1. Reading Wikipedia:
an unconventional
approach to information
Andrew Gray
(former) Wikipedian in Residence, British Library
JIBS, July 2014

2. what I did on my holiday…
• AHRC-funded one-year “Wikipedian in
Residence at the British Library”
• Residencies previously often with galleries/
museums, focusing on collections/objects
• But libraries (generally) place less emphasis on
“object” collections

3. a different tack
• Alongside content program, created a “skills
program”
• Workshops looked at how to create Wikipedia
articles – but also how to engage with the
project as a reader, or a researcher
• ~400 people over dozens of sessions across
the country

4. the project
• A collaboratively-written encyclopedia
• A synthesis of published material
• Aiming for neutrality and verifiability
...not editorial authority
• Free to use, distribute and reuse

5. the numbers
• Thirteen years old
• 30,000,000 articles in 280 languages
• Growing by 8-10,000 new articles/day
• Reaching 500,000,000 readers/month
...or 7% of the world’s population

6. the problem
“We have a problem. The kids these days
are reading too many encyclopedias.”

7. the opportunity
• Users are actively seeking out the resource
• “Don’t do that!” is never very effective
• This is a perfect teaching moment
– how to tell the good from the bad?
– thinking critically about online material
– engaging with the means of production
– what are we actually saying “don’t” to?

8. some thoughts
• On average... quality is acceptable
• 2005 study: four errors in WP for three in Britannica
• 2011 study (in English, Spanish, Arabic):
“…the Wikipedia articles in this sample scored higher overall
than the comparison articles with respect to accuracy,
references, style/ readability and overall judgment…”
• But millions of articles = millions of problems
• Radically transparent editorial process
• Signs are there for alert readers

9. looking for the hints
Article tags
Talk pages and histories
Corner icons
- locked (a red flag) - quality ratings (positive)
...and, most basic of all, style

10. the springboard
• Wikipedia material is (aspirationally) heavily
cited
• Reader can move past single sources
• Challenge is to highlight and encourage this
capability

11. moving onwards
Footnotes
Internal navigation

12. turning it around
• Wikipedia Education Program
– Encouraging teachers to engage with WP
– Content creation, critical assessment, etc.
• Online courses
– “Writing Wikipedia” MOOC (now fourth round)
• Outreach resources
– Wide range of past projects for different audiences
– Some printed/printable material available

13. some reading
• Head & Eisenberg (2010): survey of the ways students use
Wikipedia as a resource
• Sormuen & Lehtiö (2011): students wrote Wikipedia articles,
which were examined to study their citing/plagarising habits
• Konieczny (2012): survey of five years of teaching using
Wikipedia in various ways
• Roth, Davis & Carver (2013): examination of student
engagement with Wikipedia-related teaching projects

14. Contact details
Andrew Gray, British Antarctic Survey
(late British Library)
Email: anday@bas.ac.uk
Twitter: @generalising
Credit where it's due: this discussion draws heavily on a workshop Nancy
Graham (Roehampton) and I ran at the LILAC conference in April 2014