Kaitlyn Graber, Kenny Henault, Mike Hoelzel, Aaron Hall
Wikipedia is the 5 th most popular Web site in the world Roughly 325 millions monthly visitors Founded by Jimmy Wales in 2001 as an online encyclopedia with provided feedback from experts. The term “wiki” is the Hawaiian word for fast— therefore Wikipedia was designed in hopes of speeding the pace of other online encyclopedias.
Despite popularity with the public, volunteers who write, edit, and police Wikipedia are quitting. Net losses have accelerated over the past year—Wikipedia suffered a net loss of 49,000 editors in comparison to the 4,900 loss in The “free encyclopedia anyone can edit” is facing major decline in reliability due to errors and deliberate false additions
One factor in the decline of volunteers is that many topics have already been written about. Many rules have been adopted to control Wikipedia, specifically to reduce differing opinions in controversial matters Wiki’s struggles raise questions about “crowdsourcing” or allowing large numbers of individuals to work on a single task without rules of traditional organizations
As Wikipedia ages, it is becoming less permissive and is adding more rules. Many new volunteers are finding that their posts have broken a rule—and have been deleted.
Wiki founder, Jimmy Wales, recognizes that the Wikipedia community has become unfriendly to new users and claims that it is a correctible problem Top priority is to improve the accuracy of Wikipedia’s articles. With this push—all edits will be required to be approved by top editors before published to the site.
Collaborative software fostered a unique form of online governance. One of the main principles is that decisions are based by consensus-building One original unbreakable rule is that articles must be written from a neutral point of view. Another is that anyone is able to edit articles
Foundation employs 34 people, most of which in San Fransisco—to run the site’s computers, planning and serve as it’s public face. As it’s fiscal year ended in June, Wikimedia reports $5.6 million in expenses—as it’s funds operate mostly through donations and campaining.
Wikipedia is now a constant target for vandals who post intentional false information or slander. In 2005, John Seigenthaler Sr; a journalist, wrote about his own write-up which unjustly accused him of murder—ending in bad press for Wiki. Wikipedians began calling for better patrolling of articles.
New antivandalism features were enacted including “semiprotection”, which prevents newcomers from editing certain articles. In 2008, editors deleted one in four contributions from infrequent contributors— a jump from one in ten in The wikimedia Foundation is seeking to increase participation, however; overall number of participants isn’t a big focus.
There were a lot more participants in the early days when anyone could write about anything. Seminars are being held world-wide to increase participation