Wikipedia's growth is slowing. Maturity or crisis?
When Wikipedia appears in the headlines of news and blogs, usually the occasion is another record or the threat of censoring and blocking Wikipedia in some country. This time it will be about something else. Yes, the number of articles in all language sections of Wikipedia is growing, and attendance and the number of authors are growing. But there are several important indicators that are falling. And not the first year. In English Wikipedia, the oldest and largest, the decline began in 2007. In Japanese and major European sections - a year later. Russian Wikipedia began to slow down in 2010.
Until 2006, Wikipedia grew exponentially. Since 2007, the number of new members, active and very active Wikipedists (that is, those who have made at least 5 and 100 edits, respectively) for the last month, and the number of new articles is slowly falling. If this trend continues further, the number of articles in the English Wikipedia will never exceed four and a half million. The remaining sections in general repeat the history of English with a lag of one to several years.
It is not surprising that in recent years, panicky articles have appeared in the English-language media that Wikipedia is dying. The problem is recognized by the Wikipedians themselves. Thus, the risks associated with a decrease in the number of readators are mentioned in the annual plan of the Wikimedia Foundation for 2011-2012. Moreover, in the same plan, a slowdown in the growth of the audience, especially in the English segment, was noted. This problem becomes especially obvious if, instead of absolute figures, we compare the growth in the number of visitors with the growth of the Internet as a whole.
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However, talking about the imminent death of Wikipedia is premature. Wikipedia is unique. This is the sixth most visited site on the Internet. This is one of the largest international projects that humanity has ever begun. This is by far the largest crowdsourcing project. It is almost impossible to build a fairly reliable forecast for Wikipedia - there is nothing to compare it with except for itself. Perhaps this is a crisis that will be successfully overcome, and Wikipedia growth will continue. Perhaps in a couple of decades Wikipedia will become history. Or maybe this is a regular phase transition to a new stable state.
Let us take a closer look at the history of the 2007 turning point in the English Wikipedia. The graph above reflects the growth rate of the number of articles in English Wikipedia. A rapid rise, a peak in 2006–2007, and then a smooth decline. A very similar picture is observed in the change in the number of active users and administrators of Wikipedia. Practically the same can be seen on the official statistics pages of Wikipedia for many other indicators and language sections.
The dynamics of Wikipedia in recent years are best described by the Gompertz function . It resembles a logistic curve, but not symmetrical, but with a flatter right tail, that is, growth is not slowing down as fast as its acceleration occurred. The upper limit to which the function graph asymptotically approaches in the current growth model of the English Wikipedia is 4.4 million. If we assume that this model will describe events well and further - this will be the maximum number of articles in the English Wikipedia.
Is this slowdown due to external or internal causes? Maybe there is no crisis, and in the English Wikipedia there is simply nothing more to write about? It is doubtful ... First, there will always be new events, new topics will appear, new discoveries will be made. The number of articles cannot be limited from above by a constant. Secondly, the notion of “significance”, which serves as a filter for including or not including information in Wikipedia, can always be revised in the direction of softening, if suddenly Wikipedians find that they have nothing to do.
It is much more likely that a balance has been reached between the information hunger of the audience and the costs of maintaining and expanding Wikipedia. Every time someone does not find the necessary information in Wikipedia, he has an incentive to write or edit an article. While there were relatively few articles, the flow of such incentives was powerful and constant. This attracted more and more people to the ranks of active Wikipedians. Now this stream is pretty scanty. Not getting enough stimulation in the form of obvious holes and gaps in the encyclopedia, they lose interest. Wikipedia now has almost everything. In most cases, this "almost" is more than enough.
Another possible external cause is lack of resources. The number of people who have enough knowledge and desire to create or edit an encyclopedic article is very limited. Donations are hard to maintain infrastructure. At the same time, an increasing share of resources should be aimed at maintaining order in already existing articles. Very weak "business model".
Perhaps Wikipedia could continue to grow even despite all external constraints, but it is hampered by the imperfection of the technical platform or non-optimal mechanisms of community self-regulation. The development of a prototype of a visual wiki editor is aimed just at overcoming technical limitations. If it will be easier to edit articles, perhaps the number of participants will go up. In general, the quality of the interface and the usability of working with it is a controversial topic. Naturally, experienced Wikipedians know Wikipedia like the back of their fingers, and the design of the early 2000s evokes nostalgic feelings. They do not feel the desire to change something. But it is these things that increasingly scare off potential new entrants. And there is nothing good about it (unless you accept the fact that Wikipedia has grown to its theoretical maximum and no longer needs to be expanded, but only to maintain order. Unfortunately, this “stability” ends sooner or later with death).
Nontechnical reasons are even more important. Complaints of inertia, conservatism and arbitrariness of administrators are heard from all sides. Yes, part of them is subjective whining and resentment. But only a part. Too strict an attitude of bureaucrats and administrators is able to repel the desire to edit for a long time. Established communities really die very often due to closeness, elitism and inability to change. It is precisely the problems with the self-regulation of the community that the Wikimedia Foundation management considers one of the main causes of the crisis.
For crowdsourcing, it is not only the quantity that matters, but also the quality of active participants. Measures aimed at mechanically increasing the quantity - simplifying the editor, softening the rules, can have a detrimental effect on quality. On Facebook, almost a billion users willingly post and filter content. But its value is close to zero. By editing Wikipedia I want to attract people as competent as possible - scientists, experts, professionals.
And with this there are big problems. It's not about design, editorial, or complex markup. And not in the severity and closeness of the community - to earn credibility in scientific circles and to print articles at least in mediocre scientific journals is more difficult than to become a full editor of Wikipedia. The fact is that the interests of serious scientists and professionals are diametrically opposed to some of the basic principles of Wikipedia.
First, they want to devote all their time to their beloved work and receive enough remuneration for it in order not to think about money. Wikipedia is permeated with the spirit of volunteering and selflessness. Secondly, they value their reputation and want their work not to be anonymous. Each scientific publication is signed, the names of the authors are in the most prominent place, even their order is important and follows strict rules and traditions. Each Github repository and LinkedIn profile can decorate their host’s resume. And Wikipedia dissolves and depersonalizes the contribution of each participant. Thirdly, the main purpose of the scientist’s work is to conduct the very “original research” that is expressly prohibited by Wikipedia rules. In the scientific environment, competing theories and interpretations can coexist. In the open source world you can always fork a project and create an alternative. Wikipedia is not.
So there is no reason to expect a qualitative improvement in the community of editors of Wikipedia. It will continue to edit the usual "average" people. Wikipedia will remain a popular encyclopedia, a bridge between science and society, an educational project, not a research project. If the quantity and quality of articles begins to decline following the number of active participants, it is hoped that the balance described above between the need for background information and the cost of editing Wikipedia will be restored automatically. Wikipedia will move from a phase of rapid growth to a phase of stable dynamic equilibrium.
Naturally, this does not mean that you can calm down and do nothing. The decline in activity continues and no one can guarantee that it will cease soon. Wikimedia Foundation's leadership is looking for ways to overcome it , but Wikipedia is the wealth of all mankind, and the looming crisis will hit us all. Perhaps Wikipedia’s biggest threat is not censorship, but the extinction of its own community.
Until 2006, Wikipedia grew exponentially. Since 2007, the number of new members, active and very active Wikipedists (that is, those who have made at least 5 and 100 edits, respectively) for the last month, and the number of new articles is slowly falling. If this trend continues further, the number of articles in the English Wikipedia will never exceed four and a half million. The remaining sections in general repeat the history of English with a lag of one to several years.
It is not surprising that in recent years, panicky articles have appeared in the English-language media that Wikipedia is dying. The problem is recognized by the Wikipedians themselves. Thus, the risks associated with a decrease in the number of readators are mentioned in the annual plan of the Wikimedia Foundation for 2011-2012. Moreover, in the same plan, a slowdown in the growth of the audience, especially in the English segment, was noted. This problem becomes especially obvious if, instead of absolute figures, we compare the growth in the number of visitors with the growth of the Internet as a whole.
')
However, talking about the imminent death of Wikipedia is premature. Wikipedia is unique. This is the sixth most visited site on the Internet. This is one of the largest international projects that humanity has ever begun. This is by far the largest crowdsourcing project. It is almost impossible to build a fairly reliable forecast for Wikipedia - there is nothing to compare it with except for itself. Perhaps this is a crisis that will be successfully overcome, and Wikipedia growth will continue. Perhaps in a couple of decades Wikipedia will become history. Or maybe this is a regular phase transition to a new stable state.
Let us take a closer look at the history of the 2007 turning point in the English Wikipedia. The graph above reflects the growth rate of the number of articles in English Wikipedia. A rapid rise, a peak in 2006–2007, and then a smooth decline. A very similar picture is observed in the change in the number of active users and administrators of Wikipedia. Practically the same can be seen on the official statistics pages of Wikipedia for many other indicators and language sections.
The dynamics of Wikipedia in recent years are best described by the Gompertz function . It resembles a logistic curve, but not symmetrical, but with a flatter right tail, that is, growth is not slowing down as fast as its acceleration occurred. The upper limit to which the function graph asymptotically approaches in the current growth model of the English Wikipedia is 4.4 million. If we assume that this model will describe events well and further - this will be the maximum number of articles in the English Wikipedia.External causes of slowdown
Is this slowdown due to external or internal causes? Maybe there is no crisis, and in the English Wikipedia there is simply nothing more to write about? It is doubtful ... First, there will always be new events, new topics will appear, new discoveries will be made. The number of articles cannot be limited from above by a constant. Secondly, the notion of “significance”, which serves as a filter for including or not including information in Wikipedia, can always be revised in the direction of softening, if suddenly Wikipedians find that they have nothing to do.
It is much more likely that a balance has been reached between the information hunger of the audience and the costs of maintaining and expanding Wikipedia. Every time someone does not find the necessary information in Wikipedia, he has an incentive to write or edit an article. While there were relatively few articles, the flow of such incentives was powerful and constant. This attracted more and more people to the ranks of active Wikipedians. Now this stream is pretty scanty. Not getting enough stimulation in the form of obvious holes and gaps in the encyclopedia, they lose interest. Wikipedia now has almost everything. In most cases, this "almost" is more than enough.
Another possible external cause is lack of resources. The number of people who have enough knowledge and desire to create or edit an encyclopedic article is very limited. Donations are hard to maintain infrastructure. At the same time, an increasing share of resources should be aimed at maintaining order in already existing articles. Very weak "business model".
Internal reasons for slowing down
Perhaps Wikipedia could continue to grow even despite all external constraints, but it is hampered by the imperfection of the technical platform or non-optimal mechanisms of community self-regulation. The development of a prototype of a visual wiki editor is aimed just at overcoming technical limitations. If it will be easier to edit articles, perhaps the number of participants will go up. In general, the quality of the interface and the usability of working with it is a controversial topic. Naturally, experienced Wikipedians know Wikipedia like the back of their fingers, and the design of the early 2000s evokes nostalgic feelings. They do not feel the desire to change something. But it is these things that increasingly scare off potential new entrants. And there is nothing good about it (unless you accept the fact that Wikipedia has grown to its theoretical maximum and no longer needs to be expanded, but only to maintain order. Unfortunately, this “stability” ends sooner or later with death).
Nontechnical reasons are even more important. Complaints of inertia, conservatism and arbitrariness of administrators are heard from all sides. Yes, part of them is subjective whining and resentment. But only a part. Too strict an attitude of bureaucrats and administrators is able to repel the desire to edit for a long time. Established communities really die very often due to closeness, elitism and inability to change. It is precisely the problems with the self-regulation of the community that the Wikimedia Foundation management considers one of the main causes of the crisis.
Quality or quantity?
For crowdsourcing, it is not only the quantity that matters, but also the quality of active participants. Measures aimed at mechanically increasing the quantity - simplifying the editor, softening the rules, can have a detrimental effect on quality. On Facebook, almost a billion users willingly post and filter content. But its value is close to zero. By editing Wikipedia I want to attract people as competent as possible - scientists, experts, professionals.
And with this there are big problems. It's not about design, editorial, or complex markup. And not in the severity and closeness of the community - to earn credibility in scientific circles and to print articles at least in mediocre scientific journals is more difficult than to become a full editor of Wikipedia. The fact is that the interests of serious scientists and professionals are diametrically opposed to some of the basic principles of Wikipedia.
First, they want to devote all their time to their beloved work and receive enough remuneration for it in order not to think about money. Wikipedia is permeated with the spirit of volunteering and selflessness. Secondly, they value their reputation and want their work not to be anonymous. Each scientific publication is signed, the names of the authors are in the most prominent place, even their order is important and follows strict rules and traditions. Each Github repository and LinkedIn profile can decorate their host’s resume. And Wikipedia dissolves and depersonalizes the contribution of each participant. Thirdly, the main purpose of the scientist’s work is to conduct the very “original research” that is expressly prohibited by Wikipedia rules. In the scientific environment, competing theories and interpretations can coexist. In the open source world you can always fork a project and create an alternative. Wikipedia is not.
So there is no reason to expect a qualitative improvement in the community of editors of Wikipedia. It will continue to edit the usual "average" people. Wikipedia will remain a popular encyclopedia, a bridge between science and society, an educational project, not a research project. If the quantity and quality of articles begins to decline following the number of active participants, it is hoped that the balance described above between the need for background information and the cost of editing Wikipedia will be restored automatically. Wikipedia will move from a phase of rapid growth to a phase of stable dynamic equilibrium.
Naturally, this does not mean that you can calm down and do nothing. The decline in activity continues and no one can guarantee that it will cease soon. Wikimedia Foundation's leadership is looking for ways to overcome it , but Wikipedia is the wealth of all mankind, and the looming crisis will hit us all. Perhaps Wikipedia’s biggest threat is not censorship, but the extinction of its own community.
List of sources:
- Wikipedia Growth Modeling.
- Wikipedia has exhausted itself?
- Wikipedia: death or maturity?
- Why do scientists reluctantly edit Wikipedia?
- The dissertation of doctor Felipe Ortega "Wikipedia: quantitative analysis" (PDF)
- Research trends in the environment editors
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/148025/
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