[WikiEN-l] Some more unscientific findings

Fri Dec 9 21:27:20 UTC 2005

On 09/12/05, MacGyverMagic/Mgm <macgyvermagic at gmail.com> wrote:

> If we have a systemetic bias, it's reasonable to assume it also
> portrudes to the featured articles we have.

First-cut analysis of [[WP:FA]], plus or minus a margin of error (I
handcounted, and my list totals 828 not the given 826, oops):

Art, architecture, and archaeology - 20
Awards and decorations - 9
Biology and medicine - 44
Chemistry - 9
Computing - 28
Culture and society - 31
Education - 4
Economics - 15
Food and drink - 7
Geography and places - 66
Geology, geophysics, and mineralogy - 9
History - 68
Language and linguistics - 18
Law - 8
Literature - 54
Mathematics - 12
Media - 36
Music - 55
Philosophy - 7
Physics and astronomy - 35
Politics and government - 75
Psychology - 4
Religion and beliefs - 26
Royalty, nobility, and heraldry - 31
Sport and games - 48
Technology - 32
Transport - 31
War - 46

Some of these are a little vague - Computing and Technology might need
reassessing, various odd articles could be classed elsewhere, the
usual odd grouping of spaceflight and astronomy, and Culture and
Society is a catch-all miscellaneous category which includes
[[Exploding whale]], [[Octopus card]], [[Pet skunk]] and four articles
on flags.

But, it's good enough for our test.

Highest ten proportions are:

9% - Politics and government
8% - History
8% - Geography and places
7% - Music
7% - Literature
7% - Sport and games
6% - War
5% - Biology and medicine
4% - Media
4% - Physics and Astronomy

Politics and Government has 75 articles. 28.5 of these are
"essentially American", 15 of these "essentially British", 5
"essentially Canadian", 3 "essentially Australian".

("Essentially X" means an article that's to do with a topic mostly
specific to one country. Cases where I wasn't sure I split the
difference; feel free to guess which ones)

I invite people to look at the other categories and see if anything
interesting emerges

--
- Andrew Gray
  andrew.gray at dunelm.org.uk