User:Soperm/subpage

Wikipedia Contribution Reflection

“Soperm, you are invited to the Teahouse!” The first message I received on Wikipedia was a welcoming invitation from an automated bot. The invitation was to group created as a friendly space for new users of Wikipedia to meet friendly, experienced users and ask questions. The purpose of the group is to ease newcomers into Wikipedia and to give them a specific page to ask questions where a helpful user will respond, instead of asking a question on an article’s talk page and risking a response from a jaded user. When I created my Wikipedia article for the Friends of the Public Garden, I expected responses from bots right away and helpful, or angry, users later. My experience with moderation on Wikipedia was, however, very neutral. It exemplified the attitude on Wikipedia towards Newcomers. The only interaction I had during this experience—outside of the class—was with a user to whom I sent a Barnstar. The Teahouse offers a pleasant space for beginners, but the welcoming environment is, for the most part, contained within that page. Once newcomers leave it to edit real articles, they are no longer guided by patient teachers. My overall experience on Wikipedia taught me that while there is a strong focus on content, the community is not friendly towards newcomers.

The goal of Wikipedia is to create a comprehensive encyclopedia that can be changed and updated with newfound information. The purpose of the site is to create and edit articles to ensure accuracy and uniformity. I experienced the collaborative editing and moderation on Wikipedia almost immediately. I first posted my Wikipedia article Friends of the Public Garden in the mainspace on February 17th. Less than two hours after posting, a user had made an edit to my page. The edit was a simple “Uncategorized” category tag, which was not a great help to the article itself, but it showed how quickly other users could find and review my article. I lightly edited my article after the original posting, and received helping hands from four additional users. The users changed the title of the article so that all of the words were capitalized (diff), added categories to the page (diff), corrected the references section (diff), and fixed the photo and info box on the article—which I had been struggling with (diff). My experience was so positive, it was easy for me to forget that the users were working on my article to improve its presence on Wikipedia, not to help me personally. The users who edited my article had various identifying tags on their pages, including Uncategorized Task Force, Random Page Patroller, and New Page Patroller. These particular users had assigned themselves the duty of reviewing new articles, random pages, and uncategorized articles to help integrate them into Wikipedia. Other people in the class had a different experience with Wikipedia. Many had templates put on their articles, marking them as promotional or alerting that the point of view was not neutral, or had angry editors delete their page. I had followed Wikipedia’s instructions for a perfect article and had followed the instructions as closely as possible throughout the writing process, which I believe caused the editors to add positive changes to my article rather than tear it down. There were no comments on my article’s talk page from editors, positive or negative. The users had done what they considered their job and moved on, which is helpful for the articles, but does not make a friendly experience for a newcomer like me.

In Building Successful Online Communities, Kraut and Resnick outline ways that a community can welcome and assimilate a newcomer into the community’s culture and norms. The steps include recruiting, selection of users that fit the community, retention, socialization of newcomers with experienced users, and protecting the community from mistakes that the newcomer may make. Wikipedia fails to socialize users, and instead focuses on protecting the site. While this is overall beneficial, it does not make Wikipedia an enticing community for newcomers. If a new user is not completely committed to improving Wikipedia’s articles, the coldness that they often experience could drive them away. Wikipedia has guides for user conduct and community guidelines which include Be Nice, Assume Good Faith, and Please Do Not Bite the Newcomers. While posting pro-social norms like this is meant to improve user behavior, in practice, many Wikipedians continue to act in what they believe is the best interest of the website and do not concern themselves with the feelings of the newcomers. I did not personally experience the angry comments or actions of an experienced Wikipedia user, but I did not receive any support or interaction from the users who edited my page. Their focus was on fixing the article, not on welcoming the newcomer. There does not seem to be a space on Wikipedia for a connection over and conversation about a shared interest outside of mutually editing an article.

Wikipedia has developed methods of increasing positive interactions between users. Wikilove is a concept of showing kindness and appreciation around Wikipedia. Users can post Wikilove on another user’s page, which can range from a picture of a kitten to a Barnstar. Barnstars can reward people for editing a vast amount of articles, for taking pictures that they add to Wikipedia's archive, for helping others or for a variety of other reasons. For the Gratitude assignment, I put a Random Act of Kindness Barnstar on the user talk page of the Wikipedian who had edited the part of my article that I had been struggling with. The user was clearly actively editing many articles, as I was one of 36 users commenting and thanking the editor. In response, the user wrote “Glad to help, article is good, thanks”. It was a short interaction, but as a newcomer, the simple exchange made me feel more like a part of the community. Some of the other comments on the user's page asked clarifying questions about the edits that the user had made, and he responded to each and every one with a detailed answer. It seems that while the overall community of Wikipedia is content-focused, the focus can also lead to positive interactions. I realized that, while many of my classmates were having negative experiences with Wikipedians, it was still possible to have a positive interaction if you look for it.

My overall experience with Wikipedia was positive. I was helped by diligent moderators, and though I believe that the community of Wikipedia is content-focused and interactions are too purpose-driven to leave room for welcoming newcomers, there are users who will act as a kind helping-hand. However, the newcomers are thrown into the community to sink or swim, and, from my experience, it is only those who independently seek out assistance that find it. With movements on Wikipedia that emphasize gratitude, I believe that the community can improve on an interpersonal level, which will help it improve overall. Moderators create an excellent website, but a lacking newcomer experience.