Wikipedia's birthday brings tributes, app, award; Castro death rumors
Wikipedia's birthday brings tributes, Android app, Erasmus Prize
Wikipedia turned 14 on January 15. A few media outlets took note of the anniversary. Time recalled "What Wikipedia’s First Users Got Wrong", reminding readers that in the early years of Wikipedia, some people had trouble grasping the concept of Wikipedia. Some complained that anyone being able to edit the articles was a "major security flaw", while others thought Jimmy Wales wrote all the articles. The Huffington Post offered "13 Super-Specific Tactics To Get The Most Out Of Wikipedia", such as edit histories, the random button, and The Wikipedia Adventure. Bustle presented "The 27 Weirdest Wikipedia Pages, Because Sometimes, You Just Need To See a List of Every Fictional Duck", and who can argue with that? The Houston Press gave us a list of five songs honoring Wikipedia, but one of them is by Limp Bizkit, so we'd like to give that one back.
Tech media took note of the release the same day of a new Android mobile app. A version for iOS will follow. A Wikimedia Foundation blog post called it "A more immersive mobile experience". VentureBeat noted that "the focus of the refresh is firmly on imagery", with the lead photo dominating the app's presentation of the article and the app allowing the user to easily enlarge photos and swipe through a slideshow of all the article's images. They wrote that these features gave the app "a little more visual zing". TechCrunch reported that "the search experience now features a more defined, higher-contrast search bar alongside a list of recently searched topics" and noted the "Read More" feature which offers three related pages at the end of each article.
Also the same day, the Praemium Erasmianum Foundation announced it was awarding the prestigious 2015 Erasmus Prize to Wikipedia. In a press release, they said it chose the Wikipedia community for the award because "it has promoted the dissemination of knowledge through a comprehensive and universally accessible encyclopaedia." The Wikimedia Foundation responded to the news in a press release and a blog post. English language media has not taken notice of the award as of press time, but Jimmy Wales was personally on hand in the Netherlands for the announcement and appeared on the Dutch television show RTL Late Night on RTL 4, along with Wikipedia editors Spinster and Effeietsanders. See the full story of the award in our "News and notes" section this week.
Wikipedia helps spread rumors of Fidel Castro's death
Fusion reported (January 9) on the wild spread of rumors on January 8 and 9 about the alleged death of 88-year-old longtime Cuban dictator Fidel Castro, who has not been seen in public since January 2014. The rumors spread on social media, especially Twitter, though some media outlets, like Diario Las Américas and De Telegraaf were reporting on the rumors and claimed that the Cuban government would be holding a press conference about the matter. This was a claim that left many journalists who hadn't heard about a press conference scratching their heads. The Associated Press noted (January 10) that one publication, Corriere della Sera, even reported the rumor as fact before quickly removing the story from their website.
The Cuban government officially denied the rumors and the existence of a press conference to Agence France-Presse. Univision anchor Jorge Ramos warned on Twitter about the prevalence of false rumors regarding Castro's death, especially in the community of Cuban-American exiles in south Florida. "Careful. Remember that here in Miami, almost like a ritual, Fidel Castro is killed several times every year." Many news outlets are speculating the source of the rumor was the January 4 death of Fidel Castro Odinga, son of former Prime Minister of Kenya Raila Odinga.
On Wikipedia, three different editors edited Fidel Castro's article to report the death as factual. One of them cited the De Telegraaf article and even submitted Castro's death as a potential story for the In the news section of the front page of the encyclopedia. Aside from Fusion, these edits attracted little attention in the English language press, but numerous Spanish language media outlets reported on Wikipedia's role, including stories in BBC Mundo, Perú.21, El Heraldo, and Página Siete.
In brief
- Academia: The Daily Northwestern opines (January 15) that "Academia should find a place for Wikipedia".
- Football fans: Soccer Gods lists the "Seven things we learned from Wikipedia about the 2015 Africa Cup of Nations" (January 15). The 2015 Africa Cup of Nations will be held in Equatorial Guinea from January 17 to February 8.
- Pakistan editing: The Express Tribune reports (January 14) that Wikimedia Pakistan is working with the National Assembly of Pakistan to obtain biographical information about each Assembly member, including dates of birth, educational background, and photographs, to create and improve encyclopedia articles for all 340 members.
- Checking in with Whitehall's Resident Wikipedian: BBC News reports (January 14) on the anonymous UK civil servant (or servants) who has been diligently editing Wikipedia articles on Scottish football from work.
- Unusual aggregations: The Huffington Post offers "The 49 Most Entertaining Wikipedia Entries Ever Created" (January 14), most or all of which were taken from Wikipedia:Unusual articles.
- Armenian editing: PanARMENIAN.Net reports (January 13) on Wikimedia Armenia's Wiki Winter Camp for youth aged 14 to 20 in Aghveran from January 7 to 11. The Camp's work boosted the Armenian Wikipedia from 42 to 41 on the ranking of Wikipedias by number of articles. Four such Camps are planned for 2015.
- Tackling the gender gap: The blog of the Anita Borg Institute for Women and Technology offers advice and encouragement (January 13) for women wishing to edit Wikipedia to address the gender gap.
- Canadian Resident Wikipedian: All Points West talks with (January 12) the new Honorary Resident Wikipedian at the University of Victoria, Christian Vandendorpe, professor emeritus at the University of Ottawa and author of the book From Papyrus to Hypertext: Toward the Universal Digital Library (2009).
- Corrupting Wikipedia: In a discussion (January 12) of "pernicious corruption" in the US government in the Washington Post, Professor Janine R. Wedel writes of public relations firms: "One firm employs 'all sorts of dark arts' (their words) on the Internet: editing Wikipedia entries deemed damaging; setting up third-party blogs that also appear independent; and gaming search results to ensure that positive content outweighs negative content. Such efforts sway public perception and mold policy yet are virtually invisible even to a trained observer."
- Golden jokes: While presenting the Golden Globe Award for Best Screenplay at the 72nd Golden Globe Awards on January 11, Kristen Wiig noted that according to Wikipedia "you cannot make a movie without a screenplay."
- Time for questions: Jimmy Wales appeared on the January 8 episode of Question Time on BBC One.
- Crazy Popes: Adweek interviewed (January 6) Archer creator Adam Reed, who said he relies on Wikipedia for each episode. "I would be lost without it. I will go look for like, I don't know, like what type of pistol would this guy be carrying, and then an hour later I'm like, 'Man, this Pope Pius IV was crazy!' And then the afternoon is gone."
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