Wikimedia for civil servants

Wikimedia for Civil Servants

Scottish Government, 8th December 2016

Wikimedia Foundation

Imagine a world in which every single human being can freely share in the sum of all knowledge.

That’s our commitment.

Not just Wikipedia

More than meets the eye★ Quality & ratings scale★ Vandalism picked up quickly★ Wikipedia is more accurate than

you think★ Study by Nature in 2005, found Wiki

nearly as accurate as Britannica (2.92 errors per article comp to 3.86 on Wikipedia.)

★ Journal of Clinical Oncology, 2010 found Wiki as accurate as Physician Data Query.

★ Ease of editing reflects ongoing debate

Wiki has a gender problem

Pillars of Wikipedia

An encyclopediaNeutral point of viewFree content that anyone can use, reuse or distributeRespect & civilityNo firm rulesBy Thermos (Thermos) (Own work) [CC BY-SA 2.5 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.5)], via Wikimedia Commons

Core content policies

Topics should meet Wiki’s standard of

notability

Avoid conflict of interest (maintain

neutrality)

No personal interpretation (aka “no

original research”)

Verifiability

“...anyone using the encyclopedia can check that the information comes from a reliable source.”

What’s a reliable source?If available, academic and peer-reviewed publications are usually the most reliable sources.Other reliable sources includeuniversity-level textbooksbooks published by respected publishing housesmagazinesjournalsmainstream newspapers

“Wikipedia is the single greatest

open educational tool the world has

ever known”Jim Groom, #OER16

Politics & PR fails

http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/queensland/anonymous-wikipedia-edits-linked-to-queensland-government-networks-wikiwatchdog-reveals-20161027-gsci5j.html

Conflict of interest

can be apparent

as well as actualhttps://www.theguardian.com/polit

ics/2016/jul/06/andrea-leadsom-faces-questions-over-wikipedia-profile-edits

https://www.revealnews.org/blog/wikipedia-users-are-revolting-against-donald-trumps-inner-circle/

@parliamentedits

C

@WhitehallEdits

This can lead to a siege mentality

Protected & semi protected pages

As civil servants, how do we contribute?

The talk pageEnsuring accuracy

Managing COI

●Create an account●Be open about CoI●Don’t try & game the

system●Be authentic in your desire

to contribute

Sara Thomas@lirazelfsa.thomas@live.com[[user:lirazelf]]