We're pulling an all-nighter in the university library with WikiProject Academic Journals. Started in February 2007, the project has grown to include a long list of participants maintaining over 9,000 pages covering academic journals, publishers, societies, conferences, prizes, and monographs. To help fill holes in Wikipedia's coverage, the project keeps lists of missing journals and missing journals that have been cited in Wikipedia articles. In addition to creating and improving articles, the project tries to promote the use of citations, particularly the {{ cite journal}} template. We interviewed Headbomb and DGG.
What motivated you to join WikiProject Academic Journals? Do you specialize in a specific academic field?
What are some of the difficulties of improving articles about academic journals? Has the project struggled with promoting articles to FA and GA status? Are some academic disciplines better covered on Wikipedia?
In terms of coverage, I would say that Math, Physics, and Astronomy are ahead of the curve, but Medicine, Psychology, and Biology are severely lacking. I haven't paid attention much to Law journals, but I suspect they get "average-ish" coverage.
How frequently does the project deal with issues about notability and conflict of interest? How easy is it to show that an academic journal has received substantial coverage in other publications?
Also unlike in several other areas on Wikipedia, I think WikiProject Journals is more welcoming of those "COI editors" because several of them end up saving us massive amounts of work with article creation, updating articles with the latest information (impact factors, editors, etc.), and so on. So if we have an intern from e.g. Cell Press taking care of Category:Cell Press academic journals, then that's 11 journals we don't need to monitor for vandalism, outdatedness, etc.
In addition to improving articles about journals, the project supports and recommends that Wikipedians use the {{ cite journal}} template. How widespread have these citations become? What kinds of citation mistakes do you find yourself correcting most frequently?
|volume=33 p.58
rather than |volume=33
|page=58
). Luckily
AWB and bots such as
CitationCleanerBot help a lot with those tasks.The project maintains a massive list of red links for missing journals. Have you had any success reducing this list? What kind of resources does the project need to tackle a task of this magnitude?
Is there substantial crossover membership with other academic or literary projects? Does WikiProject Academic Journals collaborate with any other projects?
What are the project's most pressing needs? How can a new member help today?
Anything else you'd like to add?
Next week, we'll toot the
horn of a military publication. In the meantime, get some
R&R in the
archive.
We're pulling an all-nighter in the university library with WikiProject Academic Journals. Started in February 2007, the project has grown to include a long list of participants maintaining over 9,000 pages covering academic journals, publishers, societies, conferences, prizes, and monographs. To help fill holes in Wikipedia's coverage, the project keeps lists of missing journals and missing journals that have been cited in Wikipedia articles. In addition to creating and improving articles, the project tries to promote the use of citations, particularly the {{ cite journal}} template. We interviewed Headbomb and DGG.
What motivated you to join WikiProject Academic Journals? Do you specialize in a specific academic field?
What are some of the difficulties of improving articles about academic journals? Has the project struggled with promoting articles to FA and GA status? Are some academic disciplines better covered on Wikipedia?
In terms of coverage, I would say that Math, Physics, and Astronomy are ahead of the curve, but Medicine, Psychology, and Biology are severely lacking. I haven't paid attention much to Law journals, but I suspect they get "average-ish" coverage.
How frequently does the project deal with issues about notability and conflict of interest? How easy is it to show that an academic journal has received substantial coverage in other publications?
Also unlike in several other areas on Wikipedia, I think WikiProject Journals is more welcoming of those "COI editors" because several of them end up saving us massive amounts of work with article creation, updating articles with the latest information (impact factors, editors, etc.), and so on. So if we have an intern from e.g. Cell Press taking care of Category:Cell Press academic journals, then that's 11 journals we don't need to monitor for vandalism, outdatedness, etc.
In addition to improving articles about journals, the project supports and recommends that Wikipedians use the {{ cite journal}} template. How widespread have these citations become? What kinds of citation mistakes do you find yourself correcting most frequently?
|volume=33 p.58
rather than |volume=33
|page=58
). Luckily
AWB and bots such as
CitationCleanerBot help a lot with those tasks.The project maintains a massive list of red links for missing journals. Have you had any success reducing this list? What kind of resources does the project need to tackle a task of this magnitude?
Is there substantial crossover membership with other academic or literary projects? Does WikiProject Academic Journals collaborate with any other projects?
What are the project's most pressing needs? How can a new member help today?
Anything else you'd like to add?
Next week, we'll toot the
horn of a military publication. In the meantime, get some
R&R in the
archive.
Discuss this story
Great writeup. An oft-overlooked aspect of Wikipedia's coverage I'm glad has some dedicated attention! Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs( talk) 03:34, 22 November 2011 (UTC) reply