This week, we listened to the members of WikiProject Albums as they shared their experience improving articles about music albums. Started in October 2002, WikiProject Albums has grown to include nearly 130,000 pages, including 78 Featured Articles, 35 Featured Lists, and 385 Good Articles. Despite an active group of editors, the project's members have acknowledged that the project has some difficulty keeping up with assessments, evidenced by the 36,000 unassessed articles under the project's scope. The project is a child of WikiProject Music and overlaps with several projects, including WikiProject Songs, WikiProject Discographies, and WikiProject Record Charts. WikiProject Albums maintains a to-do list, follows a watchlist, and contributes to the Music Portal.
We interviewed three of the project's members. Zidane tribal joined after creating an article for one of his favorite bands and "receiving very nice feedback from a member." His favorite albums are Legend and the Hola/Chau twin concerts. Backtable is a musician and music collector. He joined WikiProject Albums a while ago but only recently became active in the project. Among his favorite albums are Wish You Were Here, In the Court of the Crimson King, Red, Close to the Edge, Blackwater Park, Frances the Mute, Sub Templum, and Heligoland. Freekee joined both Wikipedia and WikiProject Albums "partly because one of my favorite albums had an article that really needed improvement. I won't tell you what album it was because in the five and a half years since then, I never fixed it." He describes himself as a wikignome who fixes categorization, grammar, and wording. He adds that he would just like "to make sure that there is a good source for information on the music that I love so much."
What motivated you to join WikiProject Albums? Do you have experience in the music industry? What is your favorite album?
The project is home to over 100 pieces of featured content and nearly 400 Good Articles. Have you worked on any of these articles? What are some common elements found in most FAs and GAs about albums?
How does the project handle notability of albums and promotional material added to articles about albums? How frequently does the project deal with editors who have a conflict of interest?
Are some music genres underrepresented by Wikipedia's coverage of albums? What can be done to improve coverage of these neglected genres?
Does WikiProject Albums collaborate with any other projects?
What are the project's most pressing needs? How can a new editor help today?
Anything else you'd like to add?
Next week, we'll try not to infringe on Hormel's trademark as we investigate some mystery meat that has been clogging up the internet's arteries. Until then, clean out your junk mail folder and visit the WikiProject Report Archives.
This week, we listened to the members of WikiProject Albums as they shared their experience improving articles about music albums. Started in October 2002, WikiProject Albums has grown to include nearly 130,000 pages, including 78 Featured Articles, 35 Featured Lists, and 385 Good Articles. Despite an active group of editors, the project's members have acknowledged that the project has some difficulty keeping up with assessments, evidenced by the 36,000 unassessed articles under the project's scope. The project is a child of WikiProject Music and overlaps with several projects, including WikiProject Songs, WikiProject Discographies, and WikiProject Record Charts. WikiProject Albums maintains a to-do list, follows a watchlist, and contributes to the Music Portal.
We interviewed three of the project's members. Zidane tribal joined after creating an article for one of his favorite bands and "receiving very nice feedback from a member." His favorite albums are Legend and the Hola/Chau twin concerts. Backtable is a musician and music collector. He joined WikiProject Albums a while ago but only recently became active in the project. Among his favorite albums are Wish You Were Here, In the Court of the Crimson King, Red, Close to the Edge, Blackwater Park, Frances the Mute, Sub Templum, and Heligoland. Freekee joined both Wikipedia and WikiProject Albums "partly because one of my favorite albums had an article that really needed improvement. I won't tell you what album it was because in the five and a half years since then, I never fixed it." He describes himself as a wikignome who fixes categorization, grammar, and wording. He adds that he would just like "to make sure that there is a good source for information on the music that I love so much."
What motivated you to join WikiProject Albums? Do you have experience in the music industry? What is your favorite album?
The project is home to over 100 pieces of featured content and nearly 400 Good Articles. Have you worked on any of these articles? What are some common elements found in most FAs and GAs about albums?
How does the project handle notability of albums and promotional material added to articles about albums? How frequently does the project deal with editors who have a conflict of interest?
Are some music genres underrepresented by Wikipedia's coverage of albums? What can be done to improve coverage of these neglected genres?
Does WikiProject Albums collaborate with any other projects?
What are the project's most pressing needs? How can a new editor help today?
Anything else you'd like to add?
Next week, we'll try not to infringe on Hormel's trademark as we investigate some mystery meat that has been clogging up the internet's arteries. Until then, clean out your junk mail folder and visit the WikiProject Report Archives.
Discuss this story
I find the Wikiproject interviews quite good. The interviewer doesn't just ask the same questions each time, but comes up with interesting ones that are specific to the topic at hand. Sometimes they are thoughtful ("more meta") and the responses of editors are as well.
I think some "what I've learned from interviewing and looking at Wikiprojects" feature by the main interviewer might be interesting. I realize this would be some work of analysis and writing, but I think the interviewer may have a more informed perspective than anyone on Wiki for what makes Projects tick (or not). Obviously this would be a bit more of an opinion or analysis piece...and I think on the individual interviews, they are (wisely) pretty neutral, just with good tee-up questions to get the subjects to opine.
TCO ( reviews needed) 16:27, 12 July 2011 (UTC) reply