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Provide observations and inferences about reasonable content growth in x set of wikis
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Description

Please provide all the following information:

  • Context. Provide a short paragraph with some background context for your request, please include links to relevant material.

In 2024/25 , through the knowledge equity objective, we have had an opportunity to support 5 new languages Southern Ndebele (nrwiki), Iban (ibawiki), Obolo (annwiki), Tai Nüa (tddwiki), Pannonian Rusyn (rskwiki) . So far we have tested several hypothesis as defined in the 2024-24 Annual plan. Learnings from this experiment, highlighted that most of the test Wikipedias that were allowed to ‘graduate’ from the Incubator early and receive full production access were in fact experiencing decreased content editing activity. We however learnt that the decline in edits was not limited to these wikis, but to other wikis that have graduated recently for example Central Dusin Wikipedia created on 28th May 2024, Angika wikipedia created on 22nd March 2024 and Kusaal Wikipedia created on 24th April 2024 just to mention a few. In terms of article creation, we observed that only Iban Wikipedia showed a significant increase in the number of articles created, while others either remained stable or declined.

Digging up this further, we observed different patterns of content growth in various wikis. For example, looking at a few recently launched wikis from this list that have either grown fairly quickly or declined since their launch-Betawi Wikipedia, which has reached nearly 3,000 articles since its launch in April 2024-what’s their story? Or how did Moroccan Amazigh Wikipedia managed to create over 11,000 articles since its launch in November 2023 with 36 editors? On the other hand, what happened to Dinka Wikipedia, which, since its launch in 2017, has struggled to surpass 400 articles and grow beyond 11 editors?

  • Description.*What is your request about?
    • Provide observations and inferences about reasonable content growth in x set of wikis within a certain period of time from graduation date
    • Provide observations and inferences about slow content growth in x set of wikis within a certain period of time from graduation date

Scope

  • Wikipedias
  • Specific set of languages (to be determined)
  • The focus is on research to provide observations and inferences
  • Both Qualitative and Quantitative insights
  • To be added as relevant

Draft deliverables(s)

  • A set of observations and inferences about reasonable content growth and slow growth in x set of wikis within a certain period of time from graduation date. How was content created in these wikis? (Mobile, desktop, visual editor, CX?) How has content grown over time? (Quantity & Quality aspects (edits, images, refs etc) ) what are the types of content? (topics?)(any other additional questions)
    • Priority Please indicate a priority of your task and a small description of what it would unlock for you. We ask you to leave this task as “needs triage” since your request will go through a Backlog refinement process where our team will prioritize the work.

High. This work is a continuation of our OKR work and will help us explore potential interventions to support content growth for languages with a smaller presence on our platform. We expect this work to contribute to vital knowledge objective. Ideally, it would be great if this work can be prioritized for Q1.

I need this task resolved in:

  • 1 month.
  • 3 months.
  • 6 months.
  • Whenever you get to it :-)
  • Other. Do you have any other questions or comments ?

Ground work is needed to align on definitions for this research for example what is reasonable content growth? what does slow growth mean? What are the set of wikis to draw observations and inferences from?


For use by WMF Research team; please leave everything below as it is:

  1. Does the request serve one of the existing Research team's audiences? If yes, choose the primary audience. (1 of 4) Yes. WMF
  2. What is the type of work requested? insights and recommendations for decision making
  3. What is the impact of responding to this request?
    • Support a technology or policy need of one or more WM projects
    • Advance the understanding of the WM projects.
    • Something else. If you choose this option, please explain briefly the impact below.

Event Timeline

MaryMunyoki renamed this task from Supporting Growth of Small Language Wikipedias to Proposed research topic; Supporting Growth of Small Language Wikipedias .

Research team might be already aware of this existing research conducted by the Language Diversity Hub: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Barriers_experienced_by_contributors_to_small_language_versions_of_Wikipedia.pdf. It might be good to determine how the new research will distinguish from the existing research and can build upon it.

MaryMunyoki renamed this task from Proposed research topic; Supporting Growth of Small Language Wikipedias to Proposed research topic; Content Growth for Small Language Wikipedias .Jan 14 2025, 5:36 PM
leila triaged this task as Medium priority.Jan 16 2025, 11:12 PM
leila added a project: Design-Research.
leila added subscribers: CMyrick-WMF, dchen.
leila renamed this task from Proposed research topic; Content Growth for Small Language Wikipedias to Propose hypotheses for interventions to increase content growth for small language Wikipedias .Jan 16 2025, 11:18 PM
leila added a project: Essential-Work.

@MaryMunyoki we reviewed this task and will start working on it in Q3. I labeled it as Essential Work b/c your task is future looking for FY25-WE.2.2/KE.2 (support new languages) and that future is not prioritized, yet.

I changed the title to make it clear (based on what I gather so far from the description) that the goal is effectively for us to propose hypotheses that can be in the form of interventions that you can consider and if you decide you can test starting July 2025.

In the coming days, I expect that we can assign the task to a researcher on our end who will be in touch with you for further scoping of the task. Once the scoping is completed, we can review timelines together.

@MaryMunyoki: Daisy will be in touch with you to scope the task. She will work on it.
Thanks, Daisy.

leila set Due Date to Mar 28 2025, 12:00 AM.

@MaryMunyoki: Daisy and I connected about this task today. She's looking forward to hearing from you and colleagues. I updated the task description based on what Daisy and I know as of this moment. I appreciate if you can work with the Daisy to finalize the remaining details and help her answer remaining questions she may have. For this work to conclude by the end of March, Daisy needs to start almost immediately so please help her with that.

currently reviewing background documentation and collecting reports/papers for lit review.

still receiving team comments on the research brief and slack to determine best approach for interviews, currently slated to be with members of the 5 pilot wikis, to supplement findings from the lit review. challenges for adding cohorts for interviewing remain in recruitment (language and availability) and timeline limitations. next steps are to connect with KC/Caroline/possibly Satdeep to discuss overall viability of additional interviews, and to explore whether a survey can be used instead to address these comparative questions.

@dchen we discussed this internally and we are okay to move the due date June 2025. I hope this gives more time and flexibility to the schedule

dchen changed Due Date from Mar 28 2025, 12:00 AM to Jun 15 2025, 12:00 AM.Feb 24 2025, 7:23 PM

out last week (Feb 17-21); looks like my previous week's update did not populate - adding below.

drafting lit review currently, and will likely still proceed as planned.
initial research plan was to speak with pilot wikis, but this has been more or less covered with Satdeep/KC's research report. team uncertain whether to proceed with additional research or to pursue/test more interventions at this juncture. a possible angle for research can be to interview two cohorts of editors from small wikis, graduated within the last 3 years, that have demonstrated statistically significant increases or decreases in post-incubator (production) editing activity. meeting scheduled for 2/26 to discuss interest and viability.

MaryMunyoki changed the task status from Open to In Progress.Feb 25 2025, 2:40 PM
MaryMunyoki renamed this task from Propose hypotheses for interventions to increase content growth for small language Wikipedias to Propose hypotheses for interventions to increase content growth for emerging language Wikipedias .Feb 25 2025, 9:57 PM
MaryMunyoki updated the task description. (Show Details)

Update for this week: many updates on the research planning. lit review was put on hold due to understanding the pivot and prep work for related logistics and research ops.

current plan as outlined in the updated brief document (still in progress, awaiting feedback):

  • wikis of interest will be those that have graduated incubator in the last 10 years, and have shown statistically significant increased/decreased edit activity when comparing 1 year pre- and post- graduation. i've additionally asked for a sublist of increased activity wikis that show sustained growth as defined by the team, as an additional comparison point.
  • analytics review will consist of exploring:
    • contribution and readership metrics among these language wikis groupings
    • effect of near term (within the 1 year post-graduation) drops in edit activity/article creation reflect in the longer term
MaryMunyoki changed the task status from In Progress to Stalled.Mar 11 2025, 10:47 AM
leila removed dchen as the assignee of this task.Mar 14 2025, 12:09 AM
leila removed projects: OKR-Work, Essential-Work.
leila raised the priority of this task from Medium to Needs Triage.Apr 1 2025, 8:07 PM
leila removed Due Date which was set to Jun 15 2025, 12:00 AM.

@MaryMunyoki: My understanding is that you will use some time to re-define your team's ask for research support. If you can confirm this, I'm going to remove the Research and Design Research labels and you can add them back when you're ready for us to review it. Let me know if I can help in some other way as well.

MaryMunyoki renamed this task from Propose hypotheses for interventions to increase content growth for emerging language Wikipedias to Provide observations and inferences about reasonable content growth in x set of wikis within a certain period of time from graduation date.Apr 3 2025, 1:12 PM
MaryMunyoki renamed this task from Provide observations and inferences about reasonable content growth in x set of wikis within a certain period of time from graduation date to Provide observations and inferences about reasonable content growth in x set of wikis .
MaryMunyoki updated the task description. (Show Details)
MaryMunyoki triaged this task as Medium priority.Apr 3 2025, 5:23 PM

@leila the request is updated, however, ground work is needed as described here

closing as invalid for now as the current approach is to experiment and evaluate interventions related to T391035