[Foundation-l] FW: [Gendergap] Nine Reasons Women Don't Edit Wikipedia

SlimVirgin slimvirgin at gmail.com
Mon Feb 21 14:52:19 UTC 2011


>> On 20 February 2011 14:24, Marc Riddell <michaeldavid86 at comcast.net> wrote:
>>
>>> Sue, as you know, this is the area of my greatest concern regarding the
>>> future of the Wikipedia Project. The gender gap is a part of the larger
>>> problem you described above: That of a combative, hostile and defensive
>>> culture that presents an unchecked arena for Community Member harassment and
>>> abuse
>>
> on 2/20/11 5:46 PM, Sue Gardner at sgardner at wikimedia.org wrote:
>> Yes, absolutely. And it's not just plans: people are actively working
>> on the issue, today. This is the primary work of the Community
>> department at the Wikimedia Foundation -- the staff there are
>> currently working with community members on a bunch of projects and
>> activities to help make the Wikimedia projects more inclusive.

I think it requires community inreach, more than outreach.

We're sinking under the weight here of a thousand petty rules, or good
rules applied with no common sense. So we have image policies that
seek the deletion of Holocaust photographs because we can't establish
that they're freely licenced. I mention that only as an example that
I've had to deal with many times, but there are examples like it in
every area Wikipedia -- editors being forced jump through byzantine
hoops to achieve the most basic of editorial functions.

It's losing us editors, particularly content contributors and older
editors (and by older I mean only 30 plus), and it must be failing to
gain us others.

Sarah



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