Wikipedia talk:Survey 2008/Archive 1

Comment

NB: I'm primarily responsible for this project, together with Naoko Komura who has project managed it for the Wikimedia Foundation since September. I'm on Pacific Standard Time. I'm going to check in here a few times throughout the evening, but may not be able to respond until tomorrow. Please use info(at)wikipediastudy(dot)org for any highly relevant questions/comments regarding the functioning of the survey.

There's a cluster of 12 servers dedicated to handling survey responses, but if the survey completely breaks under load, please feel free to remove it from the MediaWiki:Anonnotice and MediaWiki:Sitenotice for now. Thanks,--Erik Möller 02:13, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Interesting, just finished the survey. Dinner time. 76.90.137.11 (talk) 02:00, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

"Have you ever considered contributing to Wikipedia (e.g. creating a new article, editing an article or participating in a discussion, etc.)?" seems to be a silly question given earlier in the survey I said "Yes, I am an editor and an administrator". Daniel (talk) 02:04, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Heya, just filled it out. :) BTW, I checked the main page at wikipediastudy.org, and it's still saying, "will present the data in Alexandria", so you might want to update that. Is there a previous set of data that's available? Also, a good FAQ question would be, "How long will the survey run?" --Elonka 02:23, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

What does "provisions for Wikipedia articles" mean? The options "DVD-ROM, book, kiosk" do not clarify this for me Shii (tock) 03:33, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

I presume it meant offline options for articles. But then under "other" I put "online". :-) Carcharoth (talk) 06:48, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

I also kind of gathered they meant "What would be a good way to distribute the encyclopeadia if we ever intended to do so" - either that, or "How could we advertise Wikipedia to the masses?" Shii is right though - that question was extremely confusing. I had to do a double-take, and even now I still come up with "It either means this or this". GrahamDo (talk) 11:37, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Yes, I didn't understand the "provision" question either, so just answered, "I don't know". --Elonka 15:21, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Number of articles edited

I checked this using a tool, and it seems I've edited nearly 11,000 separate articles. Not as a bot or anything, but just single edits here and there over the years as a wikignome. I suspect this is not what the question was asking, but I still put "over 500" anyway... :-) I've created around 30 articles, and substantially edited a number between 30 and 100, but I wouldn't know the exact number. If you asked me which ones I'd edited enough to be sure I would be happy "signing off" on the article for publication, that would be a different matter. I'd say "still a work in progress" for most of them. Carcharoth (talk) 02:23, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

I answered "8" to that question, as the edit counter I just ran shows I have edits to almost 10,000 articles, but I can only remember actually making substantial edits to a little more than a handful. I agree, that's probably the spirit of the question, so do try to answer that way if you haven't gotten to that point yet - if you already answered, don't worry about it, as their answers for that question will probably be a little confused anyway. Hersfold ^(t/a/c) 04:12, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Personally, this seems a bit suppositional to me, and since many people taking the survey will probably not be reading this comment section, I'm going to go ahead and answer the question literally. But that's just me. Dar-Ape 04:52, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

I think it's a mistake to try to second guess what we think the survey authors might have meant to ask. Since the WMF and the university decided that's the question they wanted to ask, let's take them at their word, and answer it. --HughCharlesParker (talk - contribs) 12:26, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Hersfold: which edit counter shows you how many articles you've edited? I'm probably being daft, but none of the edit counters I tried gave me that information. --HughCharlesParker (talk - contribs) 12:35, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

I use this one: Yar Hersfold ^(t/a/c) 21:33, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Wannabe kate also provides the number of unique pages edited. --Philosopher ^{Let us reason together.} 03:16, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

As it asked me for my id before it asked how many articles I had edited, I decided to guess c200 rather than look it up. It ought to be able to press a button on the survey to get the answer.--Peter cohen (talk) 17:34, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

See, I answered it literally, although now that I think about it that might not have made sense. Oh well. I think if they were going for actual number of edits of articles they would have not had 1-500 and 500+ as options, since they would have realized there will otherwise be a large number of us who are above the 500 edit mark... Should be interesting. 138.86.165.47 (talk) 20:11, 29 October 2008 (UTC) (I definitely didn't notice I wasn't logged in until too late! Oops! ~Pip 20:12, 29 October 2008 (UTC))

What is the point of this question, testing my memory? Why don't they just look it up using my username? Dandv (talk) 01:24, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

Maybe because username is an optional response ... Truthanado (talk) 23:42, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

Missing back button

I misinterpreted "Contribute content" to include "Helping people fix templates and stuff" rather than just article edits, and then it wouldn't let me go back to adjust my time estimate when I realized the error two questions later. I guess the survey results will show I never sleep, or live in a time warp or something ;) Anomie⚔ 02:42, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

You mention not being able to go back. For me this was a serious issue. Absolutely every page needs a back button, since they disabled the browser back button. Also, the survey has some other weird issues on Konqueror—I kept being told a page being reloaded was the result of a POST operation, when clearly it was trying to move on to a new page. Ntsimp (talk) 04:52, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

I had the same issue on a different question, and didn't see a back button on the next several questions.--Fabrictramp | talk to me 14:19, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

I concur. I considered "contributing content" being pretty much any editing until I saw the next question, and couldn't go back. Oh well. VegaDark (talk) 20:43, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Yes, all of those questions should have been on the same page. Mr.Z-man 03:48, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

I too had a problem with no back button on pages, so I used the back button on my navigator and then when I used the continue button the survey jumped forward missing out several pages of the survey so I was unable to answer all the questions!Mjchesnel (talk) 06:15, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

I made the same error that Anomie did. Hopefully they'll compare the sum of the "time spent on content" and "time spent on non-content" to "total time spent" and see that the sum of the two is larger than the total. But that presumes that someone is actually trying to internally validate the results... WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:38, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Same. After like one-quarter of questions, the "back" button is gone. OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 15:24, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

Translation

The section on translation does not do a good job of distinguishing languages you translate from and languages you translate to. - Jmabel | Talk 02:55, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Other Wikimedia Foundation wikis

The section on other Wikimedia Foundation wikis does not allow for the possibility that you contribute to something, but don't use it. - Jmabel | Talk 02:55, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Well... that's a little unusual. :-) Technically, in order to contribute to something, you have to use it in some way. Cbrown1023 talk 20:50, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Better distinction of using, editing

Several questions I encountered late in the survey struck me as unclear as to whether they were asking about access as a user or as an editor. This should be more explicitly spelled out in the wording of the questions. Also, there is nothing here pursuing how much people use Wikipedia as a (non-citable) resource (or to re-use existing citations for facts) while researching for new Wikipedia articles. - Jmabel | Talk 02:55, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

I agree that the question "Approximately, how many hours do you use Wikipedia in a typical week?" is unclear; at first, I interpreted it as "editing + reading", but the follow-up question seemed to imply reading alone. —Josiah Rowe (talk • contribs) 05:05, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Administrative tasks question was confusing

I wasn't sure if that question was for administrators or for editors who have done small administrative tasks, like making small fixes... Louis Waweru  Talk  03:00, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

If you got that question, it's probably aimed at both types of users. Remember that you can be involved in blocking processes (such as WP:AIV or WP:UAA) without actually pushing the buttons yourself. Some sorts of tasks may not apply to editors, however in general there is some overlap. Hersfold ^(t/a/c) 04:09, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

I also think it was confusing. The question was "Considering the last three months, how many hours did you spend on average per week on administrative tasks relating to the organisation and structure of the Wikipedia project rather than the content?" I really didn't know how to answer the question as someone who is not an administrator, yet spends many hours editing in Wikipedia:-space. I assume "content" refers strictly to articles? --Pixelface (talk) 05:16, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

I also thought the questions - or at least the order - was confusing. When I answered the first (I think "content") question, I included time spent on administrative tasks as well...then when I got to the administrative tasks question it was redundant. Also, for some reason there was no "back" button on those few questions so I couldn't correct the answer. --Philosopher ^{Let us reason together.} 10:39, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Donation question

"If you do not donate money to Wikipedia, why not? (select as many as apply)"
I don't have a credit card. I wish this had been an option I could have selected. Kinou (talk) 03:04, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

But you don't need a credit card to donate. :-) You can donate via credit card, Moneybookers, PayPal, sending a check, donating stock, direct bank transfer, and many more. See Donate for more information. Cbrown1023 talk 20:41, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

That and parents won't allow it. :P —Preceding unsigned comment added by Ericius (talk • contribs) 13:55, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Other reasons are clearly missing here. For example "other charities are higher priority for my charitable giving". GRBerry 14:59, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

I know all I'm saying is "me too" but I came to this page to say the same thing. This is a very problematic issue with the question. There are plenty of "other" fields where surely nobody is likely to specify, but not this one. BigBlueFish (talk) 18:16, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Yes, most of the active Wiki community are aware that a reasonable percentage of editors are children so a "Parents wouldn't allow me" choice would have been good to add. Generally speaking however, I thought the survey was very good and especially good for a first try. The issues raised throughout this discussion page are minor and can be fixed when the next survey is released. Gizza^{Discuss ©} 00:42, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

Doesn't seem to work: stuck on gender question

It won't go beyond the gender question for me. Johnbod (talk) 03:43, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

What browser are you using? It seems to work fine in Firefox 3. Hersfold ^(t/a/c) 04:07, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

IE 7.0.5730.11 Tried again - still doesn't work. Johnbod (talk) 04:28, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Doesn't work for me either -- I ran into the same problem as Johnbod. (browser:IE 6.0.2900) Cgingold (talk) 11:25, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Do more people see this? We cannot reproduce. At what url are you seeing this behaviour? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 192.87.143.125 (talk) 11:43, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Worked fine for me, using Firefox 3.03 on OSX Leopard. -- Daniel Mietchen (talk) 14:35, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Does not work for me either, after answering the very first question, the test starts to fill by its own. There are no questions at all and I'm always prompted whether I really want to refresh a page made using POST data. I can see only a progress bar increasing its value with each prompt. Using Konqueror 3.5.10. --StenSoft (talk) 14:52, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

With IE7 it gets stuck on the gender question. After answering this a dozen times and trying the browser back button (there was no back button in the page, so I could not follow that bit of the instructions) it got stuck "going back" to a question on type of user that had not appeared before. Did the Wikimedia "project management" include trying to complete the questionaire using IE, the most common browser? It should have done. JonH (talk) 19:33, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

I have added a question to the main page on this - #13, perhaps appropriately. Johnbod (talk) 19:42, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Thank you, Johnbod. -Naoko --Shuhari (talk) 20:37, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

The survey was tested for various combinations of browser and OS including IE7 on Windows platform. We cannot reproduce the problem JonH is seeing. We'd appreciate if you can let us know the OS and its version number, so that we can reproduce it and troubleshoot the problem. -Naoko --Shuhari (talk) 20:33, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

I think I may have found the cause of the problem. I have discovered that my "Internet Options" had "Check for newer versions of pages" set to "Never". Changing it to "Automatically" allows the survey to proceed. I am a bit surprised that I have not had problems with more websites with my browser set the way it was. (My apologies for jumping to the conclusion that no testing had been done with IE.) JonH (talk) 22:27, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, I can reproduce it now(!). I will try to create an FAQ tomorrow. If anyone can get to it before me, please do. Thanks. - Naoko --Shuhari (talk) 05:12, 31 October 2008 (UTC)--70.137.130.225 (talk) 05:09, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

That worked for me - on IE it's at: Tools - Internet Options - General - Browser settings. Change to "Every time a page is viewed..." But you shouldn't need to go through all that, and most people won't realize or bother. Johnbod (talk) 11:00, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

"Automatically" is the default setting[1], and it functions the same wayas "Every time a page is viewed.." setting. Isn't it better to see updated pages than cached pages, if there is an updated page, in general? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Shuhari (talk • contribs) 04:40, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

It happens to me in Opera 9.61 too.--83.38.192.5 (talk) 15:12, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

I've gotten it to work after the third time in Opera. Pacific Coast Highway ^{{talk • contribs}} 20:22, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Huh? I use IE and it worked fine. ~AH1^(TCU) 22:32, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Also requires JavaScript

The survey also appears to require JavaScript to work — otherwise it just displays a blank template page after the first screen. This requirement is not displayed anywhere, so someone probably needs to put a notice somewhere (on the first survey page?) as soon as possible. However, I think this is a different issue than above — without JavaScript, it went blank long before the gender question. --Closeapple (talk) 06:04, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, sucks ass all right. Fine, I wasn't really interested in answering anyway..... 78.27.90.194 (talk) 13:55, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

The blank page has nothing to do with JavaScript — it's due to a <meta HTTP-EQUIV="Refresh" CONTENT="1; URL=..."> that may be blocked by some browsers, depending on configuration. Such redirects always require a manually clickable link. A decent implementation would send an HTTP status code of 30[127] with a location header instead.

But the survey also doesn't work with Lynx. --89.55.51.69 (talk) 16:33, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

Doesn't work with an external cache / proxy

To get beyond the gender question also doesn't work with an external cache / proxy, because the result of the POST redirects to always the same URL, and a proxy may return a cached copy of the page. Internal browser caches won't do that because of a <META HTTP-EQUIV="CACHE-CONTROL" CONTENT="NO-CACHE">, but to work with external caches, you must send an actual HTTP header, because most external caches don't look at the content of pages. A decent implementation would send the next page directly as the response to the POST (which aren't cacheable by default) or at least use a different URL for each page of the survey. --89.55.51.69 (talk) 16:33, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

Why so complicated?

Why doesn't anyone ever design web pages using reasonably stock HTML any more? Why does everyone always insist on overusing JavaScript and all sorts of other fiddly little browser-dependent tricks? You might be able to improve the nominal "user experience" by a percent or two, but you absolutely guarantee that you're going to find yourself enmeshed in an everexpanding thicket of complaints like these, which you can only definitively fix by (a) having access to a test copy of every browser ever and spending one zillion hours debugging your pages against every one of them, or (b) reimplementing your pages from scratch in stock HTML, like you should have done in the first place.

Wikipedia is nicely usable under every browser. Why can't a Wikipedia survey be? —Steve Summit (talk) 15:59, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

Some options I missed

The question about why we contribute to Wikipedia lacked one (or is it two?) options I would have marked: It is fun and it is intriguing/interesting to edit Wikipedia. (The editing in itself can be fun, and it is interesting to see what comments one get from other editors and see what happens over time with the stuff one have added.)

There was a question with the two options married (or having a life partner) or single. What about just having a girlfriend, who I not yet classify as a life partner? Relations are not just 0/1, at least not in the part of the world where I live. And I bet one editor I know would complain too, since she has several boyfriends.

I would have liked a comment field for every question, instead of just for some. Since then I could have given feedback on some of the comments immediately, instead of coming to this talk page later when I already have forgotten some of the things I found weird or unclear.

In the beginning of the questionnaire it asked for ones user name. But it didn't have an option for marking which project that username is valid for. In my case that is not a problem since I have a global account, but some users might only have a user name on some smaller language Wikipedia.

Regarding the question to be contacted next year for a follow-up: Then it wanted my email address to be contacted next year. But I don't use email and some editors don't want to give out their email. The proper way to contact Wikipedia editors is of course on their talk page. So there should be the option to be contacted on one's talk page. And don't forget to then have the option to mark which Wikimedia project that username is for. And next year when that time comes I think the bot owners here will be helpful in sending out the requests for the follow-up.

--David Göthberg (talk) 03:56, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

I strongly support the comments David made in paragraphs 1 and 3. (reasons for editing. no ability to include comments.) For the question comparing Wikipedia to a conventional encyclopedia, the answer I wanted to give but could not was that the quality is extremely variable from article to article. CBHA (talk) 04:04, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Absolutely! Johnbod (talk) 11:01, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

Yes, a comment field for most questions would be helpful (although I understand the reason for not having too many). The relationship question needed more options. I suppose engaged is single? The question "What are the reasons why you read the discussion/talk page" needed more options or a comment field. The question about contacting needs to specify in the question how contact would be made. I think the question "Which three of the following formats do you consider most useful for the provision of Wikipedia information?" should be reworded, something like, If Wikipedia information was provided in new formats, which three of the formats would you consider most useful? --Pixelface (talk) 05:24, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

more options/"other"/comment fields were very definitely needed. where i live, people routinely have multiple professions; education systems vary; some people are not interested in "gaining reputation in the wikipedia community" or the logistics thereof; and the accuracy/depth/etc of wikipedia as opposed to other encyclopedias depends totally on the article (and/or on the "other encyclopedia"), doesn't it. Sssoul (talk) 07:01, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

The survey could certainly have used more options in places, some obvious things I would have answered differently if I had the chance:

• I've used and contributed to many more than 20 languages of Wikipedia, I visit various foreign language Wikipedias fairly often.
• In the question of whether spelling errors negatively affect your view of Wikipedia, I'd have liked to answer "very strong negative effect, but I fix them whenever I see them", similar answers could apply to the other questions in that section.
• Sports and games should not be grouped with culture and the arts as a single topic. Most of my contributions are to sport articles, but I didn't select culture and the arts, as I never even look at articles about culture and the arts. I selected history and events as a replacement, as many of my contributions go to articles about specific editions of a sporting event. MTC (talk) 08:02, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

I'd have liked a fill-in option on the "things that negatively affect your perception of an article" section. Yzalzy (talk) 05:53, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

i answered "no" to the question "do you want to contribute more to wikipedia", and was then asked why not. "because i already contribute as much as i want to" seems like an obvious option to offer, instead of assuming something's wrong ("i don't know how", "i don't have time", etc). i think there was an "other/specify" window for that one, but still, the proposed options were annoying in their presumption that we "should" all want to contribute more. Sssoul (talk) 10:29, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

Where are the incentives?

What are the incentives of the survey? Do participants get entered to win a free iPod? miranda 04:07, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

What are the incentives of contributing to Wikipedia? The answer to your first question and my question are the same, for me. --Deskana (talk) 04:08, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Doesn't getting your opinion overruled and criticized qualify as "incentive" anymore? --Kaizer13 (talk) 04:54, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

I would like the clarify. The past surveys regarding Wikipedia had some kind of reward by independent companies. I thought that this was one of those surveys. Oh, and the bitchfest regarding attacking person's opinion is NOT an incentive to this project and is getting very old and very childish. tyvm...and move on please. miranda 05:19, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Incedentally, "why do you edit Wikipedia?" "for money.". Huh? Mⁱc_rochip ⁰⁸ 11:31, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Some people do get paid by clients to edit their articles. Frowned on, especially because of WP:COI issues, but it happens.--Fabrictramp | talk to me 14:22, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Survying in several languages

If I have participated in the survey in language X, and now I am reading Wikipedia in language Y and am asked to participate again, does it make any sense? Or just one time is OK? --texnic (talk) 07:09, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

One time is fine. :-) - Naoko --Shuhari (talk) 18:44, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia nickname in different languages

The survey asks to tell the user name. If I participate in the survey in language X, what about my user names in other languages? --texnic (talk) 07:11, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

I presume that the user name of the account you use most often should suffice. Besides, it's optional, you can continue without entering an user name. Gestumblindi (talk) 12:09, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Don't forget SUL. MER-C 11:59, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

pretty good, I thought

I agree with some of the points raised above (especially the iPod one! totally agree with miranda ;-) - I think the survey was pretty good all round, and await with interest the analysis in due course :-) cheers, Privatemusings (talk) 07:36, 29 October 2008 (UTC)so thanks to whoever is behind this!

Language/nationality questions

They should all have been on one page really, not a seperate page for one question relating to which country you live in and what languages you read/speak. Lugnuts (talk) 07:59, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Seriously. It should not take a zillion screens to say, "I'm American, I live in America, I read the English Wikipedia, I edit the English Wikipedia, I can speak, read, and write in English..." I really can't see why the survey's organizers expected there to be a significant population of people who tend to read Wikipedia in one language but edit most often in another language. (I may be misremembering exactly the questions were that required me to select the English Wikipedia TWICE, but in virtually any case it would be excessive.) Of course, if the results show that 45% of users are Swedish, living in France, reading the German Wikipedia and editing the Russian one, I'll eat my words. Propaniac (talk) 00:38, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Cannot claim about the majority, but I do live in Germany, read English wikipedia mostly and edit the Russian articles mainly :) --texnic (talk) 20:21, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Agree, the languages could have been compressed significantly. Or something along the lines of check boxes. Thus select English as primary language and the check boxes if that's the same for following questions (what language wiki do you read, etc...) IMHO (talk) 23:44, 31 October 2008 (UTC) Edit- the nationality questions were fewer so smaller problem there.

The nationality question lets you select only one nationality... What do I do? I have 3! I just selected the one from where I live, but it'd be nice if I could have selected all three.Ericius (talk) 13:57, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

I am happy that Tibetan (bod yig) was given as a language, but not so happy that there was no choice for Tibetan as a nationality. Tibetans in India are not nationals of India, even if they are born there. Tibet may not have the legal status of a "nation" -- but still a Tibetan has nothing to choose if they should wish to participate in this survey. 220.227.37.163 (talk) 15:43, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

Currencies

Hey guys, I just finished the questionnaire. One question was asking me how much I earn per month, and I couldn't find RMB in the currency list. --GnuDoyng (talk) 08:29, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

The international currency code of remenbi is CNY.

There is no simple language option

It is not possible to select Simple English (or at least as far as I could see) for what Wikipedias you contribute to etc. on the survery? Tombomp (talk/contribs) 09:00, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

I noticed this as well. This makes me wonder if it possibly excludes other wiki-languages or includes languages that don't have a wiki-equivalent. --Philosopher ^{Let us reason together.} 10:36, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Simple English has been added as of October 29. Please let us know if you notice other languages are missing. - Naoko --Shuhari (talk) 20:11, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Oops, I forgot to list Simple English as one of my options even though I contribute to it. Oh well. ~AH1^(TCU) 22:35, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

For me, Simple English turned up as an option where it shouldn't have (primary language or some such), which made me suspect that I didn't understand the question. ... More importantly, though, the survey lacked a feedback textfield at the end. Rl (talk) 11:55, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

Feedback

The survey was in great need of a feed back at the end option. To me many of the questions showed that person asking lacked a lot of basic knowledge of Wikipedia. There wouldnt be many editors that havent edited more than 500 articles, the questions about talk pages has no resemblance to Wikipedia:TALK#How_to_use_article_talk_pages. Overall I'd be cautious about how much the information gathered influences the future of Wikipedia. Gnangarra 10:44, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

I agree with the preceding criticisms. The "how many edits" questions are dumb, as the only accuate way to answer these is to look up a stats page, but the questionnaire did not link to any. The "good / OK / bad" questions needed to allow for the variability of articles, etc., as some are excellent and others are rubbish.

Finally the survey BREAKS THE BACK BUTTON - yes, I know I'm shouting, but breaking the back button is the number one Web design sin. If I'd known how the survey was going to break the Back button I would not have started it. -- Philcha (talk) 11:44, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

PS I'm still seing an invitation to particpate. Why???? -- Philcha (talk) 12:18, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

The survey is directed at all Wikipedia users, including readers who don't contribute at all and infrequent contributors. Indeed, every editor who is fairly continuously active will have edited more than 500 articles, so "more than 500" as the highest available option seems to be somewhat low. But there certainly are also many, many contributors whe edited less. Gestumblindi (talk) 12:44, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

The options could have been in ranges like, 0-10, 10-20, 20-50, 50-100, 100-200, 200-500, 500-1000, 1000-2000, 2000-3000, 3000-4000, 4000-5000, 5000+, whats the difference between an editor who edited 301 articles to that of someone whos edited 302, what meaning ful information can be gain from knowing this. Statistically I'd expect the extremes to get the numbers besides Wikipedia:Editcountitis its not the number but the content that matters. What about asking how many some of us "just do it"(sorry Nike) and really dont care about the numbers if an article needs to be created we create it, if exists and we have more info we add it, if its wrong we fix it. Also concern with the asking why do we edit having two options that indicate its for work purposes thats WP:COI we discourage that, also that question had no "other reason" option, there's a page some where that has a 100 odd reasons for editing listed. This is why I came to the conclusion that caution should be used with how much influence the results have, I doubt it'll provide a true statistical representation of the community. Gnangarra 13:08, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Agree that past 10 or so, ranges would be preferable to exact numbers. Plus, for "creating" articles, is that including disambig pages? Redirects? Personally I tend not to include disambig pages in my count. Then again, sometimes I have spent many many hours creating them, and they can require just as much (or more) research than creating a small stub. --Elonka 15:29, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

I also assumed that redirects and dabs didn't count, and I think that the ranges Gnangarra proposed would be a good idea. Perhaps none of the people involved have edit counts over 10,000, and just can't imagine that anyone else would? If you're doing the same sort of thing to a wide variety of articles (recent change patrolling, for example), then it's really not hard to get edit more than 500 pages. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:46, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

I agree that there is more need for feedback text boxes. For instance, in the "why don't you donate to the foundation" section, there was a checkbox for "Don't agree with Wikipedia policies" but there is nowhere to say with which policies you disagree with (such as letting unregistered users vandalize pages, or not requiring that editors exhibit some credentials). The categories of what you read and what you edit also seemed very underinclusive (i.e. is radio "applied science or transport"). Busjack (talk) 13:32, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

too long

the survey is way too long. Maybe have 2 versions, one for hardcore wikiers and one for the normal sort. I had to stop at 45% because it had taken over 20 minuets. Be realistic.--Jab843 (talk) 12:11, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

I strongly agree. This is only for the idle. --KSiOM(Talk) 14:24, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

I agree as well. The survey should be shortened, either by removing questions, or presenting more questions simultaneously. Also, some questions take long to answer (looking up my number of edits in a combobox of 500+ items is really tedious). Presenting ranges or numerical input boxes could reduce the required time to fill this in. 212.104.207.210 (talk) 15:10, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

I thought the length was good, especially considering that there was a status bar showing how far along the process was, and that it's not necessary to answer it all in one sitting. --Elonka 15:27, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

I also thought the lenght was good. The survey was thorough and deep. It will produce a clear picture of who edits and who uses Wikipedia. This survey will help the Foundation gain trust in order to get donations and improve its services.EconomistBR 17:23, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

It will produce a clear picture of those people with the patience and attitude to sit through an hour plus long questionaire, who also edit the wikipedia. The rest of us aren't in the picture, because we didn't finish the questionaire. Toby Douglass (talk) 14:46, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

Agreed.This thing was far too long and too detailed for anybody but the most dedicated wikipedian. --Woden325 (talk) 19:35, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

Seconded. I wanted to do it, obviously, but when I got to 28% and had a page full of minutely detailed questions which seemed to me to have very little real informational value, I bailed. It's not just that I have other things to do, it's that I'm human and there's a limit to the pure tedium I will endure. Toby Douglass (talk) 18:25, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Agreed. If it wasn't for the progress indicator I would have given up. The page reloads after every question were really annoying. Nonetheless, I'm very interested in the results of the survey. --Hamster128 (talk) 05:09, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

I've run 100s of web surveys and this is just too long - I stopped after ten minutes. --Cameron Scott (talk) 20:01, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Survey was WAY too long. I sincerely wanted to complete the survey, but it locked up when I was at about 82%. H2O (talk) 06:37, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Update - I did try again and was able to resume the survey right where it locked up and quickly finished the survey. I guess their server was busy. I do hope that future surveys will be brief and get to the heart of the matter. H2O (talk) 07:11, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

It was a bit long; I just skipped the useless questions.

Topology Expert (talk) 10:21, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

They promise 20 minutes but this is underestimated. IMHO 40-80 minutes would be more appropriate - some questions invented by obvious outsiders are really hard to understand, one also need time to guess what is the point of each question (what sort of info they need to extract from it), think over answers etc... I understand that one hour is too long for occasiona contributors but for me the survey was too short, there are too many issues not covered by it. If asked I would spend 2 or 3 hours with such important survey without hesitation. I think there should be some fork after first questions - one XXL version for heavy contributors and one lite for people not having wiki as ther "meaning of life". You simply cannot ask "30 edits'" and "30,000'" edits contributors the same questions... --Miaow Miaow (talk) 19:09, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

I did not find the survey too long. It only took me about 30 minutes, and considering I've taken the wikiholism test countless times, that is nothing. If you don't have time then just skip a few questions. ~AH1^(TCU) 22:36, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

This survey is way too long and asks some personal questions with no explanation or justification. I gave up 12% of the way through. Stephenjh (talk) 22:47, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

Donating to wikipedia

For me, and I'm sure for many others, I do not donate to wikipedia because it simply isn't a priority for me. I donate to other charities, but wikipedia is not something I feel the need to give money to. This perspective is not captured in any of the choices for that question, which I actually find a little bit offensive. That question assumes that you need a concrete reason, like "I can't afford it" or "I don't like the mission" or "I don't ever give to charity." Can this be altered somehow? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.61.29.102 (talk) 14:08, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

A person doesnt need to hand over cash to the foundation for it be a donation, from the article A donation is a gift given, typically to a cause or/and for charitable purposes. A donation may take various forms, including cash, services,..... I've purchased books for referencing, driven 100's of mile to take photographs even brought a macro lens just so I can take those photographs. Spent hours editing, turn down work to organise and attend meetups, we have all by definition made a donation just by improving even one article. I know that wasnt the intent of the question which was asking about a specific cash transaction to the foundation but your right the no responses made an assumption of negative motives. Gnangarra 14:32, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Agree strongly with Gnangarra. At a minimum, a reword, and an option for "I don't wish to say". FT2 ^{(Talk | email)} 15:12, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Yes, Gnangarra is right about the definition of "donation," but the context of the question makes it pretty clear that they mean to ask why I haven't given money (particularly with the option "I donate in other ways [time editing etc]").64.61.29.102 (talk) 16:09, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Given that I expect the results from this question to be given to the development office, I think that they should have done a better job with the options. "Other charitable causes have a higher priority" is a standard response on most surveys of this type. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:42, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

At the question "If you do not donate money to Wikipedia, why not?", there was an option "I donate my time instead of money" --Pixelface (talk) 09:58, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

Based on the above, there should have been a distinction between "donating" in general and "monetary donations". Pacific Coast Highway ^{{talk • contribs}} 19:45, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

Some logic?

Would be really nice if - once I told it I live in Britain that it could guess that I speak, read, and contribute in English? (though give me the option to change that) Conrad.Irwin (on wikt) 15:01, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

It is possible for someone to live in another country but not be able to speak the language very well (like in some countries, many people speak English even though that is not the main language so it is possible for some outsider to live there).

Topology Expert (talk) 10:24, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Questions and improvements for future surveys

Please add proposed questions, improvements, and comments on others' briefly below, with a short rationale if not obvious. FT2 ^{(Talk | email)} 15:08, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Proposed additions by FT2

1. Many dedicated users have ended up in a role that they volunteered for, that may take them away from usual editing or other previous areas of interest, which they might well enjoy. Propose a question along the lines
   Have you developed a niche role in Wikipedia? If so, has it taken you away from other areas you enjoy (and which ones?) If so, is this a problem, how you address it, and is it sustainable in the long term? Please describe briefly.
   Objective: FAC reviewers, administrators, wikignomes, patrollers, vandal fighters, checkusers, stewards, otrs volunteers, mediators... anyone with a specialized role. What's the effect of that role on their enjoyment? FT2 ^{(Talk | email)} 15:08, 29 October 2008 (UTC)
2. Standard survey questions about how Wikipedia is used, that we really would want answers to are missing:
   How do you use Wikipedia. How often? In what kind of circumstances? When you do, what has been your experience? is it the same in all fields or do different fields vary? What do you like about using Wikipedia? What do you dislike?
3. Ditto for error correction and editing:
   If you find an error do you know you can correct it? Would you? If no or unlikely, why not? FT2 ^{(Talk | email)} 15:26, 29 October 2008 (UTC)
4. The questions about "How would you rate the quality of the information in Wikipedia as compared to a conventional encyclopedia..." could do with fleshing out in this way:
   What is your own experience of Wikipedia's reliability compared to a conventional encyclopedia, when you have used it?..... What led you to feel that way?
   Objective: ask about their actual personal experience as well, not just what they think. A user might believe Wikipedia is bad quality from newspapers yet their own experience is actually it's quite helpful. (Or the other way round.) And ask what experience that's based on, so we know how such opinions form. FT2 ^{(Talk | email)} 15:17, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

Proposed additions by Zunaid

Oh crap. In between trying to move these questions to this section, I see many people have responded to my original post below already. Let's keep the discussion in the section below. I'll leave this double-posted here just for reference.

"Please rate the following on a scale of 1-5, where 1 means it would reduce the perceived reliability of Wikipedia, 3 means it would have no change, and 5 means it would improve the perceived reliability of Wikipedia:"

1. Currently, any edit made to a Wikipedia article (including both improvements and vandalism) are immediately made visible to the public. Wikipedia has the ability to enable "stable versions" of articles, in which only the latest approved version of an article is displayed to the public (approval is given by any "trusted" editor of Wikipedia). Any later edit to the article will not be visible to the reader until they are again approved by a trusted editor. Should Wikipedia implement stable versions?
2. Wikipedia allows anyone to edit articles simply by clicking the "edit this page" button, without having to register an account. Should Wikipedia disallow such anonymous editing and force users to register an account in order to edit articles?
3. Wikipedia currently blocks unregistered and brand new users from creating new articles and moving pages, in order to prevent vandalism or mistakes by inexperienced users. The current threshold for determining "brand new users" is any account less than 4 days old and with less than 10 edits. Should Wikipedia increase these thresholds, and if so by how much? (For this question just give 2 drop-down boxes for days and edits).
4. Wikipedia's best articles are its Featured Articles. In general such articles have been thoroughly scrutinised by many editors for factual, grammatical and stylistic correctness. They are among the most reliable and well-written articles found on Wikipedia. These articles, as with most Wikipedia articles, are open for anyone (including unregistered users) to edit. Should Wikipedia "protect" these articles and only allow "trusted" editors to edit them?
5. Wikipedia articles rely on external published sources for their information. Such sources must generally be reliable and have a reputation for accuracy. Editors wanting to add information must cite externally published sources. Expertise of the particular editor, regardless of their qualification, are not taken into account, only the quality and reliability of their source of information is considered. Should Wikipedia give recognition to the expertise of editors who are suitably qualified in a specific discipline?
6. Write in any pertinent comments about the perceived or actual reliability of Wikipedia, and any suggestions for improving it. Zunaid 15:40, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Proposed additions by Piotrus

Various questions that the community wanted to ask per meta:General User Survey/Questionnaire and that were not asked in the survey (about user interface, conflicts and dispute resolution, etc.).--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 01:16, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Proposed additions by InMyHumbleOpinion

Where you have check or dot boxes, such as in How negatively do you think will the following items affect your perception of a Wikipedia article’s quality?, a range would be appropriate. Depending on the specifics, the described factor may not mean anything to me, or may be a big problem. IMHO (talk) 23:51, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

Proposed additions by White.Matthew.09

I think it would be best if before the survey went out next time, it were posted somewhere on Wikipedia or a WMF website for a week or more where users could edit it to make it more clear. I think that 95% or more of the difficulties people are having with this survey could have been fixed by a few good editors and a constructive talk page.

Also, in future surveys (if they are going to be of this length again), they should be broken down into sections (like a Wikipedia article), such as basic information (name, age, nationality), views about Wikipedia (accurate/inaccurate, non-profit), contributions (gnoming, creating), etc. This way it doesn't just seem like one interminable stretched-out quiz. This addition would ease navigation, perhaps with a table of contents or similar feature, and would allow responders to review their answers and/or take breaks in the survey without forgetting where they were.

Also Also wik, the survey is too general at some points, and too specific at others. For example, in terms of language proficiency, it was too general. It would have been better to have basic, intermediate, advanced, near native, native, etc. Perhaps if the next survey is conducted by the WMF instead of an outside organization it will be more focuses on these important matters. Matt White (talk) 01:00, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

Proposed additions by Rosuav

With the numeric questions, a drop-down list with all the numbers from 1 to 500 is incredibly tedious. With questions like "how many articles have you edited", a set of ranges would probably be more useful, as very few people are going to know whether they've edited 326 or 327 different articles (and if you DO know, you desperately need a life!!). Maybe have individual numbers up to 10, then 11-20, 21-30, etc, 51-75, 76-100, 101-200, and up by centuries after that? Rosuav (talk) 15:14, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

No questions about stable versions? No comments for further improvement?

So there's only one page of questions dealing with the reader's perception of Wikipedia vs traditional encyclopedias. And it doesn't get to the real meaty questions in my opinion. The next survey should definitely include questions about:

1. stable versions and patrolled edits
2. compulsory registration before editing
3. auto-confirm thresholds for new page creation and page moves (this might be a bit technical for normal readers)
4. semi- and full protection of "completed" and/or featured articles
5. recognition of expertise vs consensus
6. various other questions in this line of thinking

It would be nice to know what ordinary readers' perceptions of Wikipedia are (and if/how they would change) vis a vis the above questions. I have a feeling that users would perceive Wikipedia as an infinitely more trusted source if some of the above measures were put in place, reason being some of these measures will address common criticisms levelled at Wikipedia's reliability. However we as editors are too close to the coal face to make these decisions amongst ourselves, or in some cases even concede that it MAY be a real problem (e.g. insert standard disclaimer that 80% of anon edits are good). Getting ordinary readers to give us answers to these will be hugely beneficial. Oh, and they should include a final comments section to allow you to put in anything that you think is important that perhaps wasn't covered in the survey. Zunaid 15:13, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Technical questions for this kind of survey. I think these are possible, but only as part of an additional section: Would you like to take our contributors survey that probes current issues and attitudes.

The questions it misses (the "meat") are much more around usage. How do you use Wikipedia. How often? In what kind of circumstances? When you do, what has been your experience? What do you like about using Wikipedia? What do you dislike? Ive added these above since on reflection these are classic Survey questions we could legitimately wish to check.

The other thing with these is, 99% of readers and users probably don't contribute, and the survey seems mainly designed to get general views and profiling done. By contrast the questions you're asking would be a more internal community survey for knowledgable contributors who are aware of the issues and debates around many of them. Which might be no bad idea, except many of these are topical (ie they are 2008 questions, not 2009, 2010, 2011...), and that's what consensus is for. FT2 ^{(Talk | email)} 15:21, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

See my re-post in the section above. I've specifically directed the questions to ask the casual reader their opinion about whether these measures would improve their perception of Wikipedia, and I've explained some of the things in what I hope are layman's terms. I think it is very valid to try and figure out what the public make of our contributions. It is pointless for us to write the encyclopedia when the greater world out there feels they cannot trust a single word we say (and in fact it would be good to know whether they do or don't trust a word we say. For all I know I could be completely off base). Zunaid 15:48, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

I also think those questions would be good to ask. Although there was a question sort of related to stable versions. It was "How negatively do you think will the following items affect your perception of a Wikipedia article’s quality?" and under "Article is not labeled as "checked” or "endorsed"" people could choose no/small/strong/very strong negative effect. There was a question sort of related to expertise. It was "Of the categories that you contribute to, please indicate yes or no to the following questions: do you have subject matter expertise in the field; have you received formal training in the field; have developed expertise in this field as part of your job." But I agree that a future survey should include the questions you suggested. --Pixelface (talk) 03:29, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

The "Of the categories you contribute to" questions irritated me. I primarily contribute to a single part of one category... that easily overlaps with two other categories... and touches on two more. But I frequently patrol articles in another area, and I happen to edit occasionally in all kinds of articles. There's some 19th century African king's bio that I worked on, and the oft-vandalized Cupcake was an eight-sentence stub when I found it. These have nothing to do with my primary area, but I have, indeed, contributed to these unrelated areas. I have probably "contributed" to more than one article every single category -- but they weren't looking for that kind of information. WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:29, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Quality questions

I found it very difficult to answer the comparison questions, rating quality and depth of coverage between Wikipedia and regular encyclopedias. It's just so variable from article to article. With some topics, I find that Wikipedia has by far the better coverage, whereas with others where Wikipedia just has one or two lines (or nothing), the regular encyclopedias are obviously much better. About the only thing I could clearly answer that Wikipedia is "better" on, is up-to-date coverage, and sheer breadth of topics. --Elonka 15:26, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

This is an example of where allowing written comments in with questions would help. It's more effort to process, but provides a lot of useful info, even if you take a subsample of the responses.--Peter cohen (talk) 17:49, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

The categorys miss the point entirely. What needs to be investigated are the

1. variability in quality- Stubs are poor/ FA are superb- while conventional encyclopedias and consistently good or bad.
2. Interactivity is not investigated.
3. Nor are out POV policies- after two years of wikiediting, I will edit a bus ticket and find bias- a conventional encyclopedia represents the POV of the principle shareholder of the publisher- this is not investigated.

ClemRutter (talk) 23:35, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Reliability

I'm on the question that asks how I would rate the quality of the information in Wikipedia as compared to a conventional encyclopedia. It varies hugely by subject area - physics and maths, I'd trust WP over anything else. Biographies of pop singers I'd take with a whole spadeful of salt. Articles that are more likely to be watched are more reliable than backwater articles. Articles on emotive issues are more likely to be edited by people pushing an agenda. There's no way of reflecting this in the answer to the question, and there's no "unknown / other" option, so my answers are largely random. The people who interpret the data need to take into account that the data will be unreliable where it's impossible to answer usefully.

The next question has similar problems. If the article is hard to understand because it's badly written, of course that negatively affects my opinion of it. If it's hard to understand because spontaneous symmetry breaking is, itself, hard to understand, then that's a different matter. If the discussion page contains criticism that seems to be valid, then my view of the article will be affected negatively, but if the criticism is from some stubborn idiot who refuses to accept that the reason everyone disagrees with them is because they're wrong, then I'll ignore it. --HughCharlesParker (talk - contribs) 15:32, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

I strongly agree. Also on the talk page criticism question, when was the criticism made? Was there a slough of criticism on a politician's talk page when he was up for re-election two years ago that has since subsided?

I think these types of questions that were too general and failed to acknowledge critical details will lead to varying and unreliable results, and are the weakest aspect of this survey. Dar-Ape 19:50, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Ditto, I agree. I would expect that a conventional encyclopedia has pretty much uniform quality throughout, better or worse depending on whether it is a good (long) one or not. But wiki can be highly variable from page to page. A very rough guide would be how long a page is, but frankly I consider the absence of any useful indication on a page how good we think it is, is a failing. I also agree that while a busy discussion page might affect what I think of an article, whether this is negative or positive rather depends on the nature of what is there, whether it suggests people are identifying and fixing or disagreeing. A big longstanding disagreement does not necessarily mean a bad article, either, depending on how the problem is being handled in the text.Sandpiper (talk) 20:59, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

I agree too. Many pages which are not really a specialised topic in a field are subject to vandalism so they are unreliable. I just answered that question with regards to the subject area that I edit most frequently. How could you make that question more specific? Topology Expert (talk) 10:27, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

I left these questions mostly unanswered because the very high variability makes it impossible to give a meaningful answer. I think the survey design is a lot like one of those 'pedia articles written by well-meaning idiots - it seems to make sense but fails to actually address the issues. ~ Ningauble (talk) 19:30, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Add a "Back to Wikipedia" button at the end of the survey page!

Thank you. Shir-El too 17:07, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Add an open comment box at the end of the survey page!

On too many pages there were closed options, that needed a comment, and at the end of the survey there needs to be an open question box :Do you think that this survey has adequately explored and represented your views, please add a comment here. ClemRutter (talk) 23:41, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

True.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 01:14, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

I would've liked the possibility to comment present on EACH page: there could be a "comment this page" input box at the bottom of each page. --Jerome Potts (talk) 03:33, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

The survey provided email address for your comments in the introduction page. I agree, we should have added at the end if not on every page. The email address is info(at)wikipediastudy(dot)org. [2] - Naoko --Shuhari (talk) 04:53, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

Users will enter comments in a "Further comments on this page" box far more than they will write an email afterwards. FT2 ^{(Talk | email)} 15:11, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

The survey has email links in all pages for all the 21 languages. --Shuhari (talk) 17:51, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

that's a step forward, but that kind of email link doesn't work for everybody (including me); some people don't want to provide their email addresses; and since (clearly) lots of us would have commented on multiple pages, it seems excessively demanding to expect people to stop and compose new emails each time. a "comments" box on each page would have been *far* more useful to the survey-takers as well as the survey-developers & -interpreters. Sssoul (talk) 18:09, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

I agree. Others on this discussion page cover some of what I had a comment on. I still have concerns about what you intend on extrapolating from the survey. A concern would be how the encyclopedia comparison data is used. If my data was to be interpreted as "Munden believes Wikipedia is more valuable/higher quality than traditional encyclopedia" it would be wrong in spite of the fact I checked wiki higher or equal on all but 1. The person or group that threw this survey together should not be the one(s) to determine what the results mean. Munden (talk) 19:16, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

Agree. Some could have just gotten away with a "don't know" box. It was strange it was in other questions, but not on others that applied to me. IMHO (talk) 23:47, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

I quit

I quit the survey after 33%, not because it seemed to take more time than it had suggested, but because I felt it misrepresented me. On several pages there was no way of undoing an answer given that I had reconsidered. And other pages had answer alternatives that I simply couldn't relate to or in any reasonable way give an estimate on and no alternatives allowed me to opt out stating this. __meco (talk) 17:18, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

You can change all answers in the final step, I think.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 19:17, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

hm - not when i completed it. it allowed me to back up three pages but no further. Sssoul (talk) 21:05, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Time is an issue but it is possible to change your responses at the end. At the very end you are asked if you want to do so. Topology Expert (talk) 10:29, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

that's not what i experienced. at the very end it invited me to use the "back" button if i wanted to change any answers, but as noted above, it only allowed me to go back three pages, no further. i did the survey in about 20 minutes so it would be extremely unreasonable if some kind of time limitation curtailed the possibility of backing up to make changes. Sssoul (talk) 12:40, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Thoughts

• I found the questionnaire quite difficult to navigate. Sometimes I could see a continue button but not a back - this particularly applied when I wasn't sure whether I had skipped a question.
• It was quite long for an online quiz. Would it be possible to allow future quizzes to be saved halfway?
• As mentioned by others, some questions were confusing. More words might help.
• What pilotting was done? A fair number of Wikipedians, including myself, have postgraduate research experience and would have been able to provide constructive comments.
• Most Brits do nto think of themselves as using GBP. If the currency list was in words, it woudl make it easier for people to find their currency. In fact having said that I was British and lived in Britain, it would be nice if my currency appeared at the top fo the list instead of my havign to search fro a likely candidate.--Peter cohen (talk) 17:47, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

I endorse all these comments and add

• Language questions did not allow me to express the level of understanding I have in each language. Yes I can edit names/dates/places/times in most Romance and Germanic languages, but wouldn't dare to attempt whole sentences in all but 4 of them, and would not attempt to introduce new technical terms into anything other than :en.
• Geopolitic bias- I have an honours degree- but the nearest offered is a honors (sic) which is then described as an undergraduate qualification. This needs to be researched thoroughly, so the education levels correspond with a recognised international scale. This strikes me as the sort of error that is textbook stuff, and is taught on undergrad stats courses.
• The dropdown select boxes for number of articles edit seem badly thought out both as an input and in the type of information they will generate. To answer them accurately one should have been keeping a tally, what is an edit- does correcting a typo have the same weight as working a stub up to FA. I would have thought a geometric scale to be more useful.

The more I think about it- I realise that I am just marking, a flawed attempt at a survey that will be an interesting learning exercise for the writers but has no long term value. ClemRutter (talk) 00:07, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

I agree that the language questions should let people express their proficiency (like Wikipedia's language userboxes: basic, intermediate, advanced, near native, professional, native). The articles created question should link to a tool (like this one or this one) and clarify if redirects and disambiguations pages are to be included. The number of edits to articles question should also link to a tool (like this one). I suppose a greater load would be put on the toolserver by people taking the survey, but the answers would be more accurate (if the respondents are honest). --Pixelface (talk) 03:48, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Comments by Piotrus

• doesn't allow to specify if a user has different levels of access on different wikis
• doesn't allow to speficy if a user is active on different wikis, just asks for one
• "time spent on this activity compared to 6 months ago" - should link to some edit counter so people could refresh their memories (there are counters of new articles created and various others), and also there should be more time frames (consider a person editing for 3 months, 12 months or 48 months...)
• "I research articles" - what does that mean?
• when asking what areas do you contribute to, it doesn't allow weighting them by importance (I may contribute 95% to one and 5% to other but for the question, they are equal)
• unclear: what is "subject matter expertise"?
• how many articles have you started: cap at 500 - maybe good for some, but I know I've started over a 1000 (and can check easily with one of the edit counters). Why the cap?
• Ditto for "how many articles have you edited", but even more so. This is really capping most active contributors who may have edited over 10,000 different articles...!
• why do you contribute... aren't "2. I like the idea of sharing knowledge and want to contribute to it" and "11. Because I like Wikipedia’s philosophy of openness and collaboration", "12. Because I think information should be freely available to everyone" and "13. Because I like mass collaboration/cooperation" way too similar?
• "What are the reasons why you read the discussion/talk page:" - missing other that would allow to specify a very important reason: "to discuss how to improve the article with other editors". Current options DON'T COVER that (1. It helps me assess the quality of the article 2. It shows me a broader range of opinions about the article topic 3. It's fun)
• "If you do not donate money to Wikipedia, why not? (select as many as apply)" misses an option "I've successfully convinced others to donate money to Wikipedia"
• option to save and resume might be useful to increase participation

I do wish they had included some questions from meta:General User Survey/Questionnaire about the user interface, community and conflict.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 19:17, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

I agree with everything. Criticism: what is meant by having 'formal training' in a subject? Does that include training apart from university? For instance, you could have a university degree in one subject but could have taught yourself the other (without formal training). The choices for subjects are also rather restrictive.

I'm rather confused about this as well. Does "formal training" include primary school? High School? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Mqduck (talk • contribs) 13:31, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

Topology Expert (talk) 10:34, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

reasons for editing wiki

as best I now recall the questions, it didn't allow me to rank that I edit wiki becuse I enjoy doing it, not because I want to save the planet, educate the world, get paid for it, etc, etc. If a question like that is closed, then the final answer can only be the most popular reason from the list: there was no 'other' option. If you end up with the idea people do it because they want to educate the world, which they might from my answers, that would seriously misrepresent why I come here. If someone makes decisions based on such a result they might find a lot of unhappy editors. Sandpiper (talk) 21:07, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Indeed. There should've been an "other" option, as well as "For fun".--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 01:12, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

how about "because i care about certain subjects enough that it bothers me to see mistakes/misconceptions about them on major and often-quoted websites"? i wound up choosing "to make the world a better place" for that one, which isn't especially close to what i wanted to say. Sssoul (talk) 22:37, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

We had given you 18 options to choose from, and you all could not find anything to match your reason? :-) Seriously, you all have valid points here. These options need be added to the next survey. Thank you for your comments. - Naoko --Shuhari (talk) 05:08, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

author/editor

I have now read the explanation that these two are equivalent, but in the survey this was just confusing. Was it intended to make people classify themselves as one or the other? Best I could think is that an author originates new text and an editor corrects it, but that was just me attempting to insert sense into a question which was time consuming and puzzling. Sandpiper (talk) 21:11, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

According to an explanation given over at the German Wikipedia, the originally intended distinction was that an "author" mainly creates new articles and an "editor" mainly edits existing ones and/or focuses on other things than actually editing articles. However, the distinction is now seen as not very useful even if it were phrased more clearly, and because of this it will make no difference in the analysis. Gestumblindi (talk) 22:08, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Languages?

what languages is it availible in?

The survey is available in 21 languages. Please see the details in Wikimedia Blog.--Shuhari (talk) 05:47, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

Comments from Reywas92

The second question is "What is your gender?" with the choices of Male, Female, and Other. Obviously, there is no such thing as an other gender. This should be changed to "I prefer not to answer" or something similar. Reywas92^Talk 21:45, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Some intersex people believe that they have good reasons not to identify as either male or female. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:06, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Well there are very few of those and I prefer not to answer would work better for them and the rest of the population.

"male", "female", "other" and "i prefer not to answer" would be good. similarly, the "nationality" question should include a "dual/multiple" option. Sssoul (talk) 11:28, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Also, for the question "What is your user access level?" The second choice should be "Registered user" without a hyphen.

"Which three of the following formats do you consider most useful for the provision of Wikipedia information?" is somewhat unclear.

"How would you rate the quality of the information in Wikipedia as compared to a conventional encyclopedia with regard to the following criteria?" should be at the beginning of the survey. This is what we really want to know from the public. It should be one of the first so the question is still answered if the reader gets bored and quits the survey.

On the question "How negatively do you think will the following items affect your perception of a Wikipedia article’s quality?" the section "Article is not labeled as "checked” or "endorsed"" does not apply to the English Wikipedia. Reywas92^Talk 22:13, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

i believe the intention there was to find out whether people feel all versions of wikipedia should have a system of "checking/endorsing" articles. but i thoroughly agree that the entire question was very poorly formulated, and the range of answer options was seriously inadequate. Sssoul (talk) 11:28, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

The about why you don't donate money to Wikipedia should have an Other option rather than I don't know.

If you prefer not to answer (or are unable to answer) and there isn't such a checkbox, then just click continue without answering. ~AH1^(TCU) 22:40, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Privacy concerns

I think with this survey, the Wikimedia foundation or other entities collecting the data, can build a complete profile of personal informations about the user. This is not respecting the spirit of Wikipedia privacy policy and ethics. Why should Wikipedia really need this survey? Also there is not a complete explanation of data being collected and how are they used and collocted. --  eagleal  22:32, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Have you read Wikipedia:Survey_2008#What_about_privacy.3F? --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 01:11, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

I did mind being asked my e-mail address. You can e-mail users via WP, once you have their username, provided they have set it up that way, which you could remind them of. Or ask them which way they prefer, directly by providing the e-address, or via WP. --Jerome Potts (talk) 03:37, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Yes, but still I don't see a reason why should Wikipedia really benefit from this survey. I mean, this is not in the Wikipedia and Wikimedia spirit. --  eagleal  01:14, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

Number of people being surveyed?

Is this being offered to everyone that uses Wikipedia during a particular timespan, or only a randomly selected group, or by some other criteria? WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:39, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

As far as I know, to everyone during a particular timespan. The final survey will likely report the number of respondents.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 01:11, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

New Ideas

A characters limited box to put in an idea that would make Wikipedia better Yosef1987 (talk) 01:25, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Comments

I have the following comments:

• Regarding the questions asking whether one has increased or decreased certain activities over the last 6 months: you should consider that a user might have engaged in certain activities, such as writing new articles, for brief periods of time within the last 6 months, but only rarely before or after. In such a case it would be hard to say how these things have changed in the last 6 months: to say that they haven’t changed at all during the last 6 months doesn’t seem to be accurate, and yet it wouldn’t be accurate to say that one has done them more or less often (than 6 months ago) either.
• In answer to the question about how many articles one has created: a distinction needs to be made between full-length articles, stubs and other pages such as redirects. I’ve written exactly four “full-length” articles, and probably about 3 mid-sized stubs, but have submitted huge numbers of redirects and possibly a handful of “sub-stubs” as well.
• The question about languages one can read/write/speak should allow for various levels of proficiency within each category; for example, one might be able to read Español un poco but neither speak nor write it. And one might even be able to read, write and speak a particular language but not understand it when others speak.
• Finally, a number of questions have “not sure,” “don’t know” or “no reason” as a possible answer, but not “other.” Sometimes my reason for doing something is close to one of those provided, but doesn’t fit exactly. For example, to edit Wikipedia to remove bias doesn’t quite fit into the long list of reasons one might edit; the closest two seem to be “to remove error” or “to make the world better” (perhaps an item could be added: “to make Wikipedia better.”) 69.140.152.55 (talk) 03:07, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

My own answers

When I was almost finishing the survey, I wasn't allowed to go back and read my own answers. My only question is: may I get mailed my answers? I checked all the "let us cotact you later" boxes and wrote my account name and email. --NaBUru38 (talk) 03:21, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Reputation

Overall I think this is a good survey but I don't like the question about building a reputation. That's not what we're here for to begin with and asking it adds legitimicy to an illegitimate reason for contributing. I would like to see that one replaced by the question proposed by FT2 above about what keeps an editor from correcting an error they spot. To me that is a far more relevant question. EconomicsGuy (talk) 06:19, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

It's "not what we're here for to begin with". Fair enough. But some editors take pride in the recognition by other editors and administrators that they are doing good work. I think this can be expressed in the phrase "building a reputation." CBHA (talk) 12:20, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Worst survey ever

Honestly. This was the worst survey I've ever done, ever. The main reason I'm replying here is I do not feel that this survey allowed me to answer my questions. It also did not include a normal "final question" saying how I liked the survey, and how I could improve it. My thoughts on each question that I did not feel I had a true option to answer.

I was confused by the "nationality"/"where do you live". I can understand why this is important for some, but having both questions on the same page might make this easier to understand.

The next 4 questions forced me to find and pick "english" 4 times.

I'm curious why you need to know how much money I make? Regardless, I answered it.

Would you like to be more active in Wikipedia? - I did not get that question at all. Do you mean personally, IE do I wish I had more time, or do you mean "hey, we can throw work at you"

To which of the categories below did you contribute so far? - This is where the survey falls apart for me. I contribute to politics and politics related articles. Which one would I need to pick? I answered, but I dont know if I did so correctly.

Also, there was no explanation on what "subject matter expertise " etc means. While I did eventually find it, this was after I'd done the survey, and hence usless to me.

Approximately how many articles have you edited, in total? - As in? If you count small spelling edits, I've perhaps done 250, but if your counting serious big edits, perhaps 50.

Why do you contribute to Wikipedia? - I consider this the worst question of the enitre survey because my reasons are not represented at all. Remember, I contribute on political articles. My true top reason is that Election results (IE the things I post about) should be public knoweldge. I was forced to pick the corny "to make the world a better place" because there were very other few options for me.

From your point of view, what is currently the best way to gain reputation in the Wikipedia community? - another failure IMHO. Why do I need a reputation? I cite my sources, so why does it matter how good my reputation is?? I dont want a reputation. I do what I do, and that's it.

For what purpose do you mostly use Wikipedia - the options could be worded better. I use wikipedia to learn things for my own private pleasure.

Which three of the following formats do you consider most useful for the provision of Wikipedia information? - Honestly, I neither know nor care.

Do you read the 'discussion/talk page' of articles that you have accessed? - This could have done with a "when there is a warning box", as that's about the only time I read talk pages unless I'm activly working on the article.

What are the reasons why you read the discussion/talk page: - same thing. References to warning boxes could be used. The lack of a "other: _____" option here really hurts the survey.

What is your relationship with the following projects? - I had an issue with the options here. I've contributed to the commons once because someone had replaced a star of david with a swastika, but from my answer it makes me sound like a very active contributor.

If you do not donate money to Wikipedia, why not? (select as many as apply) - I cannot afford it, but also I dont trust internet for finances period. I dont use paypal and dont like using my credit cards online.

All in all, this survey tried to do way too much, and did not do that right. IMHO either you need to cut this survey into three or four surveys, and/or you need to triple the size of the survey by adding more options (not questions). This I like answering surveys, but had this not been a wikipedia survey (I like wikipedia) I'd have stopped out of frustration. I hope that the next one will be far more "user friendly". Nickjbor (talk) 11:09, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Thank you for taking the survey despite your frustration. The survey was even longer, and the current survey is an even trimmed down version. It is true that we try to do too much, but it is out of the eagerness to learn from you and find the best way to foster Wikipedia, Wikipedians and to-be-Wikipedians. We will learn the comments from you all and try to improve the next survy. - Naoko --Shuhari (talk) 06:00, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

Cannabis?

"To which categories have you contributed to Wikipedia? ... 5. Health and fitness (e.g. Medicine, Biology, Nursing, Dentistry, Pharmacy and Pharmacology, Complementary and Alternative Medicine, Cannabis)"

I mean, I guess technically drugs falls under health and fitness, but I love how's there's ONE specific example. Molerner (talk) 11:43, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, the Cannabis mention was indicating that the survey was done by a Netherlands organization :P Dandv (talk) 01:28, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

My gripes

• Less cumbersome navigation. Iterating through twenty questions to change one response is stupid. Even worse, there are points of no return throughout the questionnaire.
• There should be a question index allowing you to jump between questions.
• Some of the questions were lacking adequate options. A "none of the above" or "other (please specify)" would suit a lot of questions.
• The "how many Wikipedias did you contribute to" wussed out at 20. There are at least 100 Wikipedias, I don't know the specific number. I've done anti-spam work on about 45 Wikipedias, and there wasn't a >20 option. What about contributions to various language Wiki(source|books|versity|media Commons|news|quote|species) and Wiktionary and the scale of involvement in these projects?
• The "how many hours did you spend on X per week" questions had 168 as a possible answer. Ummm, no. MER-C 12:05, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

there are points of no return throughout the questionnaire. indeed, I had to clear my cookies to go back after an accidental misclick. -- lucasbfr ^talk 12:11, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Was this survey worth doing?

This survey was quite frankly, unprofessionally constructed: numerous reputation on nationality and social/reading language; pointless personal questions such as 'What gender are you? Male, Female, Other[?!]' and 'How much do you earn?' I didn't feel that this survey was at all helpful for Wikipedians opinion - there were no 'How did you find this survey?' questions. Could Wikipedia please correct these minor mistakes. This survey was fairly reasonable to answer, just a few problems, that's all. DrummerMike (talk) 12:26, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Well the idea is to catch who reads and writes Wikipedia. I don't think these questions are meaningless (I think they can allow some interesting stats on the average Joe-six-edits :) -- lucasbfr ^talk 13:10, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Some of us see red, when we see the assumption that useful information may be gleaned from a flawed data model. To follow this line of thought, you can get some interesting 'stats' from the right sort of mushrooms!ClemRutter (talk) 23:48, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

This was the first survey ever done, so it will not be perfect. EconomistBR 04:15, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

Wikimedia Survey

All of the questions in this survey could be have been asked identically about all projects (e.g. Commons, Wiktionary, Wikisource). But they are only asked about Wikipedia specifically for no good reason. As someone for whom the large proportion of my time and contributions are to another project, I found myself sometimes substituting Wikisource contributions as "Wikipedia" ones when I took the survey ("Well, that's probably what they meant for my case...").

Only at the very end of the survey could one indicate if s/he also uses other projects and contributes to them. There was no way to indicate that one contributes to other projects far more than to Wikipedia.

Thus, I conclude that this survey provides no accurate data regarding the relationship of Wikipedia to the other projects. Dovi (talk) 14:26, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Indeed. I have essentially bailed out of Wikipedia in favor of a different foundation project. It would have been smart to find this out, and ask why. ~ Ningauble (talk) 19:19, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

The survey was intended for Wikipedia. That is why the survey invitation was only seen from Wikipedia. The survey asks respondents their awareness level of sister projects. We hope that learning the awareness of the sister projects will help the foundation how to fostering them. --Shuhari (talk) 05:23, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

Flawed and difficult to use survey will provide poor data.

I don't know where to begin and thankfully others have already begun....... I don't want to be repetitive - I didn't read all of the entries above - and I don't want to put more time into this (sorry)

Please consider this another vote for a "do-over"....

Great idea, but could be executed in a better fashion

Outside help should be considered - market research firms etc. if you would like a view that isn't skewed Somethingshiny (talk) 15:44, 30 October 2008 (UTC)