|
|
|
General notices
- Visual Editor – a visual way of editing, similar to word-processing software – will be the default way to edit Wikipedia some time in July.
- If the current system of talk pages seems confusing, a replacement is on the way! Flow, a much more intuitive way of communication resembling those on other websites, will be enabled soon, hopefully in June.
- The Great American Wiknic will be held in cities across the US in June 2013, with help from the Wikimedians Active in Local Regions of the United States (WALRUS) committee.
- See that little number up by your username? It's part of the new Notifications system (up and running on English Wikipedia since 30 April 2013). When a number other than zero is shown, click on it and the system informs you about new activity on Wikipedia relevant to you. It is designed to augment (rather than replace) the watchlist. The current version can notify you when you are mentioned on a talk page, when a new link is made to a page you created, when your edits are reverted, when a page you have created is reviewed, and when your user rights change. For more information, visit its FAQ page.
- First round of Wikimedia Individual Engagement Grantees announced – financial support for individual contributors to Wikimedia projects, with a particular focus on making online improvements. Includes Wikipedia-oriented development projects. Eight grant proposals were approved. Round two of the Individual Engagement Grants begins August 13, 2013. The current approved projects that involve Wikipedia are:
- The tip of the day is only proofread and updated through May 12th. Beyond that, most of the tips need to be proofread and updated.
Projects seeking help
Also consider posting WikiProject, Task Force, and Collaboration news at the Signpost's WikiProject Report page.
What's going on with outlines:
- New outlines
- Drafts in development
- Outlines undergoing overhaul or major development
The following portals are in need of attention/upkeep:
- Portal:Space – the selected article excerpts were copy and pasted between 2006 and 2009. The leads of the corresponding articles have greatly improved since then.
- Portal:Azerbaijan – news section has reports from 2009.
- Portal:Language – "Language-of-the-month" hasn't changed since June 2009. Monthly picture since March 2012.
- Portal:Thinking – "selected" sections need new material. Been the same for years.
The following portals have interesting design features that you may find useful:
- Portal:Philosophy – cycles through 52 "Selected philosophers", one per week, automatically year after year.
- Portal:Arts – uses random generators to display random featured status selections.
- Portal:Spaceflight – integrates with WikiProject Spaceflight, using the same formatting, and linking to it on its main menu as "Astronaut Cafe".
A Portal for Indian religions has been created at june 1, 2013
Discussions and collaborations
Discussions in the following areas have requested wider attention:
|
Editor Retention
|
|
ikipedia:Editor Retention (Editors are willing to lend a helping hand, just ask)
Editors are as important as content. Without them there is no contribution. Editor retention is the concern and proactive effort of retaining contributors, many who leave for various reasons. WER is a collaboration of users willing to help out when needed. Here you can find other editors with interests in areas that could benefit your work and make your time on Wikipedia more enjoyable. Part of retaining editors is to demonstrate/illustrate best practices and the editors that use them, guide editors with questions to the best venues and connect users for their specific needs with those best able to assist as much as possible.
We all share the same goal of keeping good editors here
EDITOR RETENTION COLLABORATION
Please help with our current collaboration on Snuggle
Snuggle is a browser-based newcomer observation and support system currently being developed by EpochFail as part of his dissertation research. While the functionality is still limited, a working prototype is currently available for testing. Snuggle is designed to allow Wikipedian mentors to observe the activities of newly registered editors and separate desirable newcomers (good-faith & productive) from the undesirables (bad-faith & vandals).
This tool was designed in reaction to recent research that shows that the decline in newcomer retention in Wikipedia[1][2] is the result of an increasing negative environment for desirable newcomers[3][4] and that Wikipedia's current socialization systems don't work because mentors don't find newcomers when they most need help[5][6]. Snuggle is designed to help experienced Wikipedians quickly and efficiently identify desirable newcomers who are editing in good-faith and help them dodge Wikipedia's sharper corners.
This project and its author needs your feedback and ideas to make sure that Snuggle ends up being a useful tool. If you'd like to be notified of development updates, please add your username.
Editor of the Week
|
 |
 |
 |
| Petrarchan47 |
| The Buddist symbol for rainbow body |
| |
Editor of the Week
for the week beginning June 2, 2013 |
| A dillegent and hard-working editor that holds the reader in high esteem, Editor Petrarchan47's main focus has been the articles BP and Deepwater Horizon oil spill and her efforts to maintain equilibrium for all editors at these and at similar articles is commendable. |
| Recognized for |
| Defending Wikipedia from corporate interests |
| Nomination page |
|
References for Editor Retention section
- ^ Wikimedia Foundation, The Editor Trends Study. http://strategy.wikimedia.org/wiki/Editor_Trends_Study
- ^ Bongwon Suh, Gregorio Convertino, Ed H. Chi, and Peter Pirolli. 2009. [The singularity is not near: slowing growth of Wikipedia]. WikiSym '09. ACM, DOI=10.1145/1641309.1641322
- ^ Halfaker, A., Geiger, R. S., Morgan, J., & Riedl, J. (in-press). The Rise and Decline of an Open Collaboration System: How Wikipedia's reaction to sudden popularity is causing its decline. American Behavioral Scientist.
- ^ Halfaker, A., Kids these days: The quality of new Wikipedia editors over time, Wikimedia Blog. March 27th, 2012.
- ^ David R. Musicant, Yuqing Ren, James A. Johnson, and John Riedl. 2011. Mentoring in Wikipedia: a clash of cultures. WikiSym '11 173-182. DOI=10.1145/2038558.2038586
- ^ Note that Musicant et al., 2011 was written before WP:Teahouse
|
The links below lead to the main community pages of the projects.
All of these projects are multilingual and open-content. |
| Meta-Wiki – |
Coordination of all Wikimedia projects. |
| Wiktionary – |
A collaborative multilingual dictionary. |
| Wikinews – |
News stories written by readers. |
| Wikibooks – |
A collection of collaborative non-fiction books. |
| Wikiquote – |
A compendium of referenced quotations. |
| Wikisource – |
A repository for free source texts. |
| Wikispecies – |
A directory of species. |
| Wikiversity – |
Where teachers learn, and learners teach. |
| Wikivoyage – |
A world-wide travel guide. |
| Wikidata – |
A free knowledge base that can be read and edited by humans and machines alike. |
| Commons – |
Repository for free images and other media files. |
|
