Wikimedia Meta-Wiki

Research:Disinformation, Wikimedia and Alternative Content Moderation Models: Possibilities and Challenges

Contact
Ramiro Álvarez Ugarte, at ramiroau@gmail.com
Duration:  2023-July – 2024-June
disinformation, content moderation

This page documents a research project in progress.
Information may be incomplete and change as the project progresses.
Please contact the project lead before formally citing or reusing results from this page.


In this research we propose to look at how three different Wikipedia communities deal with the challenge of identifying trustworthy sources in the context of editing entries on topics crossed by dynamics of political polarization in three countries of Latin America. We seek to shed light on how Wikipedia's community-led moderation model, as well as the broader normative commitments of the community itself, help Wikipedia deal with such a pressing and challenging task. The findings could have a broader impact on global debates on disinformation and content-moderation challenges.

Methods edit

Within the scope of this research, the narrow focus we selected will increase the likelihood of success of the research method we propose: trace ethnography[1]. Through this method we will look at how these articles evolved and the kind of discussions that they generated among Wikipedians who proposed editions. Furthermore, we want to understand how editors understand their role, how they fight the polarization that affects their communities, and what strategies they develop to deal with the tensions that naturally ensue.

This calls for expanding our understanding of this methodology. Stuart Geiger and David Ribes define trace ethnography as a form of institutional ethnography that takes advantage of the rich documentation produced in "highly technologically-mediated systems"[2].

"Analysis of these detailed and heterogeneous data---which include transaction logs, version histories, institutional records, conversation transcripts, and source code---can provide rich qualitative insight into the interactions of users, allowing us to retroactively reconstruct specific actions at a fine level of granularity. Once decoded, sets of such documentary traces can then be assembled into rich narratives of interaction, allowing researchers to carefully follow coordination practices, information flows, situated routines, and other social and organizational phenomena across a variety of scales".[3]

In that sense, our own research proposal will jump into those documents, specially the 'Discussion' tab of the three entries we have identified, as a first object of analysis. We expect to follow the most interesting discussions from the point of view of our research question in detail, and interview editors and contributors who took part in them. (We depend to some extent of the collaboration of local Wikipedia communities in that effort and have already contacted some of them). Towards the final stage of our data gathering efforts, we will likely interview senior members of the Wikipedia's bureaucracy as well as Wikimedia Foundation employees supporting these efforts from different sectors (engineering, policy, legal, trust and safety, etc).

Timeline edit

A. Lit review edit

  1. Literature review: active, 2023-07-01, 2023-10-01
  2. Methodology development: active, 2023-07-01, 2023-09-01
  3. Meth, produced: critical, 2023-09-01, 2w

B. Research edit

  1.  Desk and Archival Research: active, 2023-09-01, 2024-01-31
  2.  Interviews: active, 2023-09-01, 2024-01-31

C. Findings edit

  1.  Preliminary findings: active, 2024-02-01,2024-03-01
  2. Drafting: active, 2024-03-01,2024-04-01
  3. Final report: critical, 2024-04-01, 3w

D. Dissemination edit

  1. Derivative materials: active, 2024-04-01,2024-05-01
  2.  Discussion in selected seminars: active, 2024-04-01,2024-06-30
  3.  Presentation in RightsCon2024: active, 2024-06-01,2024-06-30

https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:WhatLinksHere/Research:Disinformation,_Wikimedia_and_Alternative_Content_Moderation_Models:_Possibilities_and_Challenges#REDIRECTX

Policy, Ethics and Human Subjects Research edit

Because our research is based on observations and review of documented data, we do not expect any kind of disruption in the processs of our research.

Results edit

TBD!

Resources edit

Upcoming

References edit

  1. ↑ Emiel Rijshouwer, Organizing Democracy: Power concentration and self-organizing bureaucratization in the evolution of Wikipedia (Erasmus University Rotterdam ene. 2019), p. 40; R Stuart Geiger & David Ribes, Trace Ethnography: Following Coordination through Documentary Practices, 2011 44th Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences 1 (IEEE ene. 2011).
  2. ↑ R Stuart Geiger & David Ribes, Trace Ethnography: Following Coordination through Documentary Practices, 2011 44th Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences 1 (IEEE ene. 2011), p. 1.
  3. ↑ R Stuart Geiger & David Ribes, Trace Ethnography: Following Coordination through Documentary Practices, 2011 44th Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences 1 (IEEE ene. 2011), p. 1.
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