Summary: Commemoration of the dead was a significant theme in the list this week, as the top three slots were taken up by the beloved poet Maya Angelou, dead this week at 86, environmentalist pioneer Rachel Carson, and Memorial Day, the US holiday for commemorating its war dead. Even Mark Twain's eerie prediction of his own death, in which he hoped to go out with Halley's Comet, and India's favoured method of disposal of remains, cremation, got onto the list thanks to Reddit. Memorial Day is also a linchpin in the US summer movie season, which continued to dominate the list alongside summer must-watch TV series Game of Thrones and singer of the summer Iggy Azalea. And speaking of India, it also had a strong presence this week, as it slowly unravelled the implications of its recent political earthquake.
For the week of May 25 to 31, the 25 most popular articles on Wikipedia, as determined from the report of the 5,000 most viewed pages, were:
One of America's most popular contemporary writers, Maya Angelou died this week at the age of 86. Since delivering a recitation at Bill Clinton's inauguration (the first poet to give an inaugural recitation since Robert Frost) she became an intellectual celebrity across all boundaries.
The last Sunday in May (that's May 26 this year), the day that the United States chose to honour its war dead, is perhaps better known as the traditional beginning of US summer vacation, and is thus eagerly anticipated by millions of people too young to serve but old enough to stand in line for action movies.
I came in with Halley's comet in 1835. It is coming again next year, and I expect to go out with it. It will be the greatest disappointment of my life if I don't go out with Halley's comet. The Almighty has said, no doubt: "Now here are these two unaccountable freaks; they came in together, they must go out together." So said Mark Twain in his autobiography in 1909, and it turned out he was right. He died the day after the comet's 1910 perihelion. This curious fact managed to spawn a Reddit thread this week (the OP wondered, I hope jokingly, if the fact that he was born when Halley returned in 1986 meant he was a reincarnation of Mark Twain- respondents were lukewarm to the notion).
This article suddenly reappeared in the top 25 a few months ago after a long absence; it's always difficult to determine the reasons for the popularity of website articles (how many are simply missed clicks on the Google search list?) but there are a number of possibilities: first, it released its digital media player, Amazon Fire TV on April 2, and second, it is currently embroiled in a dispute with publisher Hachette, a spat with potentially world-shaking implications as to whether book publishers even need to exist in the post-digital world.
X-Men: Days of Future Past, Bryan Singer's cross-generational collaboration uniting his original cast of fogies with their younger selves introduced in X-Men: First Class, earned $90 million in its first weekend, but seems not to be generating the fire of other Marvel Comics franchises. Still, it appears to have triggered interest online.
The third-person adventure game in which hacking is a significant game mechanic has been hyped to the roof as the showcase for the eighth generation of video game consoles. Well, it worked; the game has sold 4 million copies in its first week.
En Sabah Nur, the First One; towering, 5000-year-old uber-mutant and de facto "Big Bad" of the X-Men universe got a now-traditional post-credits cameo in preparation for his cinematic début in the upcoming X-Men: Apocalypse.
It took 29 months and 820 qualifying matches involving 207 national teams representing more than 99 percent of the world's population, but we now have the final 32, complete with the traditional first timers (Bosnia), the heavy favourites (five-time winners and hosts Brazil), dark horses (Honduras) European stalwarts (Germany, Spain, England, Italy, France) and African hopefuls (Ivory Coast, Ghana, Nigeria, Cameroon). Now all that remains is to see whether Brazil can get its act together and finish construction in time for the games' launch on 12 June. And if they can pull that off, they may even be able to explain why they built a 42,000-seat stadium in the middle of the Amazon jungle.
The Indian politician, onetime model, and incumbent Minister of Human Resource Development got into the news this week when it was pointed out, somewhat harshly, that India's educational resources were now in the hands of a woman with only a high-school qualification. That may be why she got on here; of course, the fact that the first word to come after her name in Google's suggestion box is "hot" suggests there may be other reasons.
Disney's rather startling subversion of one of their most popular tales has left an aftertaste in critics' mouths (its Rotten Tomatoes rating is currently just 50%) but audiences have been positively scarfing it; it's earned $88 million in less than a week.
Thanks to an effective ad campaign and a sound economic record as Chief Minister of the state of Gujarat, Modi led his Hindu nationalistBJP to victory with a stomping 282 (52%) seats. A Hindu nationalist and a member of the RSS, Modi is considered a controversial politician and debate still surrounds the extent of his role in the 2002 Gujarat riots during his tenure as Chief Minister. The Indian National Congress, the party that has mostly led India since its independence, came in second with 44 seats, its worst showing in any election in India's history.
The controversial amendment to the Indian Constitution, which grants special legal status to Jammu and Kashmir, has re-entered the news this week, as some see the first majority government in decades as in a position to repeal it. Under the current system, citizens of Jammu and Kashmir are citizens both of their region and of India, outsiders are forbidden from owning property and all laws passed by the Indian Parliament must first be ratified by the Kashmiri state government; a situation widely seen as unfair.
The Australian/American rapper released her début album, The New Classic on 21 April, and the Gods of Pop Culture have declared her single "Fancy" to be the Song of the Summer.
It seems that Hollywood's trust in Gareth Edwards, director of the microbudget scifi flick Monsters, was well placed, as his take on the Godzilla mythos has emulated its eponymous hero, stomping the box office to dust with $93 million in its first three days. Critics seem to like the movie too; it's Rotten Tomatoes rating is currently 73%. Personally, I had issues with it, but then, what do I know?
Wikipedia's article on the ritual burning of dead bodies became the subject of a Reddit thread due to the sad posthumous fate of a 200 kg Austrian lady whose immense fat reserves managed to clog up the filters and nearly incinerate a crematorium.
The rapper has plenty of reasons to be here: first, he was convicted on 13 May of being a felon in possession of a firearm, and sent to prison until 2016. As if that wasn't enough, a false rumour circulated that he had died in his cell. He hadn't. To top it off, he released his latest mixtape, Brick Factory: Volume 1, on 28 May.
This list excludes the Wikipedia main page, non-article pages (such as redlinks), and anomalous entries (such as DDoS attacks or likely automated views). Please keep in mind that the explanations given for these articles' popularity are, fundamentally, guesses. Just because I can't find a reason for an article to be included doesn't mean there isn't one; conversely, just because a plausible reason is found for a view spike, that doesn't mean it wasn't due to a bot.
There are a number of articles that reappear frequently in the top 25 for no determined reason, and have been excluded as likely being due to automated views. Please feel free to discuss any removal on the talk page if you wish.
IPv6: I have to face facts; I allowed this into the top 25 for months as it is the kind of issue that would appeal to web denizens (ala Bitcoin) but its insane popularity is just too high explain by human interest alone. It's getting help.
Climatic Research Unit email controversy: And it's back. It says something about this manufactroversy that someone feels the need to shove it repeatedly down our throats, as if that were the best way to get people to believe it.
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