Five ways academics can contribute to Wikipedia
In recent weeks, the world learned about Dr. Donna Strickland, only the third woman to be awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics. It also learned that Wikipedia lacked an article on Strickland amongst its over five million articles. Wikipedia subsequently received justifiable criticism for its low percentage of female editors, its editing culture, and its….
Should I pay for a Wikipedia article?
At the end of August, volunteer editors on the English Wikipedia blocked 381 user accounts for so-called “black hat” editing—or more specifically, undisclosed paid advocacy. As the Wikimedia Foundation’s blog post defined it, undisclosed paid advocacy is “the practice of accepting or charging money to promote external interests on Wikipedia without revealing their affiliation, in violation of….
Wikipedia is better equipped to deal with systemic bias than traditional publishers
In 2010, the artists Ditte Ejlerskov and EvaMarie Lindahl contacted Taschen, a book publisher, to point out that out of 97 volumes published in the Basic Art series, only five included women: Tamara de Lempicka, Maria Helena Vieira da Silva, Frida Kahlo, Georgia O’Keeffe, and Jeanne-Claude (who shares a volume and a Wikipedia article with her collaborator and husband Christo). Taschen asked the pair about which….