

“Copycat” section of article, copywriting, and objectivity.

At the end of the “access to content” tab of the article this section is listed:“Copycats Russians have developed Ruwiki clone. Iranians have created a new website called wikisa.org.” I don’t believe it to be objective to unilaterally declare these websites “copycats” of Wikipedia, regardless of if they are or are not. I also wonder about the inconsistency of how Russians “developed” Ruwiki, but Iranians “create a new website” called Wikisia.org. Lastly, I find it odd how the section refers to “Russians” and “Iranians” instead of the organizations and people responsible for creating the websites. All of these elements make for a confusing paragraph and I would appreciate any input on how to reformat it, if it needs to be deleted altogether, or I am somehow mistaken. Thank you. Slamforeman (talk) 18:10, 12 August 2023 (UTC)

Pronounciation

[note 4] says: "Pronounced /ˌwɪkɪˈpiːdiə/ (listen) wik-ih-PEE-dee-ə or /ˌwɪki-/ (listen) wik-ee-". I don't say Wikipedia. Me and my British friends say /ˌwɪkəˈpiːdiə/ and also sometimes end it /-dʲə/ (palatized). I'd like to hear if enough people say it this way to include it as a valid pronounciation. To be fair, at this rate we will need a "Pronounciation of Wikipedia" article sometime soon! JacobTheRox (talk) 10:44, 19 August 2023 (UTC)

"...palatization is a way of pronouncing a consonant in which part of the tongue is moved close to the hard palate. Consonants pronounced this way are said to be palatalized and are transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet by affixing the letter ⟨ʲ⟩ to the base consonant. Palatalization cannot minimally distinguish words in most dialects of English, but it may do so in languages such as Russian, Japanese, Norwegian (dialects), Võro, and Irish." John Mark Wagnon (talk) 22:40, 19 August 2023 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 25 August 2023

Could you change from "the article start it had been..." to "the website was approved by" in access to content? 113.162.142.12 (talk) 11:50, 25 August 2023 (UTC)

 Not done: I deleted the whole paragraph as the project is really the free online version of Encyclopedia of China, not in any way related to Wikipedia, and does not belong in a section about access to the real Wikipedia from China. Xan747 ✈️ 🧑‍✈️ 22:16, 25 August 2023 (UTC)

Extreme bias

https://thefederalist.com/2023/08/17/extensive-edits-to-hunter-bidens-wikipedia-page-prove-sites-extreme-bias/ 24.192.227.169 (talk) 13:37, 17 August 2023 (UTC)

And that Federalist article is a textbook example of confirmation bias. Not sure what you want done here. Should we delete Wikipedia because the Federalist doesn't like it? freshacconci (✉) 13:42, 17 August 2023 (UTC)

This article is clearly more biassed than any Wikipedia articles. Paying someone to write/edit your WP article is banned. WP is not responsible for those who break the rules doing so. Also, the Hunter Biden page is controversial (because he is) and thus is often reviewed and checked by administrators and other high-ups to ensure neutrality. What do you want us to do about this: include in the article that WP is full of propaganda when it clearly isn't? JacobTheRox (talk) 10:47, 19 August 2023 (UTC)

Biased against what ? Anonymous8206 (talk) 21:27, 29 August 2023 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 30 August 2023

Change from:

"Unlike traditional encyclopedias, Wikipedia follows the procrastination principle regarding the security of its content, meaning that it waits until a problem arises to fix it.

To this:

"Unlike traditional encyclopedias that are offline, Wikipedia follows the procrastination principle', which is the act of unnecessarily and voluntarily delaying or postponing something despite knowing that there will be negative consequences for doing so, regarding the security of its content. This means that it waits until a problem arises to fix it."

That looks like an improvement to me of course. 205.155.225.253 (talk) 16:15, 30 August 2023 (UTC)

 Not done. I have looked at the source for the passage in question, and I don't think it says what this change is proposing. In particular, where do you get the notion that waiting for problems to arise is "unnecessary" and "voluntary"? I'm not sure that it's possible for Wikipedia to predict and fix in advance all problems that might arise...  — Amakuru (talk) 16:24, 30 August 2023 (UTC)

I got it in a another article. 205.155.225.253 (talk) 16:26, 30 August 2023 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 22 September 2023

Wikipedia is an online forum that shows different articles of work Benherewhile (talk) 07:38, 22 September 2023 (UTC)

 Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format and provide a reliable source if appropriate. Meters (talk) 07:40, 22 September 2023 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 10 October 2023

Would you please like to add project milestones copied from the History of Wikipedia? This milestone is notable enough to insert this section, due to the growth of this site. 205.155.225.253 (talk) 15:40, 10 October 2023 (UTC)

 Not done for now: please establish a consensus for this alteration before using the {{Edit semi-protected}} template. M.Bitton (talk) 15:49, 10 October 2023 (UTC)

Structure of stored information

Should there be an explanation of how Wikipedia is stored? How is the content of a page stored in the database, in what format, how is it linked to other versions, what metadata is stored about edits, etc, what differences between namespaces etc, in lay terms, reasonably intelligible to readers who are not database programmers. · · · Peter Southwood ^(talk): 08:07, 30 September 2023 (UTC)

It would belong in MediaWiki which powers Wikipedia and thousands of other wikis, many with articles in Category:MediaWiki websites. PrimeHunter (talk) 13:04, 10 November 2023 (UTC)

Name change

Should mention be made in the article that in light of Elon Musk’s recent tweeting, Wikipedia will most likely soon be undergoing a change of name? Just o add context, Musk has offered Wikipedia one billion dollars to change its name. The tweet was sent yesterday at 3:41 pm. 2A00:23C4:AA1D:4A01:90E:D74:1B2E:8D48 (talk) 06:22, 23 October 2023 (UTC)

Interesting if true even if it won't be changing to Dickipedia (and Elon Musk should give the billion just for the concept of the dickipedic-type of request and, secondary, as a gift to humanity). Randy Kryn (talk) 14:03, 23 October 2023 (UTC)

We are not for sale. Deny recognition to the Trolls. Even if they are obscenely rich and have multiple media platforms. 7&6=thirteen (☎) 14:49, 23 October 2023 (UTC)

Of course we won't take him up on this public offer, but it has made news so is more than an average trolling and seems a humorously interesting way for him to make a point. Randy Kryn (talk) 14:53, 23 October 2023 (UTC)

Wait, why not take him up on it? Just stick a cartoon of Dick Tracy on the main page and explain how editors do detective work ("Dick" is a 19th/20thC slang for detective[1]) to find reliable sources to improve articles. And Musk even said after just one year we can change the name back! Let's not be clueless; we should take the billion! BBQboffin (talk) 19:25, 24 October 2023 (UTC)

Absolutely, and he'd bring some much needed improvements to the place. --2A00:23C4:AA1D:4A01:C5DF:4EC2:CFC1:3480 (talk) 16:01, 3 November 2023 (UTC)

No, I think that whoever started Wikipedia will keep the name. Special Girls (talk) 21:50, 16 November 2023 (UTC)

portable rate's apply...TofC pasttence 2600:6C50:4E7F:D47C:26E8:53FF:FE77:FC16 (talk) 20:56, 19 December 2023 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 28 December 2023

In the article, it is written that Wikipedia ranks as the 4th most viewed website by Semrush, But as of 28th December 2023, Twitter.com is on 4th place, and wikipedia.org is now 5th. Please change that. Pranav S. Duwuri (talk) 13:25, 28 December 2023 (UTC)

Do you have a reliable source for that? OhNoitsJamie ^Talk 13:39, 28 December 2023 (UTC)

Yes, you can check the website https://www.semrush.com/website/top/ Pranav S. Duwuri (talk) 14:24, 28 December 2023 (UTC)

 Done  Spintendo  16:08, 28 December 2023 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 30 December 2023

5.115.139.183 (talk) 08:40, 30 December 2023 (UTC)

 Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format and provide a reliable source if appropriate. Mattdaviesfsic (talk) 08:54, 30 December 2023 (UTC)

Lead and praise

User:Coolman2917, please be specific. Which words or phrases are undue forms of praise? -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 17:35, 15 November 2023 (UTC)

Mainly "Wikipedia is the largest and most read reference work in history.", and "It has consistently been one of the 10 most popular websites in the world, and, as of 2023, ranks as the 4th most viewed website" relying on one source (Semrush) 𝘾𝙤𝙤𝙡𝙢𝙖𝙣2917 (talkpage) 17:43, 15 November 2023 (UTC)

The source (Semrush) does back that content. Right? -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 18:11, 15 November 2023 (UTC)

The first one is pretty much unverifiable due to history spanning far before the Internet existed, and many things going uncovered. 𝘾𝙤𝙤𝙡𝙢𝙖𝙣2917 (talkpage) 17:44, 15 November 2023 (UTC)

So you are asserting that the two sources for that do not verify that statement? (Keep in mind that this is the lead and refs are not necessarily required. The content should be backed by content in the body that is properly sourced.) -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 18:11, 15 November 2023 (UTC)

Wikipedia and Eurocentrism

The study that says Wikipedia has a "Eurocentric bias" is from 2017. Here's what the study says:

“...Wikipedia narratives about national histories [...] are distributed unevenly across the continents with significant focus on the history of European countries (Eurocentric bias). Thus, our work explored how colonial ties shape popular historiography on Wikipedia.” (Samoilenko, Anna (2017). “Multilingual historical narratives on Wikipedia”. GESIS - Leibniz-Institute for the Social Sciences. Data File Version 1.0.0, https://doi.org/10.7802/1411.)

Is there a most recent study that says otherwise?

Here's what the Wikipedia page says:

“It has been criticized for exhibiting systemic bias, particularly gender bias against women and geographical bias against the Global South (Eurocentrism).[10][11] While the reliability of Wikipedia was frequently criticized in the 2000s, it has improved over time, receiving greater praise in the late 2010s and early 2020s...”

I think this is an attempt to conceal the fact that Wikipedia has a "Eurocentric bias" until today.

If there is no other study that says otherwise, we cannot try to hide this fact. Wordyhs (talk) 09:59, 10 November 2023 (UTC)

Wordyhs, "Eurocentism" is widely regarded as a problem, although I would argue that prosperous, highly literate countries dominate, no matter their relationship with Europe. Can you please put forward specific language that you propose, in the form of "change X to Y"? Cullen328 (talk) 10:08, 12 November 2023 (UTC)

Those sentences are short summary sentences in the lead, and are unrelated to each other. (Every sentence in that paragraph stands entirely alone from all other sentences.) CMD (talk) 12:18, 12 November 2023 (UTC)

I propose to add something like this:

"The most recent studies highlight the fact that Wikipedia (and in particular the English Wikipedia) has a “western cultural bias” (or “pro-western bias”) [Christoph Hube, ‘Bias in Wikipedia’ (2017)] or “Eurocentric bias” [Anna Samoilenko, Cultural Neighbourhoods, or approaches to quantifying cultural contextualisation in multilingual knowledge repository Wikipedia (June 2021)], reiterating, says Anna Samoilenko, “similar biases that are found in the ‘ivory tower’ of academic historiography”."Wordyhs (talk) 13:19, 12 November 2023 (UTC)

Carwil Bjork-James wrote that "many Wikipedia editors and observers have argued that the systemic biases of Wikipedia are inherent to current global distribution of knowledge production, and can only be overcome by changing the encyclopedia’s standards of inclusion". ('New maps for an inclusive Wikipedia: decolonial scholarship and strategies to counter systemic bias', 2021) Wordyhs (talk) 14:58, 12 November 2023 (UTC)

The authors of ‘The colonization of Wikipedia: evidence from characteristic editing behaviors of warring camps’ call for a “decolonization” of Wikipedia:

“WP sadly does, as previously claimed, appear to be a platform that represents the biased viewpoints of its most stridently opinionated Western white male editors, and routinely misrepresents scholarly work and scientific consensus, the authors find. WP is therefore in dire need of scholarly oversight and decolonization.” ('Journal of Documentation'. 10.1108/JD-04-2022-0090. 79:3. (784-810). Online publication date: 4-Apr-2023. Morris-O'Connor D., Strotmann A. and Zhao D. (2022).)

From my experience here: ‘Alleged Silencing the Haitian Revolution and the Imperialism of the French Revolution’, it seems like an impossible task. Wordyhs (talk) 10:00, 14 November 2023 (UTC)

Issues with other pages can't really be dealt with from this talkpage. There also appears to be a conflation of two kinds of bias here, systemic bias and opinion bias. CMD (talk) 12:06, 14 November 2023 (UTC)

I wrote something in the Lead that was moved to 'Reception' and edited a bit like this:

“Some studies highlight the fact that Wikipedia (and in particular the English Wikipedia) has a “western cultural bias” (or “pro-western bias”)[184] or “Eurocentric bias”,[185] reiterating, says Anna Samoilenko, “similar biases that are found in the ‘ivory tower’ of academic historiography”. Due to this persistent Eurocentrism, scholars like Carwil Bjork-James[186] or the authors of ‘'The colonization of Wikipedia: evidence from characteristic editing behaviors of warring camps'’[187] call for a “decolonization” of Wikipedia.”

So the idea disappeared from the Lead. I tried to reintroduce it with this summary:

“Recent studies, however, assert that Wikipedia (and in particular the English Wikipedia) has a "western cultural bias", "pro-western bias, or "Eurocentric bias", calling for a “decolonization” of Wikipedia.”

I gave the following four references:

Anna Samoilenko, ‘Cultural Neighbourhoods, or approaches to quantifying cultural contextualisation in multilingual knowledge repository Wikipedia’ (June 2021)

Carwil Bjork-James, 'New maps for an inclusive Wikipedia: decolonial scholarship and strategies to counter systemic bias’

D.A. Morris-O'Connor, A. Strotmann, and D. Zhao, ‘The colonization of Wikipedia: evidence from characteristic editing behaviors of warring camps’

Christoph Hube, ‘Bias in Wikipedia’ (2017)

It was deleted by OhNoitsJamie with the following explanation:

“The content you recently added to the lede is already in the "Reception" section; it does not belong in the lede per WP:WEIGHT. Please don't re-add it there unless there is a talk page consensus to do so.”

So, how can we introduce the idea into the Lead in any other way? Wordyhs (talk) 12:48, 17 November 2023 (UTC)

Wikipedia now includes the most inclusive information on all cultures, all forms of human transition and viewpoints, and all methods of civilizational tendencies and human interaction, recordkeeping, and encyclopedic description and societal chronology. To lessen this amazing collection covering these topics by suggesting criticizing their lack in the lead introduction seems like stretching a point to the extreme. Randy Kryn (talk) 13:06, 17 November 2023 (UTC)

The idea is already introduced in the lead, you mention it in your opening post here. CMD (talk) 15:21, 17 November 2023 (UTC)

The lead try to convince that Wikipedia is no longer biased (with journalistic references, The Economist and Wired, not studies), which is not what the studies I mentioned say. Here are two other recent studies that also say that Wikipedia remains biased:

Brooke A. Ackerly and Kristin Michelitch, ‘Wikipedia and Political Science: Addressing Systematic Biases with Student Initiatives’ (2022)

Caroline Ball, ‘Using Wikipedia to Explore Issues of Systemic Bias and Symbolic Annihilation in Information Sources’ (2021)

No one seems to want to take these studies into account (which is consistent with Wikipedia's Eurocentric bias). Wordyhs (talk) 13:37, 19 November 2023 (UTC)

The lead explicitly refers to, and does not make any attempt to contradict, gender and geographical systemic biases. CMD (talk) 01:37, 20 November 2023 (UTC)

The Ackerly and Michelitch article has only been cited three times, according to Google Scholar. It argues that, at least in the area of political science, the solution is more editing by college and university students. The problem is that experienced editors are well aware that work by students is frequently of very low quality, which includes poor writing and referencing, plagiarism, essay like tone and so on. Many student editors do the bare minimum to pass the course, and experienced editors are forced to do cleanup work. Cullen328 (talk) 09:02, 10 December 2023 (UTC)

Recommendation re: liberal bias section

Recommending that the note in the 'Reception' section about liberal bias be updated to note that a lot of the pundits and media organisations reporting such bias are themselves conservative (Fox News, NYPost, Sanger) or libertarian (Stossel - already noted).

Also recommending that that whole section get moved under the 'Coverage of topics and bias' subsection, so readers can compare the claims by conservatives against the claims by other researchers and orgs, such as Mark Graham and The Guardian. My opinion is that putting it at the top may lend undue weight to the claims by right-wingers, since that info is consumed first and may lead to an anchoring bias in readers.

These changes should improve the neutrality of the article in my view. Thoughts? RichardThePeterJohnson (talk) 04:15, 29 September 2023 (UTC)

I concur. John Mark Wagnon (talk) 01:21, 30 September 2023 (UTC)

I agree too. 86.4.8.85 (talk) 18:05, 5 October 2023 (UTC)

You would have to live in a bubble not to see the liberal bias in Wikipedia. This is why I ask people not to support this platform. Even the founders say it has been taken over by the left. 2600:1702:5224:C800:CDFF:EC1D:520C:E7CF (talk) 04:56, 10 December 2023 (UTC)

Are the alternatives proposed to Wikipedia intended to be encyclopedias, or political action platforms?

Also, what is a liberal in this case, or the left? Those words mean different things depending on where on the planet you come from. RichardThePeterJohnson (talk) 09:09, 10 December 2023 (UTC)

Attacks on the left-wing - from the right

"In 2022, libertarian John Stossel opined that Wikipedia, a site he financially supported at one time, appeared to have gradually taken a significant turn in bias to the political left, specifically on political topics,".

Given that many of the claims of left-wing bias are from-the-right, is it not reasonable to ask if they are using Flak to punish media outlets for daring to question them and some of their more dodgy ideas?

Semi-protected edit request on 11 December 2023

Are you planning to add trivia section, such as what year did it reach milestone and in popular culture, due to the fact that this is significant for all editors to red, as well as people who uses encyclopedias to search up for information? Is that necessary to add in to today, especially when it comes to content? 205.155.225.253 (talk) 17:30, 11 December 2023 (UTC)

Not likely, we don't normally do "Trivia", that's for the tabloids. - FlightTime (open channel) 17:39, 11 December 2023 (UTC)

@FlightTime Can this be the same as History of Wikipedia? Why it is limited to tabloids, but not significant for encyclopedia? 205.155.225.253 (talk) 17:46, 11 December 2023 (UTC)

 Not done for now: please establish a consensus for this alteration before using the {{Edit semi-protected}} template. - FlightTime (open channel) 17:41, 11 December 2023 (UTC)

Exactly why I closed this request as "Needing consensus". - FlightTime (open channel) 22:00, 11 December 2023 (UTC)

Update the phote of the Main Page of Wikipedia viewed on desktop site as of December 2023 to reflect most information.

May you upload a new image depicting the Main Page in a new freshed look in December 2023? Doing so should change the caption to 'Wikipedia's Main Page on desktop'. 2001:EE0:4BCC:C820:65D1:E41F:7E97:C466 (talk) 12:17, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

Too many primary sources

After making Wikipedia#Wikipedia-affiliated_and_primary_sources, I found it is shocking that how much we self-cite ourselves. Some of them such as statistics webpages is necessary, but I'd reckon that most of then can go away with more reliable third-party sources. CactiStaccingCrane (talk) 04:12, 17 December 2023 (UTC)

The page has 335 non-primary sources. Given that, which information are you most concerned with being incorrect? Randy Kryn (talk) 07:59, 17 December 2023 (UTC)

I think these sections are Openness, Policies and content, and Governance, as they have a lot of primary sources that should be replaced with independent secondary sources to ensure impartialness. I understand that in the past there was not a lot of secondary sources to cite, but now it is 2023 and there are a lot of research and books published that has written about Wikipedia. These primary sources must go. CactiStaccingCrane (talk) 10:40, 17 December 2023 (UTC)

Wait, this is a classic case of citogenesis... CactiStaccingCrane (talk) 10:43, 17 December 2023 (UTC)

Interesting how you did the [W14] etc. reference sourcing, never saw that before (maybe I have and didn't notice). Even the sections you marked have some outside sourcing. In this case I personally would keep the sourcing as it is, as they all can be easily checked on-site by readers (unlike primary source tags for other articles which take people off-site). They educate readers about Wikipedia practices in the most direct way possible. If this is perceived as a major problem could'nt we just call this a case of IAR, as the difference is "on-site" versus "off-site" sourcing which snakes around on itself - in a good way? (and happiest of holidays to you) Randy Kryn (talk) 14:21, 17 December 2023 (UTC)

If something is cited to both a secondary and a primary source, that sounds fine and, as you say, potentially useful from an editor perspective. If, however, we're including mention of things that aren't mentioned in any reliable sources off-project, then I'd say those bits should be chopped. Only aspects of Wikipedia that are independently notable should be included.  — Amakuru (talk) 15:28, 17 December 2023 (UTC)

Yes, exactly! Primary sources are very beneficial if they complement reliable secondary sources, but sections that only cite primary sources should be cleaned up. CactiStaccingCrane (talk) 16:14, 17 December 2023 (UTC)

You've already deleted 17 thousand bytes (haven't checked those, hopefully someone does), so please don't go hacking more out. Primary sources in this case have added value due to the placement of the article in mainspace. And yes, primary sources "are very beneficial" and do offer the reader easy in-site links and explanations. Randy Kryn (talk) 16:39, 17 December 2023 (UTC)

I reverted my edits. I think it's better to find secondary sources first. CactiStaccingCrane (talk) 03:17, 19 December 2023 (UTC)

I think you misunderstand Wikipedia's use of primary sources. Acceptable primary sources do not need to be replaced by secondary sources. Sections can use only primary sources. StarryGrandma (talk) 20:07, 21 December 2023 (UTC)

@CactiStaccingCrane, primary sources are fine to use in many cases in Wikipedia articles. We use NASA sources for articles about their rockets. From the policy at WP:PRIMARY: A primary source may be used on Wikipedia only to make straightforward, descriptive statements of facts that can be verified by any educated person with access to the primary source but without further, specialized knowledge. I came to this page looking at the Hardware section, where I would expect to find primary sources. Which of the sources that you have categorized as primary are not being used for such statements of fact? StarryGrandma (talk) 19:54, 21 December 2023 (UTC)

I've removed the template from the section. StarryGrandma (talk) 17:22, 24 December 2023 (UTC)

merging this article with the wikipedia:about page

this article is redundant due to the wikipedia:about page. they seem to serve the same purpose. Rguyr (talk) 19:21, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

Really? This 300 k page is redundant because we have the 4 k page wikipedia:about? The about page is a very short general introduction, while this page is a detailed article. They don't serve the same purpose. Meters (talk) 19:59, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

Disagree with Rguyr. ---Another Believer _(Talk) 20:06, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

why? Rguyr (talk) 20:09, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

The about page serves as a short introduction for newcomers whilst this article thoroughly documents Wikipedia itself. They do not serve the same purpose, and should never need to be merged. Jurta ^talk/_he/they 13:13, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

To quote Julia Roberts' character in Notting Hill, "Tempting...but no". Randy Kryn (talk) 13:17, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 5 January 2024

"change Hindu to Hindi in the sentence describing logo of Wikipedia" Govind75 (talk) 20:13, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

 Done Cannolis (talk) 20:23, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 5 January 2024 (2)

Add this source right there in 2023: [2]

Its called: "Wikipedia, wrapped. Here are 2023’s most-viewed articles on the internet’s encyclopedia"

It shows the most visited pages in Wikipedia wit the number of page views and the titles shown, such as ChatGPT. Do not forget that Wikipedia has even more than 84 billion views this year, according to numbers by Wikimedia Foundation. 76.20.110.116 (talk) 22:29, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

 Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format and provide a reliable source if appropriate. What text are you proposing be added? We don't just add links to sources, we cite sources when we write text Cannolis (talk) 22:43, 5 January 2024 (UTC)

I'm proposing that English Wikipedia gained more than 84 billion views in 2023, as well as having ChatGPT as the most viewed pages in 2023 with 49,490,406 pageviews including its own flaws. 76.20.110.116 (talk) 09:49, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

First paragraph rewrite detailed edit summary

Pinging User:Amakuru and User:Randy Kryn.

The main rationale for the rewrite is that the first paragraph goes too deep into statistics and technical details, screaming "we are a huge and established encyclopedia" without substantiating the impact and significance of Wikipedia itself. To me, the first paragraph also feels somewhat promotional. If this is the first paragraph in Britannica's article about Wikipedia then readers will be right to question the author's neutrality about the topic. I took inspiration from Wikipedia:About and Britannica article about Wikipedia and our coverage at other webpages (Scholarpedia, 2channel, etc.), and I came up with this rough outline:

• First sentence: What is Wikipedia?
• Second sentence: Wikipedia is editable, how?
• Third sentence: Who hosts Wikipedia?
• Later sentences: What makes Wikipedia notable?

I do find that my proposed paragraph is still too promotional and did not met NPOV, as mentioned by User:Amakuru. Perhaps I should tone down the last sentence a bit and add many reliable citations to vet this claim or rewrite the last sentence to introduce factual examples. And that's basically it for the first paragraph. My eventual goal is to rewrite the whole lead into three paragraphs, the second paragraph for explaining how Wikipedia works under the hood and the third paragraph for chronicling Wikipedia's history and reception. Currently, the lead's reception paragraph feels too much like a pro-and-cons list. In my opinion, that should be reserved for the article's body, though I am open to other ideas.

---

Current version:

Wikipedia is a free-content online encyclopedia, written and maintained by a community of volunteers, collectively known as Wikipedians, through open collaboration and the use of wiki-based editing system MediaWiki. Wikipedia is the largest and most-read reference work in history. It has been ranked consistently one of the 10 most popular websites in the world, ranks number 7th as the most visited website on the Internet, and, as of 2023, ranks as the 4th most viewed website by Semrush. Founded by Jimmy Wales and Larry Sanger, on January 15, 2001, it is hosted by the Wikimedia Foundation, an American nonprofit organization that employed a staff of over 700 people by October 2023.

Proposed version:

Wikipedia is a free-content online encyclopedia established in 2001. It uses a wiki-based editing system to facilitate users in the development of articles. The website is hosted by the Wikimedia Foundation, an American nonprofit organization. Wikipedia's language editions, when combined, comprise more than 63 million articles. It has been ranked consistently as one of the 10 most-visited websites in the world. As the largest and most-read reference work in history, Wikipedia and the Wikimedia movement as a whole has been cited as an exemplary example of democratization of knowledge, open collaboration, and display of the wisdom of the crowd.

References

References

References

---

- CactiStaccingCrane (talk) 10:26, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

@CactiStaccingCrane: thanks for opening a thread on this, and (as someone who has this on my watchlist but isn't necessarily a huge regular contributor) I'm happy to talk through any concerns you have. Just off the top of my head, here are a few comments:

1. I agree that there is slightly too much focus on the stats and I would drop the mention of the Semrush statistics, that's fine.
2. But on the other hand, as I mentioned in my edit summary and you allude to above, the last sentence looks like undue puffery to me - we already know from the "Reception" section that there are mixed opinions in reliable sources about the project, and the third paragraph sums this up fairly neatly without need for a further line without such balance in the opening paragraph.
3. And finally, I'm not sure why we'd want to do away with the line "written and maintained by a community of volunteers". This is quite fundamental to what Wikipedia is, and certainly something other sources highlight extensively... Cheers  — Amakuru (talk) 11:56, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

I don't really like the word "volunteer" because it implies that editing Wikipedia require some sorts of a membership and a certain level of commitment, but anyone can edit most articles on Wikipedia and many edits on Wikipedia are made by people who will only edit a few times in their lifetime. 'Users' might be a better word I guess though I was able to make do without it. CactiStaccingCrane (talk) 12:21, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

• The first paragraphs are fine as they are, have been discussed at length, and the changes are not an improvement. And doing away with the words 'volunteers' and 'Wikipedians', no, that edit removed the accurate descriptors of what the people who built, build, and maintain the project have done and how they identify. Randy Kryn (talk) 13:30, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

  I do not think that saying "no consensus" over and over again is helpful. Could you please give an actual, specific and actionable reason why the lead is not good? CactiStaccingCrane (talk) 13:36, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

  Yes, the lead is good, as it stands right now. Your removal of the words 'volunteer' and 'Wikipedian' indicate that you may not have a good grasp of what Wikipedia actually is and does and yet want to come by and revamp the entire lead again (perennial). If you insist on doing this please offer up suggestions one at a time, a word or two at a time, thanks, although the lead paragraph seems just about perfect now. Randy Kryn (talk) 13:48, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

  I will wait for others' comments. CactiStaccingCrane (talk) 13:49, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

  I also prefer the current version. I think it's important to keep the mention of 'volunteers' and 'Wikipedians'. The very last bit of the final sentence does seem promotional; I can think of examples where Wikipedia has been cited as the opposite of the "wisdom of the crowd". Esculenta (talk) 17:52, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

What if someone has a biased agenda?

Someone who can edit and slander the unfavorable (even if they're innocent.) Even if it's false it's controlled and edited by people who control what people read. Controlling a narrative. Because someone edited 10 wiki pages. That gives a right of passage? What kind of extreme leftist authoritarian is this site? Control the info? control the way people think? Bidenomics46 (talk) 04:05, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

Wikipedia is a collaborative project. No single editor can control what goes in an article. Blatant bias rarely lasts long in an article. HiLo48 (talk) 04:12, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 31 January 2024

Can you please update the number of articles created on Wikipedia as well as how many accounts that are created on this site? Is there a significant coverage on reliable sources related to number of pages created on Wikipedia? ArtForDecades610 (talk) 20:32, 31 January 2024 (UTC)

 Not done for now: A bit unclear what you're requesting. The "accounts created" in the infobox is updated automatically from our internal database, which well, I would consider reliable; I don't know where the number of articles is stated but I'd expect that'd update itself too. NotAGenious (talk) 20:56, 31 January 2024 (UTC)

I think the lead sentence might look redundant

I would believe some edits should be made to the introduction to maintain its clarity and short to attract the readers. 2001:EE0:4BC4:4240:71D2:A29:A5C4:100E (talk) 09:37, 9 February 2024 (UTC)

Have removed the word 'edited' (as redundant to 'written'). Does your concern include just the lead sentence or the entire lead, and what changes would you suggest. Thanks. Randy Kryn (talk) 15:11, 9 February 2024 (UTC)

Also remove 'collectively' too, per History of Wikipedia is different in the lead. 2001:EE0:4BC4:4240:71D2:A29:A5C4:100E (talk) 15:47, 9 February 2024 (UTC)

How about this:
Based on wiki editing system MediaWiki through open collaboration, Wikipedia...? 2001:EE0:4BC4:4240:71D2:A29:A5C4:100E (talk) 15:50, 9 February 2024 (UTC)

Wikipedia is a free online encyclopedia written and maintained by a community of volunteers (known as Wikipedians). Based on wiki editing system MediaWiki through..... Any thoughts? 2001:EE0:4BC4:4240:71D2:A29:A5C4:100E (talk) 16:03, 9 February 2024 (UTC)

In addition, we should decrease the number of words in the last sentence, to be:
Founded by Jimmy Wales and Larry Sanger, it is hosted by Wikimedia Foundation, a non-profit organization based in San Fransisco, USA. 2001:EE0:4BC4:4240:71D2:A29:A5C4:100E (talk) 16:14, 9 February 2024 (UTC)

Add a box for employees in the infobox is better. 2001:EE0:4BC4:4240:71D2:A29:A5C4:100E (talk) 16:15, 9 February 2024 (UTC)

Paragraph 1 (rankings); suggested edits (rhetorical)

Grammar school handed me a loathsome fixation on parallel structure before sending me on my way, so I’m compelled to suggest a revision of this sentence in the first paragraph: “It has been ranked consistently one of the 10 most popular websites in the world, ranks number 7th as the most visited website on the Internet, and, as of 2023, ranks as the 4th most viewed website by Semrush.”

My issue is with “ranks number 7th as the most visited…” and “ranks as the 4th most viewed.”

At a minimum, “ranks as the 7th most visited” would treat the problem, but seeing that this is the Wikipedia page for Wikipedia itself, I’d propose a bit more:

“It consistently ranks as one of the 10 most popular websites [on the Internet]*, and as of 2023 it is ranked the 4th most viewed and 7th most visited website on the Internet by Semrush.” []* redundant unless needed for accuracy (websites implies internet, as far as I know)

My main gripe is that we change “number 7th” to “7th” or “number 7,” and if I’m really lucky, that the structure be more consistent and pleasing to a keen reader’s eye. JizzyRizz (talk) 07:56, 19 January 2024 (UTC)

@JizzyRizz: I've taken on board your suggestion as I re-wrote this sentence. I removed the reference citing '4th most viewed', as the ranking excludes some sites, and it just generally introduces confusion. It's also currently listed as number 6 on the most visited list, up from number 7. I've retained the 'in the world' wording, as I think it's often used to qualify these things (for some people, Internet does not imply world). Thanks. -- zzuuzz ^(talk) 21:02, 19 January 2024 (UTC)

Harder to find links

Links on the Wikipedia page, and all of them, turn black when clicked instead of purple, which makes it harder to find them again and get to the topic I want after I have lost it. Can this issue be fixed please? -Different Hums 2406:3003:2077:173E:FC5E:50AC:A8EA:6BC9 (talk) 14:47, 9 February 2024 (UTC)

Already being worked on. In the future, please report technical issues at WP:VPT - this page is only for discussions concerning the improvement of Wikipedia's article on itself, as the banner at the top says. 57.140.16.1 (talk) 15:22, 9 February 2024 (UTC)

Thanks. I reported here because it was my first time with an issue. I didn’t know there was a page for technical issues until you pointed it out to me. 2406:3003:2077:173E:58F3:72B2:3A81:68F1 (talk) 02:24, 10 February 2024 (UTC)

I see there's no matter on my mobile. The links are blue as normal. 2001:EE0:4BC4:4240:71D2:A29:A5C4:100E (talk) 15:54, 9 February 2024 (UTC)

Oops. It remains blue still after even clicking links. Maybe my phone works well. 2001:EE0:4BC4:4240:71D2:A29:A5C4:100E (talk) 15:57, 9 February 2024 (UTC)

CEO of Wikipedia

@Randy Kryn Hi, CEO at its article is defined as

A chief executive officer (CEO) (executive officer, or just chief executive (CE), or as managing director (MD) in the UK) is the highest officer charged with the management of an organization – especially a company or nonprofit institution.

The highest officer is a very important person that many decisions should be made with her. The introduction of such an important person in Infobox is very helpful. But the highest officer does not exist for Wikipedia, but maybe its duties are delegated to its upper officer.

Wikipedia is hosted and funded by the Wikimedia Foundation, a non-profit organization which also operates Wikipedia-related projects such as Wiktionary and Wikibooks.

Making such decisions for Wikipedia as well as Wikicommons and others is done by Maryana Iskander. And introduction of her in Infobox is very helpful. Thanks, Hooman Mallahzadeh (talk) 14:19, 14 February 2024 (UTC)

Hello Hooman Mallahzadeh. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, not a non-profit organization. You are thinking of the Wikimedia Foundation, which owns, funds, and maintains the encyclopedia via equipment and legal assistance. But there is no CEO of Wikipedia, the title does not have a place in the day-by-day and case-by-case managing hierarchy. Randy Kryn (talk) 14:36, 14 February 2024 (UTC)

@Randy Kryn I have a question:

• If someone wants to propose an idea for Wikipedia, for example, he proposes a new Logo for it (because he is making a more informative one) who should he talk to? Probably Maryana Iskander makes the final decision. Am I wrong?

It proves that these duties are delegated from "CEO of Wikipedia" office to "CEO of Wikimedia" office. Hooman Mallahzadeh (talk) 14:49, 14 February 2024 (UTC)

Interesting question. But no, she could not change the logo, the Wikipedia community as a whole would have to discuss and "vote" on such a change (as far as I know anyway, maybe I'm mistaken but I would think that the CEO stays as hands-off Wikipedia as possible. Please see Wikipedia:Wikipedia logos for a history of the globe-logo). Others who work for the Foundation, and would be working under the CEO, may read this and hopefully comment. May be worth pinging Jimbo Wales, who would have organizational insight on your question and interest in adding the CEO to the infobox. Randy Kryn (talk) 15:01, 14 February 2024 (UTC)

Lede mention of systemic bias criticism

Should the lede mention systemic bias criticisms? They’re not a really prominent part of coverage of Wikipedia. Zanahary (talk) 04:28, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

Yes, it should. Whether people talk about it or not, it's still a significant aspect of Wikipedia. HiLo48 (talk) 04:55, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

What do you mean by “whether people talk about it or not”? If it’s not a prominent theme in Wikipedia’s coverage in reliable sources, we should reflect that here. Zanahary (talk) 05:52, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

But people DO talk about it. A lot. There's thousands of articles on Scholar about this problem. It's the most significant criticism of WP and shouldn't be removed from the lead for WP:NPOV. Larataguera (talk) 12:34, 9 March 2024 (UTC)

Extended-confirmed-protected edit request on 16 April 2024

I will like to have full right to edit any pages on this website. I wont do any random some promise 139.130.63.38 (talk) 06:19, 16 April 2024 (UTC)

 Not done: this is the talk page for discussing improvements to the page Wikipedia. If possible, please make your request at the talk page for the article concerned. If you cannot edit the article's talk page, you can instead make your request at Wikipedia:Requests for page protection#Current requests for edits to a protected page. CMD (talk) 06:24, 16 April 2024 (UTC)

Extended-confirmed-protected edit request on 21 April 2024

In the ==Policies and content== section, in the last paragraph before the ===Content policies and guidelines=== section, please make a couple minor grammar edits.

Current text: "...the category namespace (which are a collection of pages...". Please change "are" to "is" since "collection" is a singular noun.

Current text: "...there have been various books and reading list..." Please change the word "list" to plural "lists". BackspaceSomethingElse (talk) 15:30, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

 Done, thanks! Cocobb8 (💬 talk • ✏️ contribs) 16:00, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

"From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia" listed at Redirects for discussion

The redirect From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia has been listed at redirects for discussion to determine whether its use and function meets the redirect guidelines. Readers of this page are welcome to comment on this redirect at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2024 April 27 § From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia until a consensus is reached. NotAGenious (talk) 17:06, 27 April 2024 (UTC)

Revert last edit seems fine

Censorship... country's goverments seems redundant. Better restore to censorship... national governments. 2001:EE0:4BCA:B460:49A4:5AB0:3C6E:D99E (talk) 11:24, 10 March 2024 (UTC)

 Done, thanks, your concern makes sense. This was a new edit and have asked that it be talked-paged if the editor wants to return it. Randy Kryn (talk) 11:34, 10 March 2024 (UTC)

Folklore: Is This Or Is This Not A Current Endeavour?

Folklore: Is this a current endeavor? I have seen it in one instance but when I looked for it, I couldn't find it as an endeavour; only as pages of the many different cultural references and other relevant information, including detailed definitions and information therefore. Please, if this is a current endeavour, contact me. I am quite interested in this topic! Reikimom333 (talk) 00:03, 13 February 2024 (UTC)

Try Folklore and category:Folklore, that should lead to many other pages on Wikipedia. Quite a good collection here. Thanks for checking and not giving up (probably not the page for it but who knows). Randy Kryn (talk) 00:59, 13 February 2024 (UTC)

Many thanks, Randy Kryn. I'm just so glad to find such a collection of folklore that is here. It could always use more, and I shall keep the hope for more and future contributions. Reikimom333 (talk) 17:50, 1 April 2024 (UTC)

Punctuation error

The end of the third paragraph says “While the reliability of Wikipedia was frequently criticized in the 2000s, it has improved over time, receiving greater praise from the late 2010s onward. while becoming an important fact-checking site.” There’s a period there that should be removed or replaced with a comma. Pittypotty (talk) 06:18, 30 May 2024 (UTC)

 Done GSK (talk • edits) 06:26, 30 May 2024 (UTC)

Edit request

Change from: "Statistical analyzes suggest that the committee ignores"...

To: "Statistical analyses suggest that the committee ignores"...

The plural of 'analysis' is 'analyses'. This is in the section "Arbitration Committee". Buenovale (talk) 15:36, 14 July 2024 (UTC)

 Done Hyphenation Expert (talk) 15:59, 14 July 2024 (UTC)

Extended-confirmed-protected edit request

Please change from: "Statistical analyses suggest that the committee ignores the content of disputes and rather focuses on"...

To: "Statistical analyses suggest that the English Wikipedia committee ignores the content of disputes and rather focuses on"...

This is in the section titled "Arbitration Committee".

Reason: This doesn't apply to Wikipedias in other languages. Buenovale (talk) 16:36, 14 July 2024 (UTC)

 Done Buenovale (talk) 17:19, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

Erasmus Prize (2015)

The text says in the section "Cultural influence" - awards: "In 2015, Wikipedia was awarded (both) the annual Erasmus Prize, which recognizes exceptional contributions to culture, society or social sciences," It would be good / nice / fair to add, that the prize specifically has been awarded to Wikipedia as a community - the collective enterprise of tens of thousands of volunteers who, worldwide, offer support to build the initiative" (Original text in Dutch: "De prijs werd in het bijzonder toegekend aan Wikipedia als community – de gezamenlijke onderneming van tienduizenden vrijwilligers die, wereldwijd, helpen om dit initiatief vorm te geven." see: website erasmusprijs.org) Thanks! VanArtevelde (talk) 17:39, 4 April 2024 (UTC)

About Wikipedia!

Hi to whoever edits Wikipedia articles!

First off, I understand that every article’s “talk” page in Wikipedia is for discussing improvements to their Main article and they’re really not a forum for general discussion of the article’s subject. But …

2nd of all, I believe Wikipedia should have a “2nd talk” page for every Wikipedia Article, mainly for General Discussion of the main article’s subject. I may even want to discuss the main subject with Wikipedians only and nobody else on social media elsewhere (such as YouTubers, Facebookers, Quorans, people from X (formerly known as Twitter) and Reddit).

Overall, there should be 3 tabs for every subject on Wikipedia, which are …

“Article”, “Main Talk” and “General Talk”! Then everyone can keep the “Main Talk” page for discussing “Improvements” to Wikipedia’s Main Article only and everyone can keep the “General Talk” page for asking questions and discussing everything else related to the article’s main subject, if it’s not about “how to fix the article’s main page with improvements”. 🙂

This is what I want to see as an update for Wikipedia and all of its articles, as soon as possible. Craig Lungren (talk) 05:04, 6 June 2024 (UTC)

 Not done: This page is for discussion of the article about Wikipedia, not for discussion of Wikipedia itself. GSK (talk • edits) 06:24, 6 June 2024 (UTC)

Thanks GSK for reminding me of that, and I understand that this current page is for exactly what you said, but I am stating a point that there should be a 3RD PAGE mainly for Discussion of the Wikipedia Article itself! 🙂 Craig Lungren (talk) 17:31, 6 June 2024 (UTC)

And this isn't the right place for that discussion. As the big red box at the top of the page header says: This page is for discussion of the article about Wikipedia, not for discussion of Wikipedia itself. Try WP:VILLAGEPUMP Meters (talk) 17:41, 6 June 2024 (UTC)

@Craig Lungren: Please read WP:TALK#REVISE. It is not appropriate to modify your post after it has been replied to. Meters (talk) 19:44, 6 June 2024 (UTC)

Nice one Dude, but it is not at all inappropriate to modify my own post, whether it has been replied to or not. What you said is non-sense and could not exist as a rule.

A message like what you are saying, is so inappropriate to even say. I wouldn’t care if someone else edited their own post after it has been replied to by whoever else. I would not be telling them anything like your non-sense - if I notice the new edit that they’ve made in their own post. 🙂 Craig Lungren (talk) 20:51, 6 June 2024 (UTC)

Read the link, and drop this. Meters (talk) 22:00, 6 June 2024 (UTC)

I can look at the link, but I won’t drop this. Craig Lungren (talk) 00:09, 7 June 2024 (UTC)

If you're not going to drop this, I will open a discussion on you at WP:ANI, because it's becoming more and more clear that you are not here to contribute to the encyclopedia in any meaningful way and that you are treating Wikipedia as a battleground. You are picking fights with people that do not share your point of view, you are ignoring advice to take your ideas to the correct venue, and this kind of behavior is not tolerated on Wikipedia. I really do not want to have to open a discussion regarding your behavior here, but if you keep this up, I will not hesitate to escalate this to the Administrators' Noticeboard. You can choose to do better and to be better. No one but you can make that choice for you. GSK (talk • edits) 01:16, 7 June 2024 (UTC)

"Copycats"

This section dosen't seem to be very well made. "Russians" dosen't tell me who made it, probably shouldn't even use the term "copycats", it's really short, and even has a red link. It's like it had no research when making it. Should we just remove it or no? CheeseyHead (talk) 16:20, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

Yes, that's not a good example of Wikipedia editing at all. The title Copycats is just silly. Almost childish. While Wikipedia is still available in Russia, this is hardly news at all. The sources for the Russian version are both rather negative; not the sort of thing we would normally call reliable. The Persian language link is just odd. I'd be happy to see the whole subsection disappear. HiLo48 (talk) 02:08, 11 June 2024 (UTC)

I'll do it. CheeseyHead (talk) 18:11, 13 June 2024 (UTC)

Extended-confirmed-protected edit request on 13 May 2024

Anchor Text: the original is broken in live

Broken link: https://rogchap.com/2011/09/06/top-40-website-programming-languages/

Text found in the line : Archived from the original on September 22, 2013. Retrieved September 6, 2011 SpintaDigital (talk) 09:47, 13 May 2024 (UTC)

 Not done: The link linked under "the original" is supposed to be broken. If you check out citation #2 in the references list, you will see that there are two links: one that links to the original, broken page, and one to a web.archive.org version that is still accessible. Cocobb8 (💬 talk • ✏️ contribs) 12:33, 13 May 2024 (UTC)

I think a better source for that link in the infobox would be [3] Johnjbarton (talk) 19:07, 9 September 2024 (UTC)

I am kind of new here so please be more specific 😬😬😬 41.115.124.157 (talk) 18:51, 9 September 2024 (UTC)

"VVikipedia" listed at Redirects for discussion

The redirect VVikipedia has been listed at redirects for discussion to determine whether its use and function meets the redirect guidelines. Readers of this page are welcome to comment on this redirect at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2024 September 13 § VVikipedia until a consensus is reached. Largoplazo (talk) 02:39, 13 September 2024 (UTC)

"WİKİPEDİA" listed at Redirects for discussion

The redirect WİKİPEDİA has been listed at redirects for discussion to determine whether its use and function meets the redirect guidelines. Readers of this page are welcome to comment on this redirect at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2024 September 13 § WİKİPEDİA until a consensus is reached. Largoplazo (talk) 02:40, 13 September 2024 (UTC)

Wikipedia...

Wikipedia is nice but anyone can edit it and put unreliable stuff on there. So how do you know of what your reading is true. 2600:1005:A009:E1A9:407E:E303:66AA:D7E3 (talk) 01:27, 15 September 2024 (UTC)

Please read Wikipedia:Verifiability and how Talk pages are not forums. Johnjbarton (talk) 01:36, 15 September 2024 (UTC)