Research:Global South User Survey 2014

This page documents a completed research project.


The Global South User Survey 2014 is a survey that was planned and conducted by the Wikimedia Foundation during the second half of the year 2014.

Background edit

The Wikimedia Foundation has conducted three editor surveys in April 2011, November 2011, where the last one was in October 2012. Since then, no general users surveys were conducted, and we believe that the users' trends have significantly changed over the past two years. In addition, given the increase in interest in Global South communities and their activities, we wanted this survey to focus on understanding the statistics and needs of our users (both readers, and editors) in the regions listed in the WMF's New Global South Strategy.

Survey goals edit

  • Provide a better understanding of the specific needs of local user communities in the global south.
  • Provide data that supports product and program development decision making process.
  • Set an initial benchmark point to measure future programmatic success in the local areas
  • Help guide the process of the upcoming strategic planning by providing a preliminary insights about the community needs and expectations.

Countries and languages edit

This survey will be visible (en masse) to Wikipedia users in the the following countries, and in the specific languages listed below:

  • Mexico and Argentina (Spanish)
  • Brazil (Portuguese)
  • Egypt, Jordan, and Saudi Arabia (Arabic)
  • Vietnam (Vietnamese)
  • India (English, Hindi, Telugu, Kannada, Tamil, Malayalam, Bengali, Gujarati)
  • Turkey (Turkish)
  • Philippines (English, Tagalog)
  • Indonesia (Bahasa Indonesia)

In addition to this general (mass) survey in the above priority regions, the survey will also be sent individually to the most active contributors in Sub-Saharan Africa, according to WMF statistics. This will add important context about needs, challenges, and expectations about the rest of Africa, currently outside WMF's formal priority regions.

Questions edit

  • The full questions of the survey can be found here.

Results edit

 
Global South User Survey 2014 - Full Analysis Report

Results presentations edit