Upon reading the class syllabus and learning about our Wikipedia class assignment, I admit I was a little confused at first. I was primarily surprised to be working and editing Wikipedia because heading into the semester I initially was thinking of online communities in terms of more commonly thought of social sites such as Reddit and Facebook. Thinking back now, this was a naïve notion in that Wikipedia is one of the stronger and better examples of an online environment where individuals contribute, interact, and engage with the community. I quickly got over my surprise and began to get excited about the idea of contributing to a site that I so regularly visit and don’t feel guilty spending time reading articles. I believe there is a real purpose for online encyclopedias such as Wikipedia in that the Internet allows for the sharing of so much information and data, it is beneficial to have sites that educate individuals on an ever-expanding number of topics while providing them credible, impartial information. If it were to be without any flaws or imperfections, which I know from our class discussion is essentially impossible in building an online community, I think Wikipedia would be the ultimate example of the Internet being used in a positive manner around the world.^{[needs copy edit]}

The Assignment

Once our class was ‘briefed’ on the assignment and we set up our Wikipedia accounts, I began to think of contributions that I would like to make to the public encyclopedia. I was torn between selecting a topic off of the list provided by Amanda or choosing something of my own interest. I considered making a contribution related to my hometown and although there are certainly people, places, or things that I could have written intensively about, I ultimately decided that these things are more than likely more notable and important to me rather than the general public as a whole. So while I plan on adding more local-related articles in the future, for the purposes of the assignment I determined that I could better help the Boston community if I chose a topic more relevant to the city.

Looking through the potential topics list, I saw the request for Clarence "Jeep" Jones. I did a quick Google search and found that he was a community activist in the neighborhood adjacent to the one I’ve lived for the past three years (Roxbury). I felt that Jones’ history was material that I was interested in and was enough to make a good contribution for the assignment, but also could be a way for me to give back to the community that I’ve been a part of.

Becoming a Wikipedian - A Summary

Once my topic had been selected, I began to familiarize myself with the rules, regulations, and nuances of Wikipedia. I had no prior experiencing editing pages yet I understood the concepts and capabilities of the community. I mentioned previously that I am a regular reader of Wiki articles and as a result I feel as if I also had an understanding of the basic structure of articles as well as the quality of writing required to sound credible and educated to a degree. What I was not as familiar with was how to actually edit and provide a strong enough argument for the validity of my page.

Writing my article for the first draft in my sandbox wasn’t as hard as I had anticipated, as the library Archives have a recorded interview with Jones in which he details his life and career. Though I knew I couldn’t rely solely on this, it allowed me to write a detailed sandbox draft before finding other sources that could support his statements and accomplishments. I was a little slow in going live, and when I did my page was lacking some secondary sources.

I noted on the talk page of the article that this was part of a course and that I’d be continuing to add more material to the page as an indication that it wasn’t finalized. However, shortly after going live, I was notified that the article was up for deletion. I addressed the discussion for deletion and began to search for more sources as well as taking a photograph of the park named in Jones’ honor. After providing some reliable sources in the form of book citations and Boston Globe articles, Jones’ notability seemed to be better established. The ‘debate’ (loosely used) for deletion continued while I made some edits, but maybe I ought have made a stronger push and provided more concrete evidence in a more-timely manner. I think I was a little hesitant in my defense of a page, as I know that it is a community-owned article once I put it live. However, after a close vote and great contributions from other users, the article survived deletion and will, for now, remain in the Wikipedia database!

Take-Away

Looking back at the different stages of the assignment in relation to our discussions in class, some of the concepts we’ve reviewed were really made evident to me. As my knowledge of the site and commitment to my article started to develop, my desire to make more contributions also grew. I can attribute this to a few different factors, one being that as I learned more about Jones, I began to gain more interest in the topic as a whole. More so than that, however, was the engagement with other members of the Wiki community as well as my classmates. “Requests from high-status people in the community lead to more contribution than anonymous requests or requests from low-status members.^[1] In the cases of KDS and MelanieN, I’m not sure of the degree of their status within in the community, but compared to me, both were clearly established and well informed in multiple aspects of the contribution aspect. Their assistance and encouragement definitely motivated me to add more material to my page as well as ensuring that I was monitoring and addressing my articles discussion for deletion.

We’ve also discussed in our class and readings the aspect of gratuity in relation to newcomers’ commitment and contributions to an online community. When I received my first barn star from KDS for being a great new editor, I certainly felt more inclined to uphold the title and honor the recognition that had been bestowed upon me. Whether or not KDS thought I was actually “great” is a debate for another day, but what I do know is that he/she was being encouraging, supportive, and was appreciative of me joining the Wikipedia community. Though it is a simple gesture, similar to the cheeseburger shared with me by Shannon, the rewards of giving Barn Stars or WikiLove can be beneficial in that they can lead to greater contribution and stronger bonds between ‘old-timers’ and ‘newcomers’.^[2]

As for my classmates, my article got some support from Jessica as she linked her DSNI article to mine, which enabled me to remove my orphan tag. I also received advice from Shannon and help from Tate in uploading a photograph to my page. I could see that as our class progressed through the semester, our overall interest and engagement with our pages grew increasingly as we’d give more updates to one another in class. I believe that this carry-over of the online community into a real setting also strengthened our bonds to both Wikipedia as well as each other.

Conclusion

Though I will continue to polish and monitor my article page, I am happy with my contribution as a whole to Wikipedia thus far. This was a great guided learning experience that also allowed us to branch out on our own and be involved in contributing to both the Wikipedia community and our local Boston communities. Matt rodgers2 (talk) 14:49, 7 April 2015 (UTC)

References

^ Kraut, Robert; Resnick, Paul (2011). Building Successful Online Communities. MIT Press. p. 32.
^ Kraut, Robert; Resnick, Paul (2011). Building Successful Online Communities. MIT Press. p. 217.

[1] Kraut, Robert; Resnick, Paul (2011). Building Successful Online Communities. MIT Press. p. 32.

[2] Kraut, Robert; Resnick, Paul (2011). Building Successful Online Communities. MIT Press. p. 217.

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