Strategy/Wikimedia movement/2017/Sources/Cycle 3/Final summary by language

This is a short summary overview by language of the Source pages on Meta of Cycle 3 discussion. Shortcuts used here rely on the established language and project code and languages are grouped alphabetically. For example, the Arabic language Wikipedia is Ar. To provide a rough sense of activities on the projects and platforms the Source pages summarize, the full summary by community text indicates how many source statements were available and therefore taken into account at the time of writing. (3s), for example, means 3 statements were available on the referenced source page at the time the summary was drafted.

  • Contributors on Arabic Wikipedia (10s) discussed that the encyclopedia model should not be changed (§Ar1.1) while we should try to serve more people by improving the mobile app (§Ar1.3), by using Artificial Intelligence (§Ar1.4) and by promoting Wikipedia in low-awareness regions. (§Ar1.5)
  • On Bengali Wikipedia (20s), the community discussed that we are here to build an encyclopedia and we should not change our current model. (§Bn1.1) (§Bn1.3) We can remain relevant if we focus on quality of the content (§Bn1.10), outreach to spread awareness (§Bn1.6) and promoting our projects in social media. (§Bn1.9) The community also raised concerns on the credibility (§Bn1.14), reliability (§Bn1.16) and trustworthiness (§Bn1.13) of the project which will arise if we include oral knowledge. (§Bn1.1) They also suggested that we can consider govt. registered newspaper sources as credible in the respective local Wikipedia (§Bn1.17) and a designated guideline/common practice to check the fact should be made. (§Bn1.18) One participant thinks that it entirely depends on the user who is using the specific source though we can train users.(§Bn1.20)
  • Chinese Wikipedia community (19s) discussed about the inefficiency of the western model (§Zh1.8) but also questioned whether we will adopt an entirely new model in the future. (§Zh1.6) The community talked about promoting sister projects (§Zh1.14) and multilingualism. (§Zh1.13) They discussed about investing more resources into documentation (§Zh1.4) while keeping the authenticity of information in mind. (§Zh1.15) They discussed about finding ways to ascertain that our information is correct (§Zh1.11) and it becomes more important as our users are going to increase in the future. (§Zh1.17) The community believes that we need to think about our role in the future (§Zh1.8) and improve/develop our technology (§Zh1.7) and applications according to changing world. (§Zh1.16) They also discussed about ensuring that our community is welcoming (§Zh1.12) and promoting Wikipedia in emerging communities. (§Zh1.18)
  • On Dutch Wikipedia (10s) it was discussed that Wikipedia does not need adapt to the needs of the young people. (§Nl1.1) Participants also talked about fake news (§Nl1.2) (§Nl1.9) and how to overcome them though one user thinks that it is wiser to focus on what we want to achieve than on what we want to counteract. (§Nl1.3) They also talked about having a process to block users (§Nl1.9) for posting fake news after prior investigation. (§Nl1.9)
  • English Wikipedians (42s) discussed that we should work with partners (§En1.1) while balancing the needs of different audiences (§En1.4) and ensuring the quality (§En1.3) and survival of Wikipedia. (§En1.2) The community also discussed about having more videos, (§En1.9) using social media for the promotion of Wikipedia (§En1.10) and creating a new project targeted at youth. (§En1.8) We should focus on teaching with Wikipedia, (§En1.16) improving mobile interface, (§En1.19) active use of social media, (§En1.20) making navigation easier, (§En1.18) creating accurate information and delivering it to various audiences. (§En1.17) While there can be a different project for oral traditions (§En1.25) and grants should be provided to document oral knowledge. (§En1.34) Some other contributors said that we don't need to capture the sum of all human knowledge (§En1.28) and also that the outcome of this consultation has already been predetermined. (§En1.27) They also suggested to invest in AI-led audiovisual content generation. (§En1.38)
  • On French Wikipedia discussion (94s) questions were raised about the experts (§Fr1.1) and the research was deemed biased. (§Fr1.5) They stressed on not changing the five pillars of Wikipedia (§Fr1.3) and it was also mentioned that projects like Vikidia and Wikiversity are already helping readers depending on their needs. (§Fr1.2) They also suggested to reforming the lead section of articles,(§Fr1.11) (§Fr1.12) building widgets (§Fr1.16) for providing the quick answer. Participants also talked about trends that can change quickly (§Fr1.16) and increasing Wikimedia reach by using social networks. (§Fr1.17) They urged that oral tradition is actually something very important to deal with. (§Fr1.30) Most of the participants are in favor of using the current model and if necessary then we should create a new project.(§Fr1.37) (§Fr1.42) (§Fr1.46) Some of the participants said that challenge 3 conflicts with the previous two (§Fr1.62) and two Wikipedia principles, when they are applied, naturally and effectively prevent fake news. (§Fr1.68) The success of Wikipedia is based on the possibility given to anyone to participate in the project and on the democratic principles underneath its organization. (§Fr1.71) Some argues that Going to a highly automated or even fully automated version is a paradigm shift not obvious to accept. (§Fr1.87) The community also talked about increasing outreach in Africa (§Fr1.94) and rural France (§Fr1.88), promoting multilingualism on Wikimedia projects (§Fr1.91) and making Wikipedia relevant for teaching. (§Fr1.92)
  • German Wikipedians (28s) said they are here to make an encyclopedia (§De1.1) and that it does not matter whether it is of interest for a large group or a smaller one. (§De1.2) It was discussed that we can start a new project but we should not change our current model for Wikipedia (§De1.14) and we should support sister projects of Wikipedia and other free knowledge projects as well. (§De1.5) Some people said that the result of this strategy discussion has already been determined. (§De1.16) (§De1.17) Some suggested there should be a new project for primary sources. (§De1.22) While one contributor talked about oral citations (§De1.23) while another contributor said that this will violate many of our policies. (§De1.24) They also talked about finding new ways to check facts. (§De1.28)
  • On Hebrew Wikipedia (32s) some people had concerns about the problem itself (§He1.3) while it was discussed that we should focus on adapting to other populations and (§He1.1) integrating with social networks. (§He1.2) Community member said that almost all human knowledge can be documented using traditional means. (§He1.6) Community also discussed about integrating AI (§He1.7), reducing the freedom of editing (§He1.8), prioritizing the quality of encyclopedia (§He1.9), cooperating with academia (§He1.10) and knowledge experts. (§He1.11) They also community talked about translation (§He1.28) internet penetration (§He1.29), awareness about Wikipedia (§He1.30), reliability (§He1.32) and usability of content. (§He1.31)
  • During Hindi Wikipedia WhatsApp discussion (25s) community stressed that we should not change our encyclopedic model (§Hi1.1) and audio-visual should complement the text. (§Hi1.4) We should collaborate with social media instead of trying to become a social media platform. (§Hi1.5) One person suggested the creation of an encyclopedia for children. (§Hi1.6) One participant mentioned Wikilore and said that there should be new project (§Hi1.8) where readers/writers can verify the oral knowledge (§Hi1.9) where a rating system can be introduced to know how many people trust a source. (§Hi1.10) We should keep a check on paid editors (§Hi1.12) and trolls (§Hi1.11) and that the majority does not decide everything. (§Hi1.13) It was discussed that we should decide between right and wrong sources (§Hi1.16) and also that events covered by just one newspaper should not be included. (§Hi1.17) While in Hindi community one-on-one discussions (36s) It was discussed that we should not compete with social media (§Hi2.3) although we should integrate social media with Wikipedia. (§Hi2.13) They also talked about documentation of oral cultures in text (§Hi2.15) and audio-visual formats. (§Hi2.17) They also talked about hiring reviewers (§Hi2.20) and starting a new project. (§Hi2.19) Hindi community members talked about using multiple sources (§Hi2.22) and blacklisting poor sources. (§Hi2.23) They also suggested investing more into mobile technology (§Hi2.27) and easily translatable images. (§Hi2.28)
  • On Italian Wikipedia (50s), the community discussed that we should lay more stress on visuals, (§It1.1) and better communication among wikimedians. (§It1.9) While Wikipedia is not a social network (§It1.4) but we should use social networks. (§It1.8) The community also talked about introducing an article rating system along with comments (§It1.10) and we should also archive online references (§It1.17) while understanding that there is no absolute neutrality. (§It1.52) Participants suggested about oral citation is that before they can be used on Wikipedia oral sources need be recorded/written down somewhere else so that they become verifiable. (§It1.25) The important thing here is to make sure they are both reliable. (§It1.25) They also talked about involving experts (§It1.51), integrating voice-activated systems, machine translation and spell check. (§It1.36)
  • Marathi Community (31s) talked about including live data (§Mr1.22), integrating with third-party apis (§Mr1.24), starting a new project (§Mr1.25), enabling text to audio-video conversion (§Mr1.27), interactive voice response system (§Mr1.29) and including infographics. (§Mr1.1) They talked about starting a new project to document traditional and oral knowledge (§Mr1.22) and the content can then be integrated into other Wikimedia projects (§Mr1.24) after being verified by reviewers (§Mr1.25) and experts.(§Mr1.27) They also talked about the graveness of the problem of misinformation(§Mr1.22) and suggested the creation of tools (§Mr1.24) and bots (§Mr1.25) which can used to track and verify content. They discussed that creation will not be affected much (§Mr1.22) but presentation has to change. (§Mr1.24) They also discussed that content should be displayed based on user's search history (§Mr1.25) and for better presentation more videos (§Mr1.27) and tools like text to speech should be used. (§Mr1.29) They also discussed about becoming more presentable (§Mr1.22), improving user experience (§Mr1.24), increasing outreach (§Mr1.25), integrating social media (§Mr1.27) and becoming more vocal. (§Mr1.29)
  • Meta-Wiki (63s) contributors have contrary views on first week's insights. Some people suggested that we should consider that youngsters seek knowledge in different ways (§Meta1.1) do what the customers want (§Meta1.17) and stress on other projects as well (§Meta1.6) and other the other hand, some people said that encyclopedias should be known for quality (§Meta1.18) and don't have to be interesting (§Meta1.2) and another contributor talked about leaving the movement if the current model is not followed. (§Meta1.7) Many contributors talked about going beyond encyclopedia (§Meta1.10) such as video versions of articles (§Meta1.12) and becoming more modular. (§Meta1.25) It was also discussed that the current encyclopedic model is not bringing different language communities together (§Meta1.4) and we should recognize our failures. (§Meta1.22) Participants also suggested to use WMF grants to support oral knowledge and then using the text as a source. (§Meta1.31) Though participants also suggested that if WMF want's to use oral sources, that must be in a new project, not in a Wikipedia (§Meta1.35) and talked about partnerships. (§Meta1.36) Some also said that this kind of interview should go to projects other than Wikipedia (§Meta1.37) and the "mobile view" developers should focus not on editing aspects, but on readability, which would lead them into being concerned about the layouts of the "mobile view".(§Meta1.56)
  • Polish Wikipedia (51s) community believes that traditional encyclopedic format is good enough (§Pl1.43) but we should make it more attractive by adding more multimedia (§Pl1.5) and we need external experts to produce such content. (§Pl1.7) People also discussed that popularity in Google results will ensure low risk of readership decline (§Pl1.9) but we should also be prepared that Google can become our competitor one day. (§Pl1.10) Those who raised concern about Week 2 challenge argued that we need the quality, not the amount. (§Pl1.19) The other party said that the issue is if the author and/or place of publication is trustworthy (§Pl1.21). Community also discussed about modularity of content with much more multimedia content (§Pl1.43) and engaging older generations. (§Pl1.50) They also talked that focusing on small languages does not mean to just create new language versions of Wikipedia. (§Pl1.51)
  • During Punjabi Wikimedians Strategy salon at Patiala (4s), the community talked about making the interface more friendly (§Pa1.5), focusing on regional languages (§Pa1.9) and creating multilingual multimedia content. (§Pa1.6) The community also talked about focusing on engaging subject experts (§Pa1.7), documenting knowledge in other mediums (§Pa1.1), video citations (§Pa1.3), regional languages (§Pa1.10), incorporating already documented oral knowledge (§PWUG1.14) and access to content that can be used to verify information. (§PWUG1.13) It was also said that we should focus more on audio-visual sources (§PWUG1.21), create multiple versions of content (§PWUG1.18) and avoid the binary division of right and wrong. (§PWUG1.22) They discussed about combating misinformation with the help of experts (§PWUG1.16), by inculcating different point of views (§PWUG1.24) and by using multiple sources. (§PWUG1.25) While during a meeting in Delhi, it was discussed that there should be different modes of learning depending upon regions. (§PWUG2.1) While during a meetup in Chandigarh, (15s) the community discussed that we should lay more stress on audio-visual (§Pa1.5) while the quality of the content should remain a priority. (§Pa1.9) They talked about collaborations with like-minded organizations to include other model of learning (§Pa1.6) and it was also discussed that a new project for question-answers should be started. (§Pa1.7) Regarding 2nd insight some community members felt that Wikipedia should become more social (§Pa1.1), appealing and interactive (§Pa1.3) while some other felt that our goal is to build an encyclopedia and not to become a social media media platform.(§Pa1.10)
  • Russian-speaking community (8s) talked about not changing our format (§Ru1.1) and that our main focus should be to gather knowledge in the form of an encyclopedia. (§Ru1.3) They also discussed about having a quality assessment in place as most of our readers don't read full articles. (§Ru1.4) They talked about partnerships with other platforms (StackExchange). (§Ru1.2) They also talked about the problem in traditional sources and that NPOV ends up favoring mainstream. (§Ru1.6) and the authorization of all information. (§Ru1.7) They discussed about gathering information about information and to consider anything knowledge as absolute. (§Ru1.8)
  • Members of Swedish Wikipedia (28s) community said that our work is to write an encyclopedia (§Sv1.4) (§Sv1.8) and we should focus on quality (§Sv1.1) and facts (§Sv1.2) while some adjustments can be done. (§Sv1.3) They also talked about creating a new project. (§Sv1.19 They also said that a clearer definition of Wikipedia's role in relation to other actors is needed. We should not rely on unverified information from news. (§Sv1.28
  • Tamil Community (39s) talked about focusing on editable multimedia (§Ta1.1), sister projects (§Ta1.2), relevance of encyclopedia form (§Ta1.3), machine readable data (§Ta1.4) and interactive bots/apps. (§Ta1.6) They discussed that WMF can give funds (§Ta1.9) to documenting knowledge using various formats (§Ta1.7) and wikimedia projects. (§Ta1.8) They also talked about getting content released under CC licenses (§Ta1.15), organizing more contests like wiki loves monuments (§Ta1.11) and giving less stress on policies. (§Ta1.10) They also discussed that we should increase user-base (§Ta1.17), look beyond current model of fact checking (§Ta1.20) and stop relying too much on online sources (§Ta1.22) to counteract misinformation. They focused on decentralized wiki editing (§Ta1.24), MOOCs on wikibooks (§Ta1.25), wikidata games (§Ta1.26), upgrading our interface (§Ta1.30) and creating local content. (§Ta1.28) They talked about focusing on local language content (§Ta1.31), availability across languages and formats (§Ta1.32), adapting to the needs of the readers (§Ta1.33), creating tools like text to speech (§Ta1.37) and becoming more vocal about our cause. (§Ta1.39)
  • Urdu community (18s) discussed that there should be new projects for videos (§Ur1.1) and question answers (§Ur1.2) but we should keep focusing on developing Wikipedia as well. (§Ur1.3) It was also said that people use social media for entertainment and they come to Wikipedia when they need knowledge (§Ur1.6) but we should still make some changes such as having an on-wiki chatting platform. (§Ur1.5) Another user said that Wikipedia will always remain relevant (§Ur1.8) while he also talked about the doing extensive outreach to reach more people. (§Ur1.9) They also said that oral cultures and oral knowledge should be documented by making documentaries. (§Ur1.18)
  • On Vietnamese Wikipedia, it was discussed that Wikipedia is used as a reference on social media. (§Vi1.1) It was also said that Wikipedia is not a place for self-learning nowadays. (§Vi1.2) They also discussed that our interface should be improved, (§Vi1.3) and AI should be used to improve user experience. (§Vi1.4) We should also think about balanced writing and frequent fact-checking (§Vi1.5), production of false sources by governments (§Vi1.6) and the problem of Wikipedia being used for marketing. (§Vi1.8) The community talked about the ability to edit and comment articles on Wikipedia application (§Vi1.7) and recent changes of watchlist should be delivered on mobile phone. (§Vi1.9) They talked about Wikipedia being too west centric. (§Vi1.10) They also discussed about the issue of neutrality of Wikipedia in Vietnamese as the Vietnamese newspapers are government controlled. (§Vi1.11)


  • On Wikidata discussion (6s) community talked about having separate rules for non-western projects (§D1.1) and verifiability of content. (§D1.2) One participant suggested hosting a central repository of tools and techniques for verifying sources or detecting that they have been fabricated.(§D1.6)
  • WikiDonne's User Group (19s) discussed about reliability of content (§WD1.1), institutional collaborations (§WD1.3), advocating for free knowledge (§WD1.5), supporting affiliates (§WD1.7) and including oral and audio-video sources. (§WD1.9) They talked about writing with a neutral point of view (§WD1.11) with the help of reliable sources (§WD1.12) and by involving qualified people. (§WD1.13) They also talked about strengthening the projects in less represented languages (§WD1.18) and focused on all kinds of diversity. (§WD1.19)
  • Members of Wikimedia Bangladesh (7s) discussed about focusing on other projects for those who seek short information (§WMBD1.3), doing outreach in low awareness regions (§WMBD1.4) and promoting our projects on social media. (§WMBD1.6) They also said we should focus on providing credible information (§WMBD1.7) and also there should be a new project for oral knowledge. (§WMBD1.2)
  • During Wikimedians of Nepal Strategy Meetup (7s), the participants discussed about improving the Wikipedia interface (§NP1.1), making internet cost effective (§NP1.2), improving content in regional languages (§NP1.4), creating multilingual multimedia (§NP1.5), organizing more outreach events (§NP1.6) and using social media for promotion. (§NP1.7) They also discussed about involving experts in the movement (§NP1.8), collaborating with local and regional authorities (§NP1.10), verification of content (§NP1.11), creating guidelines for better contributions (§NP1.12) and encouraging Wikipedians to participate in important discussions. (§NP1.13)


See Also