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WEEK4: NGUYEN DUC DUY - Balancing Openness and Control in Wikipedia

  Chapter 4 examines the paradoxes of openness in Wikipedia. While the site’s motto promises that “anyone can edit,” this openness is not absolute. Problematic users can drive good contributors away, yet they can also inspire excellent articles. Wikipedia draws inspiration from Free and Open Source Software (FOSS), emphasizing transparency, integrity, nondiscrimination, and noninterference, though rules like “Ignore All Rules” show that complete freedom is unrealistic. The chapter distinguishes between open content—materials licensed for sharing and modification—and open communities, which rely on social norms, collaboration, and shared practices to maintain trust and accountability. Wikipedia’s success depends on balancing these ideals with practical governance, sometimes creating tension between openness and control. I found the comparison between software and knowledge particularly striking. Unlike code, knowledge cannot always be objectively verified, which explains criticisms ...
Week 2 : Understanding Wikipedia-FENG YUANCHEN This week’s course introduced the importance of Wikipedia and its role as a high-quality source of information. It also explained how editing Wikipedia can help develop practical skills and improve information literacy. Wikipedia is a non-profit project supported by volunteers from around the world, and its content quality has, over time, reached or even surpassed that of many traditional encyclopedias. In particular, when working with wiki software, contributors are required to provide information that is verifiable, neutral, and free from personal bias. The core activity of the course is to participate in editing Wikipedia by conducting research or translating content to create or improve articles. During the class, I created my own project page and carried out many hands-on editing practices in the following sessions.

Week3: Wikipedia Editing - Lee Joowon

 This week, I was primarily working on adding reliable references to Wikipedia articles, focusing on content that lacked or did not have a citation. In particular, I focused on increasing credibility by adding reliable news articles and other references to existing content. Here is the link I edited.   During this editing, I learned that more articles actually require citations for a variety of reasons than I thought. The most difficult part of adding citations to articles like this was to satisfy the suitability of the content and the reliability of the source at the same time. In the process of finding sources that are relevant to the content, there were cases where they match the content of the sentence, but the reliability of the source was low, while there were cases where reliable sources existed but did not directly support the content. As such, it took a lot of time and I found it difficult to find materials that could meet both the content and the source.  ...

WEEK3: Wikipedia editing practice - HONG XIAOQI

  This week, I made 12 edits to Wikipedia. Most of my work focused on improving the structure and adding content to existing articles. For example, I added tables of contents to some pages, expanded a few sections, and made small adjustments to make the overall organization clearer. I also linked key terms to other relevant Wikipedia pages using internal links, which helped make the connections between different topics more visible. Through this process, I realized that even small changes, like adding links or reorganizing sections, can make an article much easier to read. At the same time, I noticed that quite a few articles still lack proper sources, which affects how reliable they are. From the class activity, I learned how to add citations to sentences without references, and it gave me a clearer understanding of why verifiability matters. This made me wonder: in actual editing practice, compared to adding content or improving structure, how much importance should be given to ...

Week 3: Refinement and Verification——HAN JIAYI

This week I edited Wikipedia ten times this week.I encountered a challenge: existing references did not fully support specific arguments in the text. To maintain the article's credibility, I replaced the insufficient sources with more authoritative ones from official institutions and national news agencies. This experience reinforced my understanding that responsible editors must prioritize the accuracy of evidence, not just word count. Since my project involves Chinese culture on English Wikipedia, providing clear translations of non-English metadata was crucial. I focused on building bilingual citations and translating headings to ensure the information was verifiable for a global readership, regardless of language barriers. I also performed some routine maintenance work, such as standardizing text formatting and internal links. While these adjustments may seem minor, they are essential for ensuring a professional presentation and usability of the pages.

Week 3 : Good Faith Collaboration - Jang Eun Seok

This blog takes the concept of faith as its central keyword and explains collaboration within Wikipedia. Wikipedia is built through users’ contributions based on good faith . However, while good faith sounds ideal, it is not a perfect principle, as it faces real-world problems such as abuse and vandalism. Therefore, good faith is not absolute, and continuous adjustment is necessary in order to create an ideal Wikipedia. I was already aware that Wikipedia is sustained by users’ voluntary contributions, but it was interesting to understand this in relation to faith . However, as mentioned in the text, this principle is not flawless. Thus, further discussion seems necessary on how Wikipedia can move toward its ideal form without this principle being exploited.

WEEK3---Good-Faith Collaboration and Knowledge Co-Creation: Wikipedia as a Continuing Tradition----- XI JIAXIN

 The author emphasizes that Wikipedia is a natural continuation of humanity’s long-standing pursuit of knowledge rather than an isolated phenomenon. From the early 20th-century vision of the “World Brain” to the development of modern digital networks, humans have continuously sought ways to organize and integrate universal knowledge. The real breakthrough of Wikipedia lies not in its ambition, but in the organizational form it has discovered to realize that ambition—a collaborative culture based on “assume good faith.” This suggests that technology itself is merely a tool; what truly drives knowledge production is how participants build relationships with one another and how they treat each other. Upon reflection, this makes a lot of sense. Technology is only a tool—what truly keeps Wikipedia running is that thousands of strangers are willing to sit down together and thoughtfully discuss how an article should be written. Moreover, the author does not portray this kind of collaborat...