Wikipedia Disputes Editor Exodus Claims 207
eldavojohn writes "The Wikimedia blog has a new post from Erik Moeller, deputy director of the Wikimedia Foundation, and Erik Zachte, a data analyst, to dispute recent reports about editors leaving Wikipedia (which we discussed on Wednesday). They offer these points to discredit the claims: 'The number of people reading Wikipedia continues to grow. In October, we had 344 million unique visitors from around the world, according to comScore Media Metrix, up 6% from September. Wikipedia is the fifth most popular web property in the world. The number of articles in Wikipedia keeps growing. There are about 14.4 million articles in Wikipedia, with thousands of new ones added every day. The number of people writing Wikipedia peaked about two and a half years ago, declined slightly for a brief period, and has remained stable since then. Every month, some people stop writing, and every month, they are replaced by new people." They also note that it's impossible to tell whether someone has left and will never return, as their account still remains there."
Re:Liar (Score:3, Funny)
At Wikipedia, we are proud that we have more editors than readers
Wikipedia hits 3 million, dies. (Score:5, Funny)
The online encyclopedia, knowledge base, social networking site, essay repository, blog, search engine, news aggregator, dessert wax and floor topping Wikipedia has reached its three millionth article and ceased all editing [today.com] as everyone gives up this "free" foolishness and goes home, to read newspapers and watch network television for the rest of their lives.
Dr Felipe Ortega reported that only 1% of edits by random users were kept. "They were all unspeakable shit," said burnt-out administrator WikiFiddler451. "All of them. No, I'm not exaggerating. Go to Special:Newpages and read a day's entries some time. You'll start by deleting the whole database, before you get onto plotting the doom of humanity. Christ, why go on?"
Recent media coverage has highlighted the "inclusionist/deletionist" wars of 2005, including enquiries from Endemol looking for a "passionate deletionist" to join Big Brother 11, "preferably one with big tits." It is thought that Wikipedia could have had ten million articles by now had they not viciously abused their editorial powers by deleting your valuable contributions about you, your teacher at school, your garage band or your dog or the many cameraphone pictures you uploaded of your penis.
"Everything's already been written," said WikiFiddler451, burning the last of his Star Wars figurines before leaving for his rehabilitation course in social interaction skills and basics of hygiene. "Do you have any idea how big THREE MILLION articles is? A BILLION GODDAMN WORDS! Are you going to read more than a droplet of that in your life? No you aren't. You're following your goddamn Twitter.
"But hey, only two million articles are The Simpsons in popular culture or Doctor Who in popular culture. No-one actually reads this stuff, they just write it. We have LiveJournal for stuff people write that no-one wants to read. 'Oh, I wandered lonely as a cheeseburger/ My passionate angst filling my Coke with darkness.' Or Knol. KNOL! I'll just Bing that one."
Shell-shocked veterans of Wikipedia are at a loss now that it's all over — wandering the alleyways of the Internet, mumbling to themselves about "ANI" and "we had to delete the village in order to save it," threatening the policemen moving them on with "arbitration" and bursting into tears when the policeman answers "citation needed." Mere children, sent into the culture wars to save knowledge from horrors they barely understood, and coming home as crippled wrecks. No victory parades for these brave men and women. There is only so much Citizendium, Uncyclopedia and 4chan can do for these child heroes. With your help, we can build Potemkin wikis for these honorable veterans, where they can safely ban and unban, revert and edit-war, and correct the naming of Danzig^WGdansk^WDanzig^WGdansk without the possibility of damage to actual human readers. Please donate so that they may never bug you again.
Not a decline (Score:5, Funny)
The number of Wikipedia editors is not declining. In fact, their population has tripled in the last six months.
the problem with wikipedia (Score:1, Funny)
I think the problem with wikipedia is fairly effectively demonstrated with the following two examples:
Some guy nominates Heavy Metal (Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles) [wikipedia.org] [wikipedia.org] for deletion and fails in his attempt. So what does he do? Merges every episode, save that one, into List of Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles episodes [wikipedia.org] [wikipedia.org]. You see - this user knows he couldn't get consensus by an AfD so he engages in backroom deals to gain support.
And then there's Torchic [wikipedia.org] [wikipedia.org]. A front page featured article with 20 paragraphs and 46 citations now reduced to redirecting to a list of pokemon, with 2-3 paragraphs (depending on whether or not a one sentence paragraph counts) and no citations. Amazing stuff.
Established editors defend this by saying stuff like "wikipedia doesn't need articles on every pokemon when so many other real world subjects are lacking!". What such editors don't understand, however, is that when someone's pride enjoy is spat upon, as it often is at wikipedia, they not only stop contributing to those articles - they stop contributing to all articles.
And wikia isn't an alternative. I mean, what's the definitive wiki on pokemon if it's not wikipedia? pokemon.wikia.com? bulbapedia.bulbagarden.net? pokemon.neoseeker.com? pokemonwithus.wikia.com? pokeworldpokedex.wikia.com? pokebuddies.wikia.com? pokemates.wikia.com? pokepals.wikia.com? pokemonpokedex.wikia.com? pokemonaiman.wikia.com?
Re:Not a decline (Score:2, Funny)
Elsewhere on this page: "Wikipedia is crap! I tried to make an edit on the Elephant page, about a sudden increase in numbers, and it got reverted! Everytime! Well, that ends my experience of editing with Wikipedia, I don't know why I bother! And obviously therefore no one else will, and Wikipedia is doomed."
citation needed (Score:1, Funny)
Why hasn't this summary been given this tag yet?
Wikipedia Disputes Editor Exodus Claims (Score:3, Funny)
[Citation Needed]
A more robust citation is needed. Marked for Deletion.
Re:Liar (Score:2, Funny)
[citation needed]
Re:Liar (Score:5, Funny)
What? We can't have original research on /. now either?
You'll see an exodus of writers if this becomes common consensus!
Don't You Just Love Modern Life? (Score:4, Funny)
the problem with other editors that won't accept your edits as valid unless you can show them a citation they understand
Aggravated further still by the fact that the "other editor" is, in real life, a self-absorbed Starbuck's barista whose only claim to precedence arises from the fact that he got involved in editing Wikipedia when it was the cool thing to do for sociopathic high school geeks who didn't have the motor coordination to play online shooters. He was navigating manufactured bureaucracy while you were navigating jungles leading that archaeological expedition; now you want to correct something on the article about the very same cache you unearthed, but "Would You Like Extra Foam On That?" Boy is throwing up speed bumps, mainly because he he lacks any basic understanding of your field of expertise, but also because he just had a fight with his mom and he's in a real foul mood.
Re:Liar (Score:3, Funny)
It is not possible to have more editors than readers unless people are editing without looking at what they are editing
Given the tendency of some editors to edit without ever looking at any source material for what they are editing, it sounds about right.
Re:Liar (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Liar (Score:2, Funny)
If someone starts off saying "it ain't so" by listing half a dozen facts that have nothing to do with the question, he's either terribly stupid, or trying to pull a fast one on you. It's called misdirection and confusion. Yes, it's actually a named trick in the arsenal of con artists.
So much for that.
It ain't so!
1.Wikipedia has 14.4 million articles
2..The “black box” on an airplane is actually blaze orange so that it can be found easier among the wreckage if the plane were to crash.
3.Creedence Clearwater Revival had seven songs hit #2 on the pop singles chart, but never scored a number one hit.
4.Cockroaches can live up to two weeks without a head because their brain is located throughout their body.
5.Beowulf is the longest Old English manuscript in existence. It contains about a tenth of all known Anglo-Saxon poetry.
6.Wikipedia is the 5th most visited sit in the world.
So there, why can't you understand that's why you're wrong!