Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/Single/2023-06-05

Picture of the Year 2022

The Picture of the Year contest on Commons for the year 2022 has concluded. The top 12 images can be viewed here; all 56 finalists can be found here. – AK

Wikimedia Russia director starts Russian fork and is replaced

On 24 May 2023, long-time

and Google:

I have been a part of the Wikimedia movement for nearly 20 years. And I can say with absolute certainty: Wikipedia is a great project. Because of its importance to the world, it has become a natural monopoly. This means that it is very difficult to reform. Primarily from the fact that it is scary to screw it up.

My colleagues and I have long wanted to try various innovations and reforms. But, as mentioned above, this is extremely difficult in Wikipedia.

Fortunately, Wikipedia is a free project. Anyone can use its content for any purpose, including creating their own project based on it. A project that one can safely try to develop!

And this is what we (as individuals) have decided to do: to start a new encyclopaedic project which is a fork of Wikipedia. That is, it is based on its content (all 1.9 million articles in Russian), but it will develop in a different way – with the said innovations and fundamental reforms.

We have only started to implement our project now, because two powerful motivating factors have emerged in 2022.

The first has to do with the issue of credibility. It has been bothering me for a long time. Back in 2008, at a Wikimedia conference, I discussed the problem of unreliability of articles in Wikipedia, the negative impact on readers, and ways to overcome it. Various mechanisms for ensuring reliability and neutrality have emerged and evolved since then. But the events unfolding in Ukraine have created unprecedented pressure on them – and in my view, the Wikipedia mechanisms are not coping well with this pressure. The need to find additional mechanisms has increased dramatically.

The second factor has to do with artificial intelligence. This topic interests me even more. At a press conference in 2007 I predicted that Wikipedia materials would be actively used in training samples for artificial intelligence systems. By 2022, this has become a reality, with Wikipedia texts used to train a wide variety of systems. On top of that, the past year has seen a boom in large language models. And it was found that the quality of a training sample is especially important for them, otherwise the occurrence of "hallucinations" in the output increases sharply. It is easy to predict that both search engines and Wikipedia will become irrelevant unless ways are found to integrate them with artificial neural networks.

I've also always been concerned about the atmosphere of the project – the friendliness, the focus on compromise for the sake of education and cooperation. I have had many discussions with fellow Wikimedians on this topic. In our view, Wikipedia is suffocating without an influx of newcomers; drastic measures are needed to attract them.

Finally, Wikipedia has an ambiguous reputation in Russia, and it has become difficult to attract participants as well as partners to organize events to support it. But at the same time the public demand for new Wikipedia-like projects has grown.

The fork has been welcomed by those media outlets which are still allowed to publish in Russia, such as TASS. Ruviki will not be the first Wikipedia fork to be published in Russia. Runiversalis, which had difficulties getting started last fall, now claims to have 1,920,588 entries, but does not seem to be operated according to the usual Wikipedia rules. Adding to the expected confusion is that the new fork's name "Рувики" is pronounced "Ruviki", the same as a common name for the original Russian Wikipedia, RU.wiki.

In community discussions

.

Wikimedia Ukraine secretary Bohdan Melnychuk strongly criticized the fork in the Wikipedia Weekly Facebook group, saying that –

... at the moment Russian Wikipedia is on the brink of being banned in Russia [...] the concern here is not that there is a fork created per se. The concern here is that there are forks being created so that the most successful of them gets to be named the Wikipedia's replacement by the Russian government, while the Wikipedia proper gets banned in Russia.

Medeyko has since been replaced as director of Wikimedia Russia by Stas Kozlovsky and is now indefinitely blocked on Russian Wikipedia, alongside Dmitry Rozhkov, another longtime editor involved in the fork. Kozlovsky told RTVI on the day of the fork's announcement that (DeepL translation):

Vladimir Medeyko, the director of Wikimedia RU, happens to have been secretly involved in the preparation of such a project. There will be a general meeting today to strip him of his directorial powers. [...] Wikipedia is distributed under a free license; anyone can take the content of Wikipedia and use it – it is absolutely normal. It's not normal to use the authority of the director of Wikimedia RU to do this, and to do it in secret for several years. In my opinion, it's not very pretty.

For further discussion see the Wikimedia-l mailing list thread and the Wikipedia Weekly Facebook group. – AK, HaeB

U4C Building Committee

The U4C Building Committee has been set up. Its members are:

• HakanIST
• Waltercolor
• Denis Barthel
• Nitesh Gill
• Ladsgroup
• Barkeep49
• Olugold
• *Youngjin

According to the page on Meta, the task of the U4C Building Committee will be "to draft a charter that outlines procedures and details for a global committee to be called the Universal Code of Conduct Coordinating Committee (U4C). The U4C Building Committee will convene to define and set up the U4C to coordinate the on-going work of the UCoC. This work includes the enforcement, annual review and possible revision of the Universal Code of Conduct and Enforcement Guidelines. The U4C development and implementation will happen over the next year. This crucial work is the next step in providing community structures for the Universal Code of Conduct." – AK

Indian map dispute

A letter written by Jacob Rogers on behalf of the Wikimedia Foundation's Legal Team to the English Wikipedia community at the NPOV noticeboard addresses concerns raised by the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) of the Indian government regarding maps on Wikimedia projects. It acknowledges that India, along with several other countries, has laws that deem maps not conforming to the Indian government's national border outline as illegal. In 2023, MeitY sent the Foundation direct complaints about specific maps and provided a list of 81 URLs on Wikimedia projects, primarily English Wikipedia and Wikimedia Commons. MeitY expressed its intention to block access to Wikipedia in India if the Foundation did not respond to their demands.

The Foundation, following its standard practice in responding to government demands, explained the community-governance processes of the Wikimedia projects. It emphasized that content and editorial decisions are made by volunteers, and the Foundation has no authority to make changes based on government requests. MeitY acknowledged and agreed with this stance, clarifying that their request did not involve deleting any content from the Wikimedia projects.

However, MeitY made two specific requests to the Foundation. Firstly, they requested that the Foundation inform users (editors) about MeitY's demands. The Foundation considered this request reasonable and aligned with its transparency principles, and therefore decided to make the information public by writing the letter. Secondly, MeitY asked for notices to be added to pages where maps did not comply with Indian law. They also requested a reference to the official Survey of India map, which they had recently released into the public domain and uploaded to Wikimedia Commons.

The Foundation's Legal Department reviewed the requests and opined that informing the community about MeitY's notices was a reasonable course of action, consistent with transparency principles. However, regarding the second request, the Foundation understood MeitY's concern to be the potential misinterpretation of maps' depiction of disputed borders. In response, they suggested the addition of language to image captions in an encyclopedic style to address some of MeitY's concerns while adhering to existing content policies.

After conducting a thorough manual review of the 81 URLs shared by MeitY, the Foundation meticulously identified twelve maps of India that required attention. These maps were spread across eight pages and notably lacked any indication of the border dispute in their visual representation or accompanying captions. The identified maps are as follows:

• File:Political map of India EN.svg
• File:Diplomatic relations of India.svg
• File:Members of BIMSTEC.svg
• File:Map of India WV.svg
• File:Indus river.svg
• File:Diplomatic missions of India.PNG
• File:Pakistan India Locator 2.png
• File:Iran India Locator.svg
• File:India–Uzbekistan Locator.svg
• File:India Bhutan Locator.png
• File:India China Locator.png
• File:India location map.svg

Recognizing the importance of providing a more balanced and contextual understanding, the Foundation acknowledged the potential benefit of addressing the border dispute in relation to these maps.

The letter emphasized the Wikimedia Foundation's support for the community's editorial decisions and processes. If the community collectively decided not to take any action in response to MeitY's requests, the Foundation would communicate this decision to MeitY and would also attempt to challenge any potential blockage of Wikipedia in India. In conclusion, the letter expressed gratitude to the readers for their time and consideration. – JSG

Brief notes

• Let's improve the default behaviour of galleries? A proposal to switch the default behaviour of the <gallery> tag has been raised on the Village Pump.
• Annual reports: Commons Photographers User Group report for 2022, Wikimedians of Lagos User Group report 2022–2023.
• Articles for Improvement: This week's
  Article for Improvement (beginning 5 June) is Bible. It will be followed the week after by Tank biathlon
  . Please be bold in helping improve these articles!

Wikipedia's "credibility transformation"

Discover the captivating tale of English Wikipedia's credibility makeover in an intriguing APSR article by Sverrir Steinsson, summarized on Political Science Now. Wikipedia's shift from hosting pseudoscience and conspiracy theories to becoming a myth-busting powerhouse is unveiled. Through internal battles, changing policy interpretations, and editor exoduses, Wikipedia has emerged as a trusted source of factual information. It's a fascinating journey that proves even the wildest institutions can reinvent themselves for the better.

By conducting an extensive analysis of a diverse range of Wikipedia articles spanning topics such as climate, health, gender, and sexuality, Steinsson provides insights into the notable shifts in content and language that occurred over time. The transformation of English Wikipedia from hosting fringe beliefs to actively debunking myths was a gradual yet significant process. For instance, the evolution of our Homeopathy article gradually transitioned from describing the subject as a "controversial system of alternative medicine" to categorizing it unequivocally as a pseudoscience.

Steinsson examines Wikipedia's governance structure, saying that the underlying power struggles and editorial debates that shaped the platform's trajectory; as editors with anti-fringe perspectives gained influence and contributors holding pro-fringe viewpoints gradually departed, a new interpretation of Wikipedia's

. For Steinsson, this change occurred gradually through internal processes, including the resolution of early disputes, the departure of certain editors, and the evolution of rule interpretations. Driven by a combination of compulsory power, where dissenters were sanctioned, and productive power, which delegitimized certain rule interpretations, this pattern of change may have broader implications, and can potentially explain similar transformations in other institutions and contexts (such as political movements and parties).

The article challenges the notion that external events or changes in external sources were the primary drivers of this transformation. Instead, it points to the internal reinterpretation of institutional norms as the driving force behind Wikipedia's evolution. In an era dominated by social media and online engagement, the case of Wikipedia serves as a testament to the potential for dynamic digital platforms to adapt and improve. The narrative unravels the interplay between internal conflicts, evolving policy interpretations, and the reshaping of editorial landscapes, providing a thought-provoking exploration of institutional malleability.

Have we already covered this enough?

Wikipedia's credibility has also been a topic of discussion in other outlets, such as an article by columnist Teri Sforza in The Orange County Register. The article highlights the concerns raised by two professors, Shira Klein from Chapman University and Jan Grabowski from the University of Ottawa (refer to the last edition of The Signpost), regarding alleged distortion and misinformation found in Wikipedia entries related to the Holocaust and Polish-Jewish wartime history. The professors argue that nationalist editors have manipulated the content to glorify Polish heroism, downplay anti-Semitism, and minimize Polish collaboration with the Nazis. They call for the Wikimedia Foundation to take decisive action to protect historical accuracy, as well as its reputation as a source of truth. The professors also say that the safeguards in place to combat disinformation on Wikipedia are ineffective, and call for the involvement of experts to address the issue. The article concludes by stating that Wikipedia's reliability is a matter of concern, given its widespread usage and influence as a major source of information.

In an article by the

amplifying Wikipedia on an unprecedented scale, this new failure is all the more worrying."

It must be said, however, that these press reports have their own problems with reliability. The OC Register claims that the arbitration committee banned User:Levivich. This is untrue. Moreover, both articles refer to a 2018 Polish criminal law as though it were still in force today. In fact, the relevant law was repealed later in 2018, after widespread international criticism.

In brief

• Punting:
  United States Supreme Court cases recently brought these questions to the forefront (see in-depth Signpost coverage in April). The SCOTUS ruling said that the companies could not be expected to have prevented terrorist acts merely based on their websites having been used to make posts, reaffirming precedent for the protections of Section 230. The Hill reported the story in ‘’Supreme Court punts Section 230 debate back to Congress’’
  .
• OpenAI's Approach: Inspired by Wikipedia: Reuters reports how
  large language models
  , is exploring the concept of collective decision-making similar to Wikipedia's model, where diverse views come together to agree on content. This comes as one of several proposals by the company to increase regulatory barriers to the development of neural networks, including licensure requirements.
• Wikipedia's Wacky Footballer Fails: An article on Planet Football highlights the creation of a Twitter account dedicated to sharing side-splittingly awkward footballer photos sourced from Wikipedia articles.
• Notable Notability Fail?:
  Billy Penn brings up the existence of a Wikipedia page for Philadelphia's "French Quarter
  ," highlighting its lack of detailed information and potential failure to meet Wikipedia's notability guidelines for geographic features. "The designation has been around 24 years, but nobody calls it that anymore — if they ever did." Sources in the article make it clear the designation was a late 90s publicity campaign by the city: Arguably notable as an attempt to advertise Philadelphia, but given it was "based on the establishment of three French restaurants and a creperie in the area in the 1990s", one can't help but feel that we're not the ones that should be mocked here.
• Feud Continues – Wikipedia Page Update Pending: The Wikipedia page about the musical group
  1057ThePoint.com, it seems the Oasis Wikipedia page is destined for further revisions – as it stands right now the article states 2025 as a year the band will be active. Whatever.
• In Defense of Comprehensive Reading: Arts writer Dion Everett, in a thought-provoking piece for Varsity, sheds light on the pitfalls of clickbait-driven book criticism and the reliance on summaries and Wikipedia entries. Everett aptly emphasizes that these sources fall short in capturing the nuanced essence and depth of a book, although an image sourced from Wikimedia Commons accompanies the article.
• Green is the New Black:
  COP28. The Centre for Climate Reporting and The Guardian conducted an investigation that uncovered these edits. The appointment of an oil executive as the conference chair has raised concerns, with figures like Caroline Lucas
  from the Green Party criticizing the influence of oil companies and their CEOs on global climate conferences.
• Wikipedia Rejects UK Age Verification Bill: In TechCity this week we can read that Wikimedia Foundation has announced its refusal to comply with the age verification requirements outlined in the UK's Online Safety Bill, citing incompatibility with its content moderation and user verification model. This decision raises concerns about the possible shutdown of Wikipedia in the UK, as the bill mandates robust age checks for sites featuring "pornography". It will not be the first country, nor the last.
• Webcomic xkcd did it again: Please see Meryl Streep seagull incident (disambiguation).
• Jimmy Wales Interview: In a podcast interview, Jimmy Wales and Stewart Baker discuss the sustainability of Wikipedia's model, address claims of bias, and explore the opportunities and risks presented by AI models like ChatGPT for the online encyclopedia.
• Music Company Goes Off-Key: TorrentFreak writes that a small music company targets a Wikipedia article in its effort to combat YouTube ripping sites, by requesting Google to delist the Comparison of YouTube downloaders page. The delisting battle between music industry groups and YouTube downloaders continues, even raising questions about the presence of explanatory content on Wikipedia.
• Wikipedia's Spanish Version Gets a Makeover: Despite not being the only version of Wikipedia to get a makeover, the Spanish edition has gained attention in an article by La Diaria, which highlights the recent aesthetic changes from
  Vector 2022 aimed at enhancing the user experience and streamlining navigation and search functionality. The redesign features a cleaner appearance, an improved search bar, and seamless switching between different language versions of articles. These updates were implemented based on extensive feedback and discussions. In case you missed the opportunity to provide feedback, do not fret — 2010 Vector is still an option
  for you.
• Russian fork: ixbt.com and many others report on Рувики ("Ruwiki"), a new Russian Wikipedia fork. For more information on planned replacements for the Russian Wikipedia see previous coverage. For even more information see this issue's News and notes.

Chatting with a persistent chatbot (May 14 to 20, 2023)

Some renewal, specially in the movies and sports areas, but just about everything from last week remains, including that persistent chatbot back to the top.

Rank	Article	Class	Views	Image	Notes/about
1	ChatGPT		1,575,194		The AI chatbot is gearing up to be the most viewed article of 2023, but if there's anything 2022 taught us, it could always be far worse. In terms of updates, Google showcased a feature where, using ChatGPT, could automatically generate responses to emails, which honestly sounds incredibly dystopian.
2	Fast X		1,568,016		Another movie part of the Fast & Furious franchise, as if we didn't have enough of those. Part 10 (!) was criticized for its poor writing, and a sequel is already in development. It's made $400 million already, making it the sixth highest grossing film in 2023.
3	The Kerala Story		1,142,471		The controversial movie is still in the top 3, with it leading to protests and bans in India. It has received universally negative reviews from critics, but Prime Minister Narendra Modi spoke favorably of it.
4	Eurovision Song Contest 2023		1,033,744		With Eurovision, held in Liverpool and won by Sweden, finishing in the early hours of the 14th Wikipedia time, searches and Wikipedia views relating to the winner would have taken place this week.
5	Charlotte of Mecklenburg-Strelitz		973,028		Netflix's newest show Queen Charlotte: A Bridgerton Story (a fictional take on this royal romance) continues to perform well, if Wikipedia views are anything to go by.
6	George III		936,407
7	Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3		932,504		The fight of Marvel's cosmic team of a-holes against the High Evolutionary has had a warm reception, with box office income nearing $700 million worldwide. Next for the MCU is Secret Invasion on Disney+ in June, and in theaters there's The Marvels in November.
8	Deaths in 2023		928,656		Death is a natural part of life. the Force.
9	Anna Nicole Smith		915,581		Netflix released her teenage son die of an overdose, had a daughter that turned out not to be from her husband , and ultimately died in 2007 of an overdose of prescription drugs.
10	2023 Turkish presidential election		893,867		It's the Turkish presidential election, with the two candidates being the conservative Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, going for a 3rd term, which may violate the constitution, and the social democrat Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu.

The best (May 21 to 27, 2023)

Artists dying brought the most attention in a week full of entertainment like sports, movies, TV shows and wrestling.

Rank	Article	Class	Views	Image	Notes/about
1	Tina Turner		6,432,226		The "Queen of Rock 'n' Roll" died after years of illnesses, leading to a surge of tributes from musicians, film and television figures, and several US Presidents. Much has been said about her in the wake of her passing, but one thing's for sure: she was indeed, simply the best.
2	Ray Stevenson		1,568,016		Coming in second place to the late Queen of Rock 'n' Roll is another celebrity death. This Northern Irish actor had numerous film and television roles throughout his career.
3	ChatGPT		1,506,373		After one more of several weeks of being the most viewed article on this report, the passing of the above two celebrities led to this chatbot being kicked off the top spot.
4	Ike Turner		1,384,053		The late ex-husband of #1, whom he worked with in the 1960s and 1970s as the leader of Ike & Tina Turner, and also inflicted a lot of domestic abuse off stage (as told in her 1986 autobiography I, Tina and the 1993 film adaptation What's Love Got to Do with It).
5	Fast X		1,323,311		The tenth movie in this series about cars, unbelievable stunts and family, which is also the first part of the overall franchise conclusion (the filmmakers are certainly needing to finish things, given these movies have anywhere from Japan, Russia and Brazil to space and Antarctica!). Reviewers were unimpressed, while audiences have already brought its world box office to half a billion dollars.
6	Deaths in 2023		1,005,541		From #1's foray into acting: You can't stop the pain of your children crying out in your head They always said that the living would envy the dead
7	The Little Mermaid (2023 film)		967,345		Disney again decided to earn some cash remaking their beloved cartoons in live action, this time the 1989 fairy tale adaptation that started the Disney Renaissance, with Halle Bailey as Ariel (who thankfully is still a redhead). Like most of those remakes, The Little Mermaid delivers most of what audiences liked in the original but padding it to two hours with things that mostly don't improve the story and only serve to remind how tight and well-paced those animated features were. Hence reviews were average, but box office prospects are still big, probably on par with the Aladdin and Beauty and the Beast remakes.
8	Night of Champions (2023)		793,475		The tenth edition of this WWE event, which is also the ninth time wrestling held an event in Saudi Arabia. The two people in its poster, Raw Women's Championship , and the latter a shot at the Undisputed WWE Tag Team Championship.
9	Josh Freese		717,947		A drummer who played with just about everyone, such a testament of skill that he will fill the enormous gap left by Taylor Hawkins' death in the Foo Fighters.
10	Nikola Jokić		697,020		After already being chosen twice as the NBA Most Valuable Player, this Serbian carried the oft-unlucky Denver Nuggets to the Finals by sweeping the Los Angeles Lakers in the Western Conference Finals. Jokić will even arrive in the final with extra rest over his Eastern opponents, as the Miami Heat couldn't sweep the Boston Celtics , who managed to bring the series to the seventh game.