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Where's the equation for this model? It looks to me like it's just been eye-balled, and doesn't seem to have been well justified in the article.- ( User) Wolfkeeper ( Talk) 20:59, 1 November 2009 (UTC)
So has anyone compared the ratio of stubs:non-stub articles? If the ratio since the 2006 peak of new articles has been in favor of non-stub articles, that would support the "low-hanging fruit" hypothesis of declining new article creation -- viz., it is easier to improve an existing article than to create a new one. But if the ratio has remained roughly the same before, during, & since the 2006 peak, then the cause of the new article fall-off needs to be found elsewhere. (And I hope that this decline is due to the "low-hanging fruit" hypothesis, rather than, say, increased barriers to new article creation.) -- llywrch ( talk) 18:57, 15 March 2011 (UTC)
I am repeating this topic here, as to why enwiki user levels slowed after March-May 2007, to allow other enWP users to read and reply with any explanations they might offer. The new-articles graph (at right) shows a similar slowing in the addition of new articles, as though the major factor(s) which generated new articles had also been thwarted in early 2007. Some analysts have noted how new users often create articles about musicians, artists or authors they know (sometimes a current girlfriend, or themselves), to expand the bio pages. Meanwhile, I feel strongly that the drop (in 2007) was mainly due to the notorious banning of Wikipedia in U.S. schools and colleges, as demanded by more academic officials beginning in February 2007. See the following essay about those bans, with 19 news articles:
Other bans were suggested in England. Those early bans, coupled with the typical 3-month school vacations (June-August) seem to be what thwarted growth of the English Wikipedia. Recall how some similar reductions occurred in the German Wikipedia in early 2007 (which had the similar 50% of users younger than 22 years) despite deWP's faster initial growth of gaining new users, while the French Wikipedia graph showed only a steady, seasonal variation in adding new users, with no sign of bans in France, to deter new users from joining French WP. Because the French WP shows no signs (yet) of a dramatic decline in new users, the French statistics can be used as a control group, to exclude the effect of updates for MediaWiki release 1.09 (etc.), as not having a strong impact to deter new users. Obviously any large colleges banning Wikipedia use, among 2,000 to 50,000 students per college, would cause a massive decline in user access during 2007-2008 and beyond. - Wikid77 23:31, 17 March 2011 (UTC)
Here are the graphs I suggested. First a very simple graph showing the total number of people who have created a user id and make one edit and those who persist till they've done 5:
So there were plenty of new Wikipedians after March 2007 - the problem is that the number of active WPs starts to decline. Does this simply mean that more people are leaving than joining or that fewer people became active (ie completed 5 edits) even though they've joined. There certainly was an abrupt change as shown by the second graph.
In words, up to March 2007 about 20% more newcomers became "active" in completing their first 5 edits than old active editors dropped out. After that date the process goes into reverse. Unfortunately this graph doesn't differentiate between old active editors who've stopped and new editors who haven't become active and though I suspect the latter I can't prove it. There's obviously an amount of noise in the graph because people take a different amount of time to become active or to quit, and take holidays. They are based on monthly totals, so much but not all of the noise is absorbed.
To get a definite answer someone's going to have to frame a new query into the raw records. If you can put me in contact with the people who are close to this I'll liaise with them. Chris55 ( talk) 01:03, 20 March 2011 (UTC)
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Essays Low‑impact ![]() | |||||||||
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Where's the equation for this model? It looks to me like it's just been eye-balled, and doesn't seem to have been well justified in the article.- ( User) Wolfkeeper ( Talk) 20:59, 1 November 2009 (UTC)
So has anyone compared the ratio of stubs:non-stub articles? If the ratio since the 2006 peak of new articles has been in favor of non-stub articles, that would support the "low-hanging fruit" hypothesis of declining new article creation -- viz., it is easier to improve an existing article than to create a new one. But if the ratio has remained roughly the same before, during, & since the 2006 peak, then the cause of the new article fall-off needs to be found elsewhere. (And I hope that this decline is due to the "low-hanging fruit" hypothesis, rather than, say, increased barriers to new article creation.) -- llywrch ( talk) 18:57, 15 March 2011 (UTC)
I am repeating this topic here, as to why enwiki user levels slowed after March-May 2007, to allow other enWP users to read and reply with any explanations they might offer. The new-articles graph (at right) shows a similar slowing in the addition of new articles, as though the major factor(s) which generated new articles had also been thwarted in early 2007. Some analysts have noted how new users often create articles about musicians, artists or authors they know (sometimes a current girlfriend, or themselves), to expand the bio pages. Meanwhile, I feel strongly that the drop (in 2007) was mainly due to the notorious banning of Wikipedia in U.S. schools and colleges, as demanded by more academic officials beginning in February 2007. See the following essay about those bans, with 19 news articles:
Other bans were suggested in England. Those early bans, coupled with the typical 3-month school vacations (June-August) seem to be what thwarted growth of the English Wikipedia. Recall how some similar reductions occurred in the German Wikipedia in early 2007 (which had the similar 50% of users younger than 22 years) despite deWP's faster initial growth of gaining new users, while the French Wikipedia graph showed only a steady, seasonal variation in adding new users, with no sign of bans in France, to deter new users from joining French WP. Because the French WP shows no signs (yet) of a dramatic decline in new users, the French statistics can be used as a control group, to exclude the effect of updates for MediaWiki release 1.09 (etc.), as not having a strong impact to deter new users. Obviously any large colleges banning Wikipedia use, among 2,000 to 50,000 students per college, would cause a massive decline in user access during 2007-2008 and beyond. - Wikid77 23:31, 17 March 2011 (UTC)
Here are the graphs I suggested. First a very simple graph showing the total number of people who have created a user id and make one edit and those who persist till they've done 5:
So there were plenty of new Wikipedians after March 2007 - the problem is that the number of active WPs starts to decline. Does this simply mean that more people are leaving than joining or that fewer people became active (ie completed 5 edits) even though they've joined. There certainly was an abrupt change as shown by the second graph.
In words, up to March 2007 about 20% more newcomers became "active" in completing their first 5 edits than old active editors dropped out. After that date the process goes into reverse. Unfortunately this graph doesn't differentiate between old active editors who've stopped and new editors who haven't become active and though I suspect the latter I can't prove it. There's obviously an amount of noise in the graph because people take a different amount of time to become active or to quit, and take holidays. They are based on monthly totals, so much but not all of the noise is absorbed.
To get a definite answer someone's going to have to frame a new query into the raw records. If you can put me in contact with the people who are close to this I'll liaise with them. Chris55 ( talk) 01:03, 20 March 2011 (UTC)