User:Zazalong/Report

My experience in Wikipedia:

Editing a Wikipedia article is interesting and engaging, but it also can be challenging. First, I need to learn how to use Wikipedia, like evaluating an article, making a comment on others, and following the norms and rules. There are many tasks to do for new users to be familiar with Wikipedia. Although those tasks are not complex, I need to spend all my attention on those tasks to know how Wikipedia works. Second, I need to search and gather resources, which is the most challenging part. The article that I am editing is a Chinese company, and it is difficult for me to search for accurate resources and news for that company in the US. Since there are only a few resources about this company and I am not allowed to use the information from its official website, I need to compare different journals or news to find the correct one. In the end, I need to rephrase and summarize those resources and make my article live on Wikipedia. Although rephrase can be time-consuming, this is the easiest part for me. Rephrasing is simple, but I still need to take care of the norms for rephrasing and avoid plagiarizing. It gave me a sense of achievement after moving my article from sandboxes to the article page. Editing a Wikipedia article helps me improve my knowledge, like avoiding plagiarism and writing in a neutral, but also helps me be persistent and patient.

What is unique about Wikipedia:

Wikipedia has made lots of successful rules and decisions. For me, the three most successful things that Wikipedia has done is that it has clear norms and rules, it has a clear rewarding system, and it grows a niche. Wikipedia has many explicit norms to regulate behaviors like Neutrality, Assuming good faith, and Being bold. Those norms will help me build an article effectively and help me to know what to do when I have conflicts with other users. Wikipedia has a clear rewarding system. The best way to get contributions is to pay for the users. Wikipedia pays the active users with privileges and badges, making active users more willing to make contributions. Wikipedia also has growing niches like WikiProject, WikiEducation, and WikiProject Council. The expanding niches help Wikipedia expand over time and help Wikipedia attract more readers and users.

Advice to Wikipedia:

Based on my own experience with Wikipedia, I summarized four pieces of advice to improve for them. First, Wikipedia can enhance the design of the website. They could redesign their website by adding more pictures and reducing some words to make their website more attractive. Second, they need to enhance the motivations for new users. Wikipedia can ask old users to encourage new users when the new users make contributions. Wikipedia can also offer money rewards like a gift card when new users make a significant contribution. Third, making the resources cited to be more accurate. Wikipedia needs to check the resources that users cited to ensure they are accurate. They can also build a list for reliable resources comers and unreliable sources comers like some unreliable journals or media. In the end, Wikipedia needs to protect communities from harmful behavior by newcomers. They could make a test for newcomers, and only those who pass the test can edit the real articles.

Reasons for my first advice:

Although the Wikipedia website is clear and easy to use, the website's design might be out of date compared to other websites. For example, people now prefer to read more pictures instead of reading words. There are also too many links on their website. Those links can be integrated and make the website more clear. A good web design is also a signal of future success, which can help them attract more users. In this case, I believed that Wikipedia could enhance the website's design.

Reasons for my second advice:

Creating external rewards or motivators is a good way to motivate participation in online communities. Actually, without the requirement from my instructors, I may not finish my article in the end. Creating or completing an article is complicated and time-consuming. Without external rewards, the new users are less motivated to complete an article with nothing to do with their work or study. Encourages from the old users will help new users to build an affective commitment to the online community. By making new users feel more close to individual members within a community, they are more willing to participate and contribute.

Reasons for my third advice:

Users now need to identify a resource cited, whether reliable or not, by themselves. If the users choose an improper or inaccurate resource, the unreliable resources will negatively influence the article's content. With the increase of the accuracy of the articles, more users will build a need-based commitment to using Wikipedia, and the number of users will increase as well.

Reasons for my least advice:

Protecting communities from harmful behavior by newcomers is an essential part of dealing with newcomers. Wikipedia has sandboxes to help newcomers to build their articles. However, some users may come with spite. Without a protection system, like a test to complete before editing, some users may intentionally destroy the community by leaving offensive messages and adding the wrong information to articles.