Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/Single/2023-05-22
Golden parachutes: Record severance payments at Wikimedia Foundation
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The Wikimedia Foundation released its Form 990 tax return for 2021 on 9 May 2023. This shows that outgoing CEO Katherine Maher was paid a severance package of US$623,286 in 2021 – slightly more than one-and-a-half times her base compensation in her last full year at the Wikimedia Foundation. So Maher – who left Wikimedia at the end of April 2021 to join the Atlantic Council and currently serves on the US Department of State's Foreign Affairs Policy Board – earned a total of US$798,632 in the 2021 calendar year.
COO Janeen Uzzell, who was hired by the Wikimedia Foundation in late January 2019 and left at the end of June 2021 to become the CEO of the National Society of Black Engineers on 7 July 2021 (see also the profile in this issue's In the media section), received a severance package of US$324,748 in 2021. This is roughly equivalent to her last full annual salary; she earned a total of US$515,553 from the Wikimedia Foundation in 2021.
The severance payments made in 2021 set a new record for the Foundation. The highest previous severance payment was US$262,500. Paid to outgoing CEO Lila Tretikov in 2016, this was about 75% of her last full year's salary.
The Foundation noted in its post on the Wikimedia-l mailing list that it would in future use a new, standardised severance policy for staff at all levels, described in a Diff post published last month.
The new policy sets a cap on severance pay of one month's salary for each year worked at the WMF, up to a maximum of nine months (unless local law dictates otherwise). Under this scheme both Maher and Uzzell, who spent less than two-and-a-half years at the WMF, would have qualified for much smaller severance payments. But even the new scheme allows for "exceptions":
The guidelines have also provided an opportunity to better align our processes globally when staff leave the Foundation. This includes a new standardized severance policy for staff at all levels of one month of severance pay for every year of their employment, up to nine months (unless local laws require otherwise) – any exceptions require a joint recommendation by the Head of Talent & Culture and the General Counsel, with final approval from the CEO.
So it seems by no means assured that the new policy will prevent the recurrence of such large severance payments – which are ultimately paid from global Wikipedia donations.
Discussions during the 18 May conversation with the WMF Trustees
Former WMF Board of Trustees Chair Florence Devouard asked some further questions about the new severance policy on the mailing list, which she then also submitted as discussion topics for the Conversation with Trustees that took place on 18 May 2023 and is available on YouTube.
The discussions related to executive pay took up about 15 minutes of the 80-minute meeting, beginning here at time code 23:42 and ending at time code 38:36. First, WMF trustee Nataliia Tymkiv took the following question:
"I would like to know the trustees' characterisation of the growth of executive compensation and whether they think reducing it to historical levels is preferable to layoffs."
Nataliia said that while US compensation may seem high to someone from Europe, it was data-based rather than based on fundraising success and always reflected local salary levels, adding that going back to past compensation levels was not feasible:
"There is also no way of returning back to historical, unless we actually start hiring people who are really rich, and they can just allow to be philanthropic, and you know, not receiving salaries, but I think that's also not sustainable to just expect that rich people who don't need to care for their bread in the morning can just come and work for us."
Florence's questions
Next came some of the questions about the severance policy that Florence had submitted before the meeting:
- Is the one month of severance pay entirely based on the last month's salary, the last year or previous years?
- Will this policy affect severances for executives?
- For staff that are "exceptions", are there particular staff members that are able to negotiate exceptions when they join the Foundation, do they negotiate their exception when they depart, or is it something that can be discussed during their tenure?
- How many staff are considered "exceptions" and will there be a maximum number of exceptions?
These questions were partially answered (time code 28:47) by CEO Maryana Iskander. Maryana explained at length that the new severance policy was part of an effort to harmonise the Foundation's approach as much as possible across different countries, including for executives, but allowed that there would always be exceptions for various reasons. The policy might also need adjusting in the light of experience. However, she confirmed that the policy will take the last month of paid salary as the basis for calculating the severance.
This is an important point, as there have already been cases of Wikimedia executives being awarded steep pay rises towards the end of their tenure with the Foundation (see Wikimedia Foundation salaries on Meta-Wiki). Indeed, according to the Form 990, Katherine Maher was paid US$164,567 in base compensation for four months' work in 2021. This would appear to be equivalent to an annual base compensation of US$493,701, considerably more than her US$404,053 base compensation in 2020. Questions submitted by Florence that remained unanswered in the meeting were:
- When severance packages would be negotiated or re-negotiated
- Whether the WMF would report the numbers or percentages of staff qualifying for an "exception"
- Whether there were plans for a maximum severance for those in the exception segment (for example, at most x months per year of employment)
- Whether anything is being done to better address the serious escalation of severance packages of the high-level executives
Next, Maryana answered a question on whether there was an incentive system in place to invite Foundation staff to make donations to the Foundation or other Wikimedia entities. She said there was no such system in place, but some staff did voluntarily make such monetary contributions; many of course also volunteered on the projects.
Who approved these severance packages?
The next question was about who approved the above severance packages. Nataliia explained that the Wikimedia Foundation's Board of Trustees approved them (with input from the Talent and Culture Committee), but that severance agreements and related Board votes and resolutions were confidential and not made available to the public.
The last question in this section of the meeting concerned Maryana Iskander's and Selena Deckelmann's compensation. While their salaries were not yet reflected in the 2021 Form 990 (both only joined in 2022, and the 2022 data will only need to be reported in 2024), they were proactively disclosed a few weeks ago on Meta: Iskander's base compensation is currently US$453,000 and that of Selena Deckelmann, Chief Product and Technology Officer, is US$420,000. When asked if it was planned to make this kind of proactive disclosure of current executive compensation a regular practice, Iskander gave a non-committal answer:
"It's not clear that this type of disclosure will be necessary – now that it has been disclosed – in future years. But the intent certainly is to continue to use the Annual Plan as a place to increase visibility, transparency and accountability of information from the Foundation, I think with the intentionality that we, I hope, demonstrated this year."
For a summary of other topics discussed at the meeting see the notes on Meta-Wiki. – AK
Proposed amendment of arbitration policy
There is an ongoing referendum on a proposed amendment to the arbitration policy. The proposed amendment is:
The final sentence of Wikipedia:Arbitration/Policy#Appeal of decisions, which reads Remedies may be appealed to, and amended by, Jimbo Wales, unless the case involves Jimbo Wales's own actions
, is removed.
At the time of writing, "Yes" votes are outnumbering "No" votes 154:93.
– AK
Brief notes
- New administrators: The Signpost welcomes the English Wikipedia's newest administrator, Ingenuity (15 May 2023) with a near-unanimous 232 community members in support of their request.
- Articles for Improvement: This week's Article for Improvement (beginning 22 May) is Vandal Kingdom. It will be followed the week after by Japanese beetle. Please be bold in helping improve these articles!
History, propaganda and censorship
Wikipedia's World War II controversy attracts comments from opposing scholars
Scholars from both sides of the scholarly debate around World War II and the history of Jews in Poland are expressing their dissatisfaction with Wikipedia this week.
Shira Klein, co-author of the paper with Jan Grabowski that triggered the arbitration case on this topic area, criticized the Arbitration Committee's decision even before the case officially concluded. In a press release by Chapman University, she stated that the "Ruling on Wikipedia's Distortion of Holocaust History Lacks Depth". While the release acknowledges that the ruling includes a topic ban of "two distortionist editors" (appealable in 12 months), Klein argues that these "remedies lack depth and consequence" and that "[b]y ignoring the egregiously false content our article flagged for them and focusing only on editors' conduct (e.g. uncivil language), Wikipedia has once again failed, and miserably so." Fundamentally, she holds the view that ArbCom was ill-equipped to deal with the problem: "[Arbitrators] have zero content expertise, so they have no idea when an editor is spinning lies. More than that: They are bound by Wiki policy to steer clear of content. ArbCom was simply the wrong solution to begin with. What they should have done, which some editors suggested, was to ask historians for help."
Meanwhile, Richard C. Lukas, one of the scholars criticized in Grabowski and Klein's essay, published an editorial in the May–June issue of the Polish American Journal, titled "Is it History or Propaganda?" Lukas relates that after he had been "informed by interested friendly sources of the changes in my Wikipedia biography" that were prompted by the essay, "[m]y belief that the editors of Wikipedia genuinely tried to be fair and balanced in their presentations has been seriously shaken." However, he argues that "The larger issue is not Wikipedia but the hijacking of Polish wartime history by a group of Jewish historians who, in this post-fact world, seem more interested in exaggeration and hyperbole than in facts and analysis."
Whatever the merits and demerits of their respective arguments, it is clear that Wikipedia will never be able to satisfy everyone. – AK, H
Janeen Uzzell profile
Face2faceafrica.com has a celebratory profile of former Wikimedia COO Janeen Uzzell, titled: "How Janeen Uzzell rose through corporate ranks to manage a Wikipedia Foundation fund worth $4.5M". The piece describes her early decision to study engineering and her subsequent work for women in STEM at General Electric, for the Wikimedia Foundation and today as Chief Executive Officer at the United States' National Society of Black Engineers.
The 4.5M fund referred to in the headline is the controversial Knowledge Equity Fund held by Tides Advocacy (see previous Signpost coverage). Wikimedia CEO Maryana Iskander announced in January 2023 that the remainder of the fund would be moved back to the Wikimedia Foundation (see previous Signpost coverage). Janeen Uzzell was with the Wikimedia Foundation for just under two-and-a-half years; her executive compensation and very substantial severance, as disclosed by the Wikimedia Foundation in its recently published Form 990, are discussed in this issue's News and notes. – AK
In brief
- Legal maneuvers against Indian censorship: Further developments have emerged in the Indian court case concerning the documentary India: The Modi Question (refer to previous Signpost coverage): In response to a May 3 summons by an Indian court, the Wikimedia Foundation and BBC stated they had not been properly served according to the Hague Service Convention. As a result, they refused to accept service at the court, as they were appearing "under protest". The third foreign organization summoned, the Internet Archive, informed the court that it had already removed links to the BBC documentary. This action was taken in January following DMCA takedown requests from the BBC itself. Reports by ANI News and Times of India.
- Twitter censorship: Elon Musk, the Twitter boss, finds himself in hot water over censoring tweets in Turkey. Facing criticism, Musk defended his decision by saying that it was a choice between partial censorship or a complete Twitter blackout in Turkey. Meanwhile, Wikipedia's Jimmy Wales chimed in, proudly boasting how we fought Turkey all the way to the Supreme Court and emerged victorious. It seems even in the battle of censorship, Musk and Wales are tweeting from different playbooks! Reports by Fortune and Billings Gazette.
- How Kiwi comic got banned: On the the Australian TV show The Project, New Zealand comedian Melanie Bracewell confirmed that she and her sister had once been banned from Wikipedia for re-writing the articles of minor celebrities in the first person, so as to make them appear to be autobiographies (Video time code 3:51.)
- Techdirt on Chatbots: Techdirt reports that "Wikipedia Grapples With Chatbots: Should It Allow Their Use For Articles? Should It Allow Them To Train On Wikipedia?"
Final decision in "World War II and the history of Jews in Poland"
World War II and the history of Jews in Poland final decision
The final decision for the case "World War II and the history of Jews in Poland" was posted May 20, the day before publication of this issue of The Signpost.
The Arbitration Committee acknowledged that their acceptance of the case was "in response" to the February 9, 2023 publication of "Wikipedia's Intentional Distortion of the History of the Holocaust", authored by Jan Grabowski and Shira Klein, but reaffirmed that their review was solely concerning editor conduct, not to make a determination about the facts of history about which Wikipedia editors disagree, nor facts represented in the paper. (Reacting to the proposed decision in a university press release, Klein critiqued this same "policy to steer clear of content", see this issue's In the media: "Wikipedia's World War II controversy attracts comments from opposing scholars".)
The principles determined to be relevant to the case were an unsurprising recital of Wikipedia conduct standards such as battleground behavior, acceptable sourcing and source manipulation, and the role of the Universal Code of Conduct.
Findings of fact were likewise unsurprising, and noted defense of some parties by other parties. Findings included both exemplary community-mindedness – helping to find consensus on difficult issues, for example – and behavior that is not commensurate with community standards.
The decision includes "standard" remedies:
- Topic bans for various parties to the case
- François Robere, My very best wishes, and Volunteer Marek were topic banned from the areas of World War II in Poland and the History of Jews in Poland, broadly construed
- Interaction bans for various parties to the case
No editor was banned from Wikipedia in the final decision, although a proposal to do so was made (see below), and GizzyCatBella was blocked by the committee as a sockpuppet of Jacurek while the case was still ongoing.
In addition, there is now a new "reliable sourcing restriction" in the topic area, which reads as follows:
All articles and edits in the topic area of Polish history during World War II (1933–1945) and the history of Jews in Poland are subject to a "reliable source consensus-required" contentious topic restriction. When a source that is not an article in a peer-reviewed scholarly journal, an academically focused book by a reputable publisher, and/or an article published by a reputable institution is removed from an article, no editor may reinstate the source without first obtaining consensus on the talk page of the article in question or consensus about the reliability of the source in a discussion at the Reliable Sources Noticeboard. Administrators may enforce this restriction with page protections, topic bans, or blocks; enforcement decisions should consider not merely the severity of the violation but the general disciplinary record of the editor in violation.
This new sourcing restriction replaces a similar but discretionary restriction that had been instituted as part of the 2019 Antisemitism in Poland case and strengthened in 2021.
Of note is a lengthy section on the proposed decision page written by arbitrator Wugapodes, "Wugapodes' rationale" for an editor ban, which seems to be in alignment with their 2021 Signpost opinion piece "The (Universal) Code of Conduct"; and principle 16 of the Arbitration Committee's final decision, also concerning the UCoC:
The Universal Code of Conduct (UCoC) defines a minimum set of guidelines of expected and unacceptable behaviour. The English Wikipedia has developed policies and guidelines (PAG) that add to this minimum that take account of local and cultural context, maintaining the UCoC criteria as a minimum standard and, in many PAGs, going beyond those minimums. Therefore, the Arbitration Committee, as an identified high-level decision making body under the UCoC enforcement guidelines, may choose to evaluate compliance with English Wikipedia PAG, while still respecting the UCoC.
This is the first major ArbCom decision following the Foundation's ratification of the UCoC Enforcement Guidelines this March (see previous Signpost coverage). In this decision, ArbCom appears to be setting up a precedent for their own role in adopting its authorities. Whether the UCoC is or should be a source of authority was debated by the Committee, but with seemingly little dissent from an affirmative decision.
Create or curate, cooperate or compete? Game theory for Wikipedia editors
A monthly overview of recent academic research about Wikipedia and other Wikimedia projects, also published as the Wikimedia Research Newsletter.
Cooperative creators "lose ownership" of their Wikipedia contributions, but the community's NPOV governance should still be "kept limited"
"A game-theoretic analysis of Wikipedia's peer production: The interplay between community's governance and contributors' interactions"[1], published earlier this month in PLoS ONE, investigates what it calls fundamental but still unresolved questions about "the way in which governance shapes individual-level interactions" in peer production.
Specifically, the authors build a complex game theory model to answer the following two research questions about English Wikipedia, and validate its predictions empirically by examining the revision histories of 864 articles (up to 2012):
- "RQ1: What is the optimal strategy for a contributor who is attempting to balance the costs and benefits of peer production? Namely, how many sentences within an article should be owned by a contributor that is characterized by a certain cooperative/competitive orientation and a particular creator/curator activity profile?
- RQ2: How does the community governance mechanism, particularly the attempt to ensure a NPOV, affect the dynamics underlying Wikipedia's co-production process?"
These concepts are operationalized as follows (among other variables used to construct the the quantitative model):
- "Owned" here refers to having authored text that persists in a Wikipedia article, surviving subsequent revisions (as opposed to ownership in the sense of contributors being entitled to a form of control over the content – a notion that, as the authors discuss, is explicitly discouraged by the community). An editor's utility – i.e. the benefit that they derive from contributing to Wikipedia – is modeled using both their individual "fractional ownership" and the communal "benefit derived from the co-production of high-quality articles".
- An editor's "creator/curator" orientation is quantitatively represented by a metric that assumes that "Creators are characterized by large-size edits [..]; curators’ edits are smaller".
- The "cooperative/competitive orientation" was quantified "based on [contributors'] role in the community (those closer to the community’s core are assumed to be more cooperative)." Based on previous research, editors were "organized in four strata, reflecting contributors’ commitment and involvement within the community: unregistered members, registered members, privileged members (holding a special privilege), and core members (i.e. administrators)." The authors theorize that "the greater one’s rights and responsibilities within the Wikipedia community, the more one is considered to have a cooperative orientation. Specifically, we assigned the values of 0.1, 0.4, 0.6, and 0.9 to the different strata (e.g., an administrator is assigned w1 = 0.1, reflecting the least competitive and most cooperative orientation)."
- Lastly, an editor's cost is quantified as the sum of
- a. "the effort expended in producing content and editing an article", where the authors "assume that changing an existing sentence requires less effort than originating a new sentence, such that the effort expended by a contributor is a linear function the contributor’s position in the creator-curator continuum" (obviously a simplification, considering that an editor's individual contribution may well vary between adding and changing content).
- b. "the effort associated with participation in coordination and administrative work, such as editing the articles’ Talk Pages". Again, the authors model this solely based on the editor's overall "cooperative/competitive orientation", reasoning that "This cost element is more applicable for the cooperative contributors".
- c. "the effort of complying with Wikipedia’s rules and policies, in particular, neutrality-enforcing policies. This effort is intended to regulate only the self-interest activities (i.e., attempting to 'own' article portions) and thus is more applicable to competitive contributors." It is modeled as being proportional to the number of "owned" sentences, multiplied by the editor's competitiveness factor and a variable representing the community's overall "level of neutrality enforcement".
_and_the_interactions_between_contributors_(Fig._1_from_Anand_et_al._2023)._journal.pone.0281725.g001.png)
The game theoretic model consists of two levels:
"[...] the first level models the interactions between individual contributors who seek both cooperative and competitive goals and the second level models governance of co-production as a Stackelberg (leader-follower) game between contributors and the communal neutrality-enforcing mechanisms."
A calculation of the model's Nash equilibrium (basically, a state where no individual "player" can improve their utility by making a unilateral change to their strategy) yields several rather complicated formulae (Theorems 1-4), from which the authors derive various overall conclusions, e.g. that
"[...] the contributor’s characteristics, or more specifically, the ratio between the contributor’s position on the creator-curator continuum and the contributor’s cooperative/competitive orientation is the factor that determines who ends up owning content. When this ratio is smaller than the group’s average, the contributor maintains ownership over portions of the article. Namely, under the governance mechanisms, the fractional content that is eventually owned by a contributor is higher for curators (i.e., with a typical small-size edit per sentence) with a competitive orientation (i.e., peripheral community members). In essence, creators with a cooperative orientation lose ownership of the article. This result was corroborated through [the] empirical analysis.
The authors explain that this means that
"[...]only those with a competitive orientation who choose to act as curators making small edits end up owning significant portion of the content. One might expect that the creators who contribute more content (and in the process exert more effort) would end up owning much of an article’s contents. In contrast, the results of our game-theoretic analysis implies that when competing over content ownership in the presence of Wikipedia’s governance to ensure neutrality, and when controlling for one’s cooperative/competitive-orientation, the creators of content who make on average large contributions would eventually not own any content."
The second "key result" from the game-theoretic analysis is that
"[...] excessive governance should be curtailed, by identifying and maintaining a permissible upper limit, beyond which it discourages contributors from making contributions to an article, bringing the co-production process to a halt. Furthermore, our empirical analysis suggests that a low level of governance is optimal for ensuring neutrality while maintaining articles’ comprehensiveness.
Based on this, the authors recommend that
[T]he community’s efforts to govern content creation and ensure neutrality, although essential for maintaining a balanced position, should be carefully monitored and kept limited. The reason is that when the 'tax' imposed on contributors in terms of complying with NPOV norms, policies and procedures is too high, it outweighs the benefits associated with content ownership, such that contributors stop competing for ownership (and in effect, co-production is stalled)."
See also previous coverage of related research by one of the authors (Ofer Arazy from the University of Haifa)
Other recent publications
Other recent publications that could not be covered in time for this issue include the items listed below. Contributions, whether reviewing or summarizing newly published research, are always welcome.
"Defying easy categorization: Wikipedia as primary, secondary and tertiary resource"
From the abstract:[2]
"This article sets out to explore the different categories of source that Wikipedia could be defined as (primary, secondary or tertiary) alongside the varied ways in which Wikipedia is used, which defy easy categorization, exemplified by a broad-ranging literature review and focusing on the English language Wikipedia. It concludes that Wikipedia cannot easily be categorized in any information category but is defined instead by the ways it is used and interpreted by its users."
(We note with delight the mention of the Twitter feed associated with this research newsletter: "Serendipitous discoveries of relevant research were also made via the WikiResearch Twitter account @WikiResearch, the 'Wiki-research-l' mailing list and the Wikimedia Research biannual reports.")
"Conflict dynamics in collaborative knowledge production. A study of network gatekeeping on Wikipedia"
From the paper:[3]
"We study gatekeeping on Wikipedia by analyzing networks of deletions among editors. Factors considered to explain the emergence of these networks are editors’ information production capability, their range of activity, their communicative ties, their geographical location, and their past interactions. [...]
Highlights: [...]
- Editors’ past interactions affect gatekeeping conflicts on Wikipedia.
- Disputes among Wikipedians reflect the lines of historical conflicts to some extent.
- In- and Outgroups based on editors’ real-world attributes influence gatekeeping."
[...]
We drew our sample of articles from the French and Spanish language versions of Wikipedia, respectively. These are the most likely versions where editors from France or Spain and editors from Algeria or former Gran Colombia engage with one another, since the former colonizer’s language is either an official language or widely spoken in the successor states [...] and editors are drawn toward larger versions of Wikipedia. [...] we identified 111 unique relevant articles for both Algeria and the four successor states of Gran Colombia. We retrieved the complete revision history of these articles up until January 1st, 2019, [... and] were able to attribute each character of an article’s text to its author throughout the entire revision history. With this information we could identify who deleted the contributions of whom.
"Understanding Open Collaboration of Wikipedia Good Articles with Factor Analysis"
From the abstract:[4]
"This research aims at understanding the open collaboration involved in producing Wikipedia Good Articles (GA). [...] We propose an approach that first employs factor analysis to identify editing abilities [of contributors] and then uses these editing abilities scores to distinguish editors. Then, we generate sequence of editors participating in the work process to analyse the patterns of collaboration. Without loss of generality, we use GA of three Wikipedia categories covering two general topics and a science topic to demonstrate our approach. The result shows that we can successfully generate editor abilities and identify different types of editors. Then we observe the sequence of different editor involved in the creation process. For the three GA categories examined, we found that [...] highly scored content-shaping ability editors [tend to be] involved in the later stage of the collaboration process."
"Power Distance and Hierarchization in Organizing Virtual Knowledge Sharing in Wikipedia"
From the abstract:[5]
"The authors posed the question whether and to what extent the differences in the cultural dimension of the power distance [an anthropological concept theorized by Geert Hofstede] are reflected in the functioning of the Wikipedia community. How the hierarchization of the organizational structure may influence the organization of knowledge sharing processes is also studied. The authors selected for the research the Wikipedia language versions which were mostly edited by the communities from homogeneous national cultures. The method used was quantitative analysis of the activity of Wikipedia users intended for establishing the general rules of cooperation, as well as an analysis of the distribution of user rights in the context of the social structure of individual versions. Research has shown that with the rise of the power distance, the power structure is becoming more hierarchical. However, the users with administrative rights and users without administrative rights are equally committed to joint rule-making. At the same time, it was found that in some cultures with a low power distance, the users do not show much attachment to the acquired rights. The opposite dependency was observed in countries with Orthodox and Islamic civilizations. [...]"
"Cultural Dimension of Femininity: Masculinity in Virtual Organizing Knowledge Sharing"
From the abstract:[6]
"The aim of the presented research was to identify the differentiation of the selected language versions of Wikipedia in the cultural dimension of femininity and masculinity. We answer the questions whether these differences are reflected in the functioning of the Wikipedia environment and how this fact may improve organizing cooperation in virtual organizations to enhance knowledge sharing. The method of content analysis and analysis of the register of user activity in several fields of activity were adopted. For quantitative analysis, xTools and PetScan tools for generating statistical data were used. For qualitative analysis, chosen user pages and other public spaces were investigated. The results of the conducted research showed that in feminine cultures the relational dimension of activity in Wikipedia space was more important. Behavioural traits specific to task orientation were more pronounced in masculine cultures. In many language versions of feminine cultures, gender divisions were neither distinguished, nor exposed, thus making them more problematic to identify. [...]"
"Wikipedia as a Space for Collective and Individualistic Knowledge Sharing"
From the abstract:[7]
"The aim of the research presented in this paper was to identify the differentiation of language versions in the cultural dimension of individualism and collectivism. The research was both quantitative and qualitative. The authors selected Wikipedia language versions which were edited mainly by communities from homogeneous national cultures and with a minimum of 200 active users per month. The method used was the content analysis and the analysis of registers of user activity. The authors answer the question of whether these differences are reflected in the functioning of the Wikipedia environment. To answer the raised research question, three hypotheses were formulated. The relationship between the individualism index (IDV) of national cultures from which Wikipedians are recruited and the indicators of activity, while also the degree of regulation of activities in the project were examined. Research has shown that IDV is positively correlated with 1) the number of editions made per page which may be indicative of the greater courage to edit somebody else's text and 2) the ratio of the number of active users to the number of principles and recommendations, which means that actions on Wikipedia are relatively less frequently regulated in individualistic cultures. [...]"
From the "Conclusions" section:
"The results of the conducted research indicate that, with the adopted indicators, it is impossible to unequivocally state the influence of national culture on Wikipedia's organizational culture in terms of the degree of individualism. Of the three assumed hypotheses, two were positively verified and one was rejected. A small number of rules in relation to users and a large number of editions per page positively correlate with the level of the IDV. On the other hand the ratio of anonymous users to registered users is not related to the level of individualism."
References
- ^ Anand, Santhanakrishnan; Arazy, Ofer; Mandayam, Narayan; Nov, Oded (2023-05-01). "A game-theoretic analysis of Wikipedia's peer production: The interplay between community's governance and contributors' interactions". PLOS ONE. 18 (5): e0281725. Bibcode:2023PLoSO..1881725A. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0281725. ISSN 1932-6203. PMC 10150990. PMID 37126492.
- ^ Ball, Caroline (2023-03-21). "Defying easy categorization: Wikipedia as primary, secondary and tertiary resource". UKSG Insights. 36 (1): 7. doi:10.1629/uksg.604. ISSN 2048-7754.
- ^ Bürger, Moritz; Schlögl, Stephan; Schmid-Petri, Hannah (2023-01-01). "Conflict dynamics in collaborative knowledge production. A study of network gatekeeping on Wikipedia". Social Networks. 72: 13–21. doi:10.1016/j.socnet.2022.08.002. ISSN 0378-8733. S2CID 251892672.
- ^ Chou, Huichen; Lin, Donghui; Ishida, Toru (September 2022). "Understanding Open Collaboration of Wikipedia Good Articles with Factor Analysis". Journal of Information & Knowledge Management. 21 (3): 2250030. doi:10.1142/S0219649222500307. ISSN 0219-6492. S2CID 248882372.
- ^ Skolik, Sebastian; Karczewska, Anna (2021). Power Distance and Hierarchization in Organizing Virtual Knowledge Sharing in Wikipedia. Coventry, UK: Academic Conferences and Publishing International Limited. pp. 705–715. ISBN 978-1-914587-06-1.
- ^ Karczewska, Anna; Kukowska, Katarzyna (2021). Cultural Dimension of Femininity: Masculinity in Virtual Organizing Knowledge Sharing. Coventry, UK: Academic Conferences and Publishing International Limited. pp. 414–422. ISBN 978-1-914587-06-1.
- ^ Kukowska, Katarzyna; Skolik, Sebastian (2021). Wikipedia as a Space for Collective and Individualistic Knowledge Sharing. Coventry, UK: Academic Conferences and Publishing International Limited. pp. 459–466. ISBN 978-1-914587-06-1.
A very musical week for featured articles
-
2022–2023 California floods:
The damage from floods tore this road into parts
In this featured picture. It's by King of Hearts. —AC
We have a second poet this time, QuicoleJR, and it's great having them along! Figured it might not be the worst idea to sign poems if there's two of us, though. On my front, my penchant for taking songs and writing new lyrics to the opening lines of them hit a bit of an... interesting turn when I realised what the opening words were. You'll see it, I'm sure.
Things continue apace. I got to collaborate with MyCatIsAChonk on one of the featured pictures in this issue; that was fun. This issue will (hopefully) also contain the finale of my history of April Fools' on Wikipedia, which is a little awkward in mid-May, but, well, volunteer site.
Hope everything's going well for all of you! And to the contributors of all the hard work, well, as Puck says:
- If we shadows have offended,
- Think but this, and all is mended,
- That you have but slumbered here
- While these visions did appear.
- And this weak and idle theme,
- No more yielding but a dream —S
Featured articles
Twelve featured articles were promoted this period.
- Chilean cruiser Esmeralda (1883), nominated by The_ed17 (a.k.a. Ed)
- The first "protected cruiser", with an archéd armoured deck,
- It's innovative in some ways, but its design is kind of dreck. —AC
- 1981 World Snooker Championship, nominated by BennyOnTheLoose
- Snooker is the sport, you see;
- Steve Davis won the whole tourney;
- The Crucible Theatre hosted again;
- See you at the next event, my friend! —QJR
- "Telephone" (song), nominated by FrB.TG
- Hello, hello, Lady Gaga?
- I listened to your song
- I liked the music video
- At the prison, yeah, yeah
- Wha-wha-what did you say?
- Oh, you're breaking up with me
- By killing me with Beyoncé?
- ...I'm kinda busy. —AC
- 1894–95 New Brompton F.C. season, nominated by ChrisTheDude
- New Brompton made their league debut,
- They started out in Division Two,
- They won a match against Swindon Town in the end,
- And got moved up a league, where we saw them again.—QJR
- Panagiotis Kavvadias, nominated by UndercoverClassicist
- He helped excavate artifacts in Greece,
- And would not let smugglers steal in peace.—QJR
- William D. Leahy, nominated by Hawkeye7
- This man served in World War II;
- Did it as a senior, too;
- Chief of Staff to the Commander in Chief;
- I'd like to say more, but let's keep this brief. —QJR
- "Hey Stephen", nominated by Ippantekina
- Mmm mmm mmm mmm-mmm mmm-mmm,
- Mmm mmm mmm mmmmm-mmm,
- Mmm mmm mmm mmm-mmm mmm-mmm mmm,
- Mmm mmm mmm, yeah.
- Hey Stephen, that's a lot of hummy breathin'
- But Taylor's wrote it into you.
- But with that start to this part
- Now I didn't say half the things I wanted to. —AC
- Guitar Songs, nominated by Your Power (a.k.a. Elias)
- Billie Eilish softly sang while a guitar gently played,
- Telling of her friend's near-death and her grief o'er Roe v. Wade. —AC
- Hurricane Ophelia (2005), nominated by Cyclonebiskit
- The name is apt: Ophelia drowned
- As did many an N. C. town. —AC
- Shooting of Stephen Waldorf, nominated by HJ Mitchell (a.k.a. Harry Mitchell)
- The London Metropolitan Police
- In incompetence never cease.
- They shot an innocent man, and then
- Thought he was the one shooting, and shot him again.
- When he collapsed when they were done
- A third cop thought he was reaching for a gun.
- I think the conclusion has by now come forth:
- Every cop wants to shoot at poor Waldorf. —AC
- "Me Too" (Meghan Trainor song), nominated by MaranoFan (a.k.a. NØ)
- A song 'bout loving yourself, Megan Trainor sang,
- She is quite happy with her body.
- The music video got pulled: Why did she object?
- Changed her waist! Show her some respect, yo! —AC
- Al-Musta'li, nominated by Cplakidas (a.k.a. Constantine)
- Al-Musta'li rose up to caliph, we fear,
- Through the machinations cunning of a vizier.
- While, within a story, such tropes might be ripe,
- 'Tis rare to see a real vizier stereotype. —AC
Featured pictures
Thirteen featured pictures were promoted this period, including the images at the top and bottom of this article.
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Florence Price by George Nelidoff, restored by MyCatIsAChonk -
Frederic Edwin Church by Napoleon Sarony, restored by Adam Cuerden -
Passiflora edulis fruits by Ivar Leidus -
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Poster for The Geisha by David Allen and Sons, restored by Adam Cuerden -
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-
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.jpg)
_male_Peten.jpg)
_Copan.jpg)
Featured lists
Five featured lists were promoted this period.
- List of Kentucky Wildcats men's basketball head coaches, nominated by Newtothisedit
- Twenty-two coached the Wildcats in basketball,
- Adolph Rupp won the most of them all.—QJR
- List of Top Selling Rhythm & Blues Singles number ones of 1965, nominated by ChrisTheDude
- Billboard stopped ranking these, but no more;
- Rhythm and blues are what's in store.—QJR
- List of basal superasterid families, nominated by Dank
- There are many of these plants with flowers,
- Including beets and flytraps, and big cactus towers.—QJR
- List of birds of Wallis and Futuna, nominated by AryKun
- Three islands in Polynesia, a French collectivity,
- Wallis and Futuna for birds have proclivity. —AC
- List of Hot R&B Singles number ones of 1962, nominated by ChrisTheDude
- All the way back in 1962;
- Billboard ranked rhythm and blues;
- For ten weeks, Ray Charles stood on top;
- Dance crazes were around, and would not stop!—QJR
Coronation, chatbot, celebs
- This traffic report is adapted from the Top 25 Report, prepared with commentary by Igordebraga, TheJoeBro64, SSSB and Max BuddyRoo.
"Jerry! Jerry!" Now the crowd starts their favorite chant (April 23 to 29)
| Rank | Article | Class | Views | Image | Notes/about |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Jerry Springer | 
|
2,704,171 | 
|
Jerry! Jerry! Jerry! Jerry! The former mayor of Cincinnati turned icon of 'trash TV' with an eponymous series that was the standout point and laugh show and even inspired a Weird Al parody, Jerry Springer died at 79 of pancreatic cancer. |
| 2 | ChatGPT | 
|
2,150,517 | 
|
People still interested in AI. I don't have much to say about it other than "it's bad" and I'm too lazy to write a full blurb. (And yes, as I wrote this, I realized I could ask ChatGPT to write me one. And no, I'm not going to.) |
| 3 | 2023 NFL Draft | 
|
1,448,974 | 
|
American football picked its newest college graduates to make a professional jump, led by the Carolina Panthers choosing Bryce Young. |
| 4 | Harry Belafonte |
|
1,379,958 | 
|
Death came at 96 to the musician responsible for popularizing calypso music with hits like "Day-O (The Banana Boat Song)", "Jump in the Line (Shake, Senora)", and others that didn't appear in Beetlejuice, and with a prolific film career as well (a career shared by daughter Shari Belafonte). |
| 5 | Tucker Carlson |
|
1,210,153 | 
|
On Friday, April 21, the controversial Fox News host—who's attracted intense criticism and advertiser boycotts for his remarks on race and women, not to mention his promotion of January 6th conspiracy theories—signed off his talk show by saying, "we'll be back on Monday!" Well, that Monday morning, April 24, Fox fired him. Whether it was due to Fox's defamation settlement with Dominion Voting Systems, Carlson's internal criticism of Fox leadership, a pending lawsuit alleging a toxic work environment, or some combination of those three factors remains unclear. |
| 6 | Kisi Ka Bhai Kisi Ki Jaan |
|
1,013,196 | _(cropped).jpg)
|
The Bollywood action flick climbed from its position on this list last week as became one of the year's highest-grossing Hindi films so far. |
| 7 | Evil Dead Rise |
|
1,001,882 | 
|
Although Mario continues to dominate cinemas (at least until the release of Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3), this low-budget addition to the Sam Raimi-created Evil Dead franchise had no problem recouping its budget, even without Bruce Campbell as Ash Williams. |
| 8 | Deaths in 2023 |
|
990,491 | 
|
How 'bout unabashedly bawling your eyes out? How 'bout not equating death with stopping? |
| 9 | Gervonta Davis | 
|
868,455 | 
|
This boxer is still undefeated after 29 matches, following a successful title defense against Ryan Garcia on April 22. |
| 10 | Whitney Houston |
|
800,963 | 
|
Whitney Houston: I Wanna Dance with Somebody might not have earned entries here while in theaters or HBO Max, but once it got to Netflix's catalogue, an influx of viewers checked our article on the singer whose equally successful and tragic story was told in that film (where Whitney was played by Naomi Ackie). |
Hey (hey) what's the matter with your head, yeah (April 30 to May 6)
| Rank | Article | Class | Views | Image | Notes/about |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 |
|
1,935,502 | .jpg)
|
Breaking a streak of three Marvel Cinematic Universe movies that did not take the top spot of this Report upon entering theaters, the "bunch of a-holes" who against all expectations became one of the most popular teams out of Marvel return trying to save a furry psycho. Writer-director James Gunn (whose involvement in the film saw a slight delay due to the alt-right, during which he managed to land a movie and a job in the Distinguished Competition) manages to weave well comedy, action and drama, which translated into positive reviews and big box office numbers (nearly $300 million in a weekend!). |
| 2 | Alan Rickman |
|
1,889,935 | 
|
On April 30, the late English actor (who most audiences will probably recognize as Hans Gruber from Die Hard or Severus Snape from Harry Potter) was honored with a Google Doodle commemorating anniversary of Les Liaisons Dangereuses' Broadway premiere, which helped launch his career. |
| 3 | ChatGPT |
|
1,683,770 | 
|
Chatbots and other AI-made writing are still a big point of discussion, to the point it's one of things brought up in the 2023 Writers Guild of America strike. |
| 4 | Charles III |
|
1,408,865 | .jpg)
|
Nine months after his mother Elizabeth II died and left him the throne of the United Kingdom, Charles had a ceremony to be properly crowned. And the UK wouldn't even get a rest from big events afterwards, as the following week Liverpool hosted the Eurovision Song Contest 2023. |
| 5 | Gordon Lightfoot |
|
1,118,866 | _(cropped).jpg)
|
One of Canada's most admired songwriters, with fans like Bob Dylan, Gordon Lightfoot died at 84, less than a year after his final concert. |
| 6 | Karl Lagerfeld |
|
1,001,864 | 
|
This year's Met Gala was themed after this famous stylist who died in 2019 and was a close friend of organizer Anna Wintour. Lagerfeld's controversies, as among other things he was accused of being fatphobic and Islamophobic, led to some protests, including going against his quote "Think pink. But don't wear it." by attending the ball in lightish red. |
| 7 | Charlotte of Mecklenburg-Strelitz | 
|
985,253 | 
|
The title character of Queen Charlotte: A Bridgerton Story, a spin-off to the popular Bridgerton series which premiered on Netflix May 4. |
| 8 | Deaths in 2023 |
|
959,477 | 
|
Staring at the sea Staring at the sand Staring at myself Reflected in the eyes of the dead man on the beach... |
| 9 | Cinco de Mayo |
|
955,724 | 
|
Literally translating to the “Fifth of May” in Spanish, Cinco De Mayo celebrates the Mexicans triumphing over the French in 1862. |
| 10 | George III | 
|
928,040 | 
|
You might think his position on this list is due to the coronation of #4. But his presence here is actually linked to Queen Charlotte: A Bridgerton Story – a fictional take on his romance with #7. |
Killing for religion, something I don't understand (May 7 to 13)
| Rank | Article | Class | Views | Image | Notes/about |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | The Kerala Story |
|
2,299,171 | _(2).jpg)
|
Another Indian movie on the list, this time based on the Islamophobic conspiracy theory "love jihad", where a group of women from Kerala convert to Islam and join ISIS, has received awful reviews from critics, and also getting push-back from the Indian National Congress and the Communist Party of India (Marxist) for "defaming the state of Kerala and promoting the agenda of the Sangh Parivar". Despite this, it's become the 3rd highest grossing grossing Hindi film of 2023. |
| 2 | Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 |
|
1,955,778 | .jpg)
|
The Marvel Cinematic Universe's most unexpected success story returned for a third go, and has already earned better reviews and box office than Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania. |
| 3 | Charlotte of Mecklenburg-Strelitz |
|
1,908,758 | _-_George_III_and_Queen_Charlotte_-_RCIN_403546_-_Royal_Collection.jpg)
|
Netflix released the Bridgerton spinoff Queen Charlotte: A Bridgerton Story, centering around a Queen of the United Kingdom during both the end of her life and her romance with King George III. |
| 4 | George III |
|
1,896,483 | ||
| 5 | ChatGPT |
|
1,759,107 | 
|
People are still intrigued and worried by AI, which is already becoming a co-author of scientific papers. |
| 6 | Eurovision Song Contest 2023 |
|
1,650,872 | 
|
This here writer arrived in Liverpool to find a chaos of blocked streets and such around Lime Street, and this musical extravaganza was to blame. Sweden won with the song "Tattoo". |
| 7 | Charles III |
|
1,303,416 | _(cropped).jpg)
|
Nine months after his mother died and made him king at the ripe age of 72, Charles had a proper coronation. |
| 8 | Hannah Waddingham |
|
1,249,873 | .jpg)
|
#6 had as one of its hosts this British actress best known as Rebecca from Ted Lasso, who among other things made a moving eulogy out of a Rick Roll. |
| 9 | Robert De Niro |
|
1,097,400 | 
|
One of the greatest actors in history, who later this year will see his 11th(!) movie with Martin Scorsese released, revealed he just fathered a daugther at the age of 79. |
| 10 | 2023 SEA Games |
|
1,049,182 | 
|
Cambodia hosted this multisport event, with the most medals going to Vietnam. |
Most edited articles
For the April 8 – May 8 period, per this this database report.
| Title | Revisions | Commentary |
|---|---|---|
| Deaths in 2023 | 1777 | The obituary is always busy. Deaths not listed above include Len Goodman, Barry Humphries, Jock Zonfrillo, Tori Bowie and Manobala. (and even if it's out of the Anglosphere, I feel obligated to mention Rita Lee) |
| Coronation of Charles III and Camilla | 1451 | The reason why this here writer's visit to London couldn't include entering Westminster Abbey, and had plenty of jewelry missing at the Tower of London. |
| 2023 World Snooker Championship | 1418 | Liverpool hosted this pool tournament, won by Luca Brecel of Belgium - the first ever champion from a non-Anglophone country, as well as breaking a streak of 4 English and 13 British winners. |
| List of guests at the coronation of Charles III and Camilla | 1146 | Just about the entire British monarchy (albeit Charles' son Harry was without his wife and kids) and world leaders attended the ceremony. Among normal celebrities, Russell Crowe is seemingly too uncouth to be invited. |
| 2023 NBA playoffs | 1112 | Basketball hit the postseason, with a few upsets for the higher seeds in round 1 (the team with the best regular season fell to another that almost didn't get a spot, the second and third best teams of the West fell victim to the more victorious Los Angeles Lakers and Golden State Warriors), and the Phoenix Suns continuing their existence of over 50 years without a title by losing in round 2. |
| The Super Mario Bros. Movie | 1047 | The Nintendo adaptation became the first film of the year, and the first post-pandemic animated feature, to pass the $1 billion mark. It's a significant achievement, especially for a video game-based film—for context, the previous highest-grossing video game movie, 2016's Warcraft, managed only $439 million. All it needs now is a sequel featuring Joey Diaz and Willem Dafoe as Wario and Waluigi and then I'll be satisfied. |
| SpaceX Starship orbital test flight | 1037 | It would be nice if like promised by many science fiction works there were off-world human colonies by 2023. Instead Elon Musk's company built a massive launch vehicle, even bigger than the ones that sent men to the Moon, and it exploded a few minutes after take-off due to engine failures. |
| 2023 Sudan conflict | 1969 (967 as 2023 Sudan clashes) |
An armed conflict began in Sudan on April 15 after months of rising tensions between the Rapid Support Forces and the Sudanese government. So far, the violence has claimed almost 600 lives. |
| World Chess Championship 2023 | 985 | Kazakhstan held a decisive match of grandmasters, with Ding Liren becoming the first Chinese titleholder, beating someone from the country mostly associated with chess dominance - albeit for obvious reasons Ian Nepomniachtchi is like other Russian athletes currently playing for no flag. |
| Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 | 848 | A possible make it or break it point for the MCU given how reception for the post-Avengers: Endgame movies have been. Thankfully reviewers and audiences alike approved the return of Star-Lord and co. |
| 2023 ACC Men's Premier Cup | 839 | The first of two cricket tournaments among the most edited, this here being a qualifer for the 2023 Asian Cup, hosted and won by Nepal. |
| 2023 Southeast Asian Games | 806 | The medal table among the 11 contestants had Vietnam at first, hosts Cambodia in fourth, and right afterwards the Philippines, whose significant English-speaking population at times brings entries to the Traffic Report. |
| 2023 NFL Draft | 750 | Two days were spent to organize the transition from college football to professional one. |
| 2023 Stanley Cup playoffs | 715 | Hockey has been delivering many surprises in its postseason (and even before, as superstars Sidney Crosby and Alexander Ovechkin failed to qualify). The team with the best regular season ever was beaten by another which only won one round between 1996 and 2022, the defending champions were eliminated by a team in only its second season of existence, the league's most valuable franchise finally won a round after 19 years... |
| 2023 Indian Premier League | 710 | While the excessive mobile views make this article be excluded from the regular Traffic Report, frequent updates on India's tournament for their favorite sport enable it for a spot in this one. |
Exclusions
- These lists exclude the Wikipedia main page, non-article pages (such as redlinks), and anomalous entries (such as DDoS attacks or likely automated views). Since mobile view data became available to the Report in October 2014, we exclude articles that have almost no mobile views (5–6% or less) or almost all mobile views (94–95% or more) because they are very likely to be automated views based on our experience and research of the issue. Please feel free to discuss any removal on the Top 25 Report talk page if you wish.
Wikipedians Convene for Queering Wikipedia 2023: The First International LGBT+ Wikipedia Conference
Wikipedia is a heavily relied-upon source for LGBT+ information on the Internet. Wikipedia articles provide millions of people with information about LGBT+ topics across culture, history, health, law and justice, biographies, and more. Behind these articles are Wikimedians, who edit to maintain the integrity of Wikimedia platforms and information on LGBT+ topics and advance representation across many languages.
Documenting queer topics on Wikimedia projects is a challenging task. For example, the question of how to write biographies of LGBT+ people from the past is a very significant one. Usage differs across languages and evolves; people may not have expressed themselves in the terms used today. Such complex issues were at the core of Queering Wikipedia's May 2023 programs.
Queering Wikipedia Online May 2023
On May 12, 14, and 17, 2023 Queering Wikipedia 2023 was hosted by Wikimedia LGBT+, Queering Wikipedia Organizers, and partners. Queering Wikipedia was an online conference with 12 distributed trans-local, in-person meetup Nodes in 5 continents. Queering Wikipedia provides opportunities for LGBT+ Wikimedians, allies and guests to celebrate the vibrant community working to advance representation on Wikipedia and Wikimedia projects, and to organize conversations to further develop this work.
Presentations, panels, and workshops during the QW2023 online conference program included conversations about developing best practices; safety and wellbeing; gender and Wikidata; community engagement and strategy; ethics and AI; and the nuances of translating terms important to identity. Presentations and discussions provided insight into LGBT+ rights in many regions, including: Ecuador, Indonesia, Nigeria, Poland, Rwanda, Singapore, South Africa, and Bahrain. WMF staff also presented on these issues; the WMF Human Rights Team presented on "Human Rights Amid Rising Anti-LGBTQ Efforts", followed by a live Q&A with Maggie Dennis, Vice President, Community Resilience & Sustainability.
Queering Wikipedia 2023 celebrated the launch of Wikipedia and the Biographies of LGBTQ+ People – a translation and localisation of the Spanish-language guide produced by Wikimedia Argentina last year. As well as translating their original text Wikimedia Argentina worked with Art+Feminism and Wikimedia LGBT+ to add new essays from Argentinian travesti activist An Millet and British trans writer and heritage practitioner Kit Heyam.
Art+Feminism researchers presented on the report Unreliable Guidelines: Reliable Sources and Marginalized Communities in French, English and Spanish Wikipedias for the project "Reading Together: Reliability and Multilingual Global Communities", Amber Berson, Monika Sengul-Jones and Melissa Tamani, released June 2021.
Participants had the opportunity to propose and engage in brainstorming sessions, while the Creative Program included queer poetry performances and art uploaded to Wikimedia Commons.
Keynotes were delivered by Dr Nishant Shah, Professor of Global Media and Director of the Digital Narratives Studio at the Chinese University of Hong Kong's School of Communication and Journalism, and Esra'a Al Shafei, founder and Executive Director of Majal and WMF Board trustee since 2017, and were complemented by a panel discussion organized by Jenni Olson, Senior Director of Social Media Safety at GLAAD.
Another main attraction of the conference was its multilingual nature. There were translators between Spanish and English for many conference sessions, with some sessions also having interpreters for Turkish and Portuguese. Conference organizers focused on translation as part of a larger effort to de-center English and the English Wikipedia in LGBT+ Wikipedia efforts. Through coordinating discussions across languages, Wikipedians can explore shared goals, and the unique differences across Wikipedia language versions.
The full list of QW2023 events is available in the online conference program.
Queering Wikipedia node events held internationally
Autonomous Nodes also organized Queering Wikipedia events internationally. Nodes events were developed by local organizers and included panels and discussions, editathons, and "watch parties" of online QW2023 conversations and workshops.
- "Activismos y visibilidad Trans en internet", Online discussion panel on 12 May, and Encuentro LGBTQI+ para sumar juntxs on 17 May, in Bogotá, Colombia, hosted by Wikimedia Colombia.
- "Construcción de memoria LGBTT+ y Wikipedia", Panel in Buenos Aires, Argentina on 13 May, 2023, hosted by Wikimedia Argentina
- "Aproximaciones colectivas a la marcha del orgullo desde la experiencia universitaria", Meetup in Pucallpa, Perú, 12 May 2023, hosted by Wikimedistas de Perú
- Editatón Queering Wikipedia, Panel and Edit-a-thon in Mexico City, 13 May 2023, hosted by Wikimedia México
- Meetups in Lagos and Akwa-Ibom, Nigeria, 17 May 2023
- Meetup in Accra, Ghana, 12 May 2023
- Meetup in Vadodara, India, 14 May 2023
- Meetup in Amsterdam, the Netherlands, 17 May 2023, hosted at TechInc
- "Despite everything(?) – On the visibility of queer history on the internet", Panel in Berlin, Germany, 16 May 2023, hosted by Wikimedia Deutschland, in collaboration with
- Meetup in Zagreb, Croatia, 12–14 May 2023, hosted by Croatian GLAM and HrW initiative, with support of Multimedia Institute
- Meetup in New York City, US, 17 May 2023
- "Memorias LGBT y pasado reciente en Uruguay", Online panel in Montevideo, Uruguay, which will take place on 26 May 2023, hosted by Wikimedistas de Uruguay
Continuing efforts
Organizers hope to continue to the momentum developed during the conference through ongoing conversations and partnerships with LGBT+ Wikimedians and allies, and those interested in maintaining quality information about LGBT+ topics on Wikimedia platforms.
Wikimedia LGBT+ and Les sans pagEs invite participation in Wiki Loves Pride, an annual, global campaign to expand and improve LGBT+ content across Wikimedia projects. See: Wiki Loves Pride/2023.
Queering Wikipedia is an initiative of Wikimedia LGBT+, a Movement Affiliate, with funding from the Wikimedia Foundation. The mission of Wikimedia LGBT+ is to encourage LGBT+ cultural organizations to use Wikimedia projects and to adopt the values of free culture and open access; to promote Wikimedia projects as a tool for strengthening LGBT+ communities; and to create and expand the overall quality of content of interest to LGBT+ communities on Wikimedia projects in all languages.
Disclaimer: OwenBlacker was heavily involved in organising Queering Wikipedia and Hexatekin has provided administrative assistance with the conference. Jsamwrites is involved in related WikiProjects Wiki Loves Pride and Wikimedia LGBT+ but was not involved in organising Queering Wikipedia.