Abstract
Wikipedia is the product of thousands of editors working collaboratively to provide free and up-to-date encyclopedic information to the project's users. This article asks to what degree Wikipedia articles in three languages - Hindi, Urdu, and English - achieve Wikipedia's mission of making neutrally-presented, reliable information on a polarizing, controversial topic available to people around the globe. We chose the topic of the recent revocation of Article 370 of the Constitution of India, which, along with other recent events in and concerning the region of Jammu and Kashmir, has drawn attention to related articles on Wikipedia. This work focuses on the English Wikipedia, being the preeminent language edition of the project, as well as the Hindi and Urdu editions. Hindi and Urdu are the two standardized varieties of Hindustani, a lingua franca of Jammu and Kashmir. We analyzed page view and revision data for three Wikipedia articles to gauge popularity of the pages in our corpus, and responsiveness of editors to breaking news events and problematic edits. Additionally, we interviewed editors from all three language editions to learn about differences in editing processes and motivations, and we compared the text of the articles across languages as they appeared shortly after the revocation of Article 370. Across languages, we saw discrepancies in article tone, organization, and the information presented, as well as differences in how editors collaborate and communicate with one another. Nevertheless, in Hindi and Urdu, as well as English, editors predominantly try to adhere to the principle of neutral point of view (NPOV), and for the most part, the editors quash attempts by other editors to push political agendas.
Highlights
Wikipedia defines itself as a multilingual online encyclopedia, created and maintained as an open collaboration project using a wiki-based editing system
We found that across language editions, editors were quick to respond to breaking news events and problematic edits, and they strove to uphold Wikipedia’s core tenet of neutral point of view (NPOV)
– We extend previous work understanding Wikipedia as a source of timely information. – We uncover evidence of challenges in sustaining a neutral point of view (NPOV) on articles related to controversial topics. – We show that, while the goals and values of editors are similar across language editions, their sources and collaborative practices differ
Summary
Wikipedia defines itself as a multilingual online encyclopedia, created and maintained as an open collaboration project using a wiki-based editing system. One of its core principles is to maintain consensus around a neutral point of view in Wikipedia articles (Hecht and Gergle (2010), Wilkinson and Huberman (2007)). When information is not shared between different language editions of Wikipedia, it prevents access to a larger variety of content for monolingual users (Hecht and Gergle (2010)), creating a knowledge gap between language editions. Wikipedia offers tools and guidance for translating or requesting translations into English from another language (Wikipedia contributors (2020b)) and vice versa (Wikipedia contributors (2020c)). This knowledge gap problem may be exacerbated in the case of articles related to polarizing topics.
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