Report on Wikipedia decline is countered; fundraiser, usability, new Criterion for Speedy Deletion, and more

In the wake of the Wall Street Journal story on editors leaving Wikipedia (see previous stories: 11-30, 11-23), Erik Zachte, data analyst for the Wikimedia Foundation, ran another analysis of the numbers and concluded that the survival analysis methodology used in Felipe Ortega's research was flawed. In a blog post, Zachte concludes that in fact the number of new contributors on the English Wikipedia may have been growing, not declining at all, and the number of editors who edit regularly every month has basically been holding steady. While new editor growth peaked in late 2006, Zachte's graphs show the Journal's report on the loss of Wikipedians in recent months as being greatly exaggerated.

The widely covered statistic from the Wall Street Journal, taken from followup research to Ortega's dissertation, was that Wikipedia had lost 49,000 editors in the early months of 2009, a dramatic drop-off compared to earlier periods. However, Zachte shows that this high number is in part the result of over-counting recent editor departures, since many occasional editors who go long periods without editing will eventually return. In a second blog post, Zachte emphasizes the uncertainty inherent in correcting for this over-counting; he states that "It is hard to tell whether this line [estimating net change in active editors] will cross from negative to positive after successive corrections as per my analysis."

As another followup to the many recent media stories about their work, the latest episode of Wikipedia Weekly features an interview with Ed Chi and Felipe Ortega about their research into the possible decline of Wikipedia's contributor base.

Rand Montoya, head of Community Giving for the WMF, blogged about the annual fundraiser (see launch coverage: 11-23, 11-16, 11-09), highlighting the many new things that the fundraising team has implemented for this year's fundraiser.

The fundraising sitenotices continue to be switched out based on how well they are performing. According to Montoya, the current sitenotices running are:

• On the English Wikipedia:

• "Wikipedia is there when you need it — now it needs you." (#30 -- running 20% of the time)
• "Wikipedia is a non-profit project: please donate today." (#36 -- 20%)
• "A small price to pay for the value received." [donor comment] (#22 -- 20%)
• "My amount is little, but my support is sincere." [donor comment] (#18 -- 20%)
• "Thanks, Wikipedia." (#40 -- 20%)

• Running globally:

• "Wikipedia is there when you need it — now it needs you." (#30 -- running 40% of the time)
• "Wikipedia is a non-profit project: please donate today." (#36_G -- 20%)
• "There is never a day without Wikipedia." (#17_G -- 20%)
• "My amount is little, but my support is sincere." [donor comment] (#18 -- 20%)

Statistics for how this year's fundraiser compares to the previous two years can be seen here (the orange bar represents 2009).

Naoko Komura from the Usability Initiative has posted some statistics on how many people have tried out their beta tools, including the new Vector skin and the new editing toolbars. There are now almost 300,000 users of the Vector skin, with 79% of those who tried it choosing to keep the new design. The retention rate is highest on the English Wikipedia at 83%. On the Japanese Wikipedia, where editors have expressed problems with reading the smaller font size, it is only 60%.

The usability team found that users of the new skin were more likely to be using Mozilla Firefox, perhaps indicating issues with the code in Internet Explorer (which usually enjoys higher usage across Wikimedia projects).

In addition to sharing these quantitative statistics, they have also published the comments from their surveys which provide more specific use cases and issues. They are now discussing the timing for the new settings to become default on all Wikipedias.

The multimedia usability project is also asking for help with their domain research -- looking at how other websites accomplish tasks like uploading photos.

Finally, another report on November's multimedia usability meeting in Paris is available.

There is a new Criterion for Speedy Deletion, A10: "'Recently created article that duplicates an existing topic." The text of the criterion reads:

"A recently created article with no relevant page history that duplicates an existing topic, and that does not aim to expand upon, detail or improve information within any existing article(s) on the subject, and where the title is not a plausible redirect. This does not include content forks, split pages or any article that aims at expanding or reorganizing an existing one or that contains referenced, mergeable material."

The criterion was added on November 28 by Backslash Forwardslash, the same user having proposed it over two weeks earlier, on November 12. Both the proposal and the adoption have proven controversial, with discussion occurring here. Internet emerges was one of the first articles to be deleted under the criterion. A template has been created at {{Uw-csd-a10}}, and the criterion is also available through the editing tool Twinkle.

Two food-related writing challenges are currently ongoing: Bacon Challenge 2010 and Doughnut Days 2009.

This is the second year for the Bacon Challenge. This year's results include Snake 'n' Bacon, Stegt Flæsk, National Pig Day, bacon vodka, Mitch Morgan, and the peanut butter, banana and bacon sandwich. For the 2010 event participants are competing to win the much coveted Bacon WikiCup.

For Doughnut Days, which finishes up at the end of this month, articles including mandazi, potato doughnut/ "spudnut", Dutchie (pastry), adhirasam, zippuli, and quesito have been added. According to ChildofMidnight, "Both events have a distinctly international aspect and are meant to be fun as they don't deal with the most hard-hitting of article issues. Still, there's something to be said for the importance and significance of bacon and doughnuts... although I'm not sure just what that something is."

German Wikipedians recently completed a successful initiative to create freely licensed photos of politicians in the German state of Lower Saxony, as reported by the "Kurier", the Signpost's German sister publication. Members of a local Wikipedia meetup visited the state's parliament (the Landtag in Hanover), and, supported by the office of its president, invited all the current members of parliament to be portrayed. During two days they took photos of 136 of the 152 members, including the state's head of government and almost the entire cabinet. On the occasion, the Wikipedians had many conversations with the politicians about Wikipedia and free content, fielded some reports of small errors in their Wikipedia biographies, and gave live demos of editing Wikipedia.

• Wikimedia is looking for a full-time (unpaid) communications intern over the winter break. The successful applicant is set to "gain unique skills in social media, massive publicly collaborated web projects, research, and writing for global audiences, and will meet and interact with pioneers in the Web 2.0 movement."
• Delphine Ménard (user:Notafish), the treasurer of Wikimédia France, was in Rome in November to attend a conference at the Vatican about IT and the Church. An interview with her is posted here.
• After a two-day petition, the Bulgarian Wikipedia successfully obtained the cybersquatted domain wikipedia.bg that had been used for advertising purposes since March 12, 2008. The petition accompanied an appeal to the Bulgarian top-level domain administrator, Register.bg, to reconsider the case with the domain. The denouement, however, came from the registrant himself, who redirected the domain to the homepage of BG WP. (Previous story about cybersquatting of Wikipedia-related domains: 2009-08-17)
• Second Wikimeetup in Karachi between the editors of Wikipedia canceled.
• The Foundation-l List Summary for November 16-30 has been published.

• 2005: New article creation is restricted to logged-in editors
• 2006: Commons reaches 1,000,000 files
• 2007: Interview with new executive director Sue Gardner

Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2009-12-07/Serendipity Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2009-12-07/Op-ed Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2009-12-07/In focus