In the 48 hours after singer Prince died in 2016, his Wikipedia page had over 11 million pageviews. Spikes in Wikipedia traffic directly correlate to the news of a significant person dying. Rauwerda noted that two hours before the official announcement, another Wikipedia editor had already drafted the page for “Death of Elizabeth II.” She noted that within 15 minutes after the first change, over 55 edits were made to the page - including changing verbs to past tense. Rauwerda shared a great breakdown of what happened immediately after news broke about the Queen. It’s usually just a matter of me getting annoyed that something isn’t covered well and then wanting to fix it.” “When I improve an article, I don’t really care about getting personal recognition,” she explained. She also helps edit some of the articles in her free time. While Wikipedia is self-aware enough to know that being a community-run source of information can’t be considered flawless, the platform is still an easily accessible resource with editors who genuinely want to make all information readily available and is dedicated to sharing unusual Wikipedia articles and facts with her 635,000 followers. “The editor base isn’t huge, but there’s a core group of people who care enough about accessible information to volunteer their time.” “Wikipedia is, for better or for worse, the de-facto collection of human knowledge, and the people who edit it are contributing to the story of humanity,” Rauwerda told In The Know. Kranen speculates that even though the Wikipedia editing user experience isn’t as great on a phone screen versus a computer, typically these editors will jump into action immediately after getting a mobile news alert. A WikiJackal or a “deaditor” is someone who is the first editor to change a prominent person or celebrity’s article to say that they’re dead.Īnnie Rauwerda, the person behind the popular Twitter account, noted in a thread that Dutch Wikipedian Hay Kranen is behind the name “deaditor.” In a blog post written by Kranen that Rauwerda shared, Kranen found that when a celebrity dies, more often than not a “highly diverse set of people, often anonymous” are responsible for the first edits - “surprisingly often from their smartphone.” There are tiers of editors, depending on their specialties within the Wikipedia space. The majority of Wikipedia editors are anonymous and the process of editing pages is supposed to be collaborative. There is no final editor - in fact, Wikipedia has a whole page dedicated to reminding readers that it’s not a reliable source. The Wikipedia community is made up of volunteers who genuinely just love editing and improving the platform’s articles. “Truly a feat, albeit a strange one,” user XyNq wrote, “a notable sighting of a WikiJackal.” “From one Wikipedian to another I have to congratulate you on being the first past tense edit to Queen Elizabeth II,” user Normal Name said.
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