CEE/Newsletter/Newsroom/My experience with Wikipedia
- By: Raluca Alexandra M
My name is Raluca and I am a student at the Faculty of Letters of The University of Bucharest. I am currently in my first year of a master's program called Literary Studies. I wanted to become an editor for Wikipedia because I wanted to improve the articles written in Romanian and create articles for the missing information, given the fact that the Romanian side of Wikipedia is not very evolved yet. I also wanted to gain experience in the editing field, as I was always curious about how Wikipedia works. The purpose of this article is to reinforce the idea that editing and writing for Wikipedia is not as difficult as it seems. There are guides that explain in detail how to use every tool needed(https://w.wiki/Cm53), but also help you understand how a Wikipedia page should be written. For example, a very useful explanation is provided for the main rules of Wikipedia, regarding the way we should create Wiki pages, even more giving examples of words we should avoid so we keep a neutral tone(https://w.wiki/Cm5C).
This is very important, because even though, Wikipedia is open to everyone, meaning that people can contribute freely, we still have to maintain an objective tone and should be unbiased because the information that we bring is not only for us, but for all the people that are in need. It is also a good thing that we have to cite all the information that we write, so we know for sure that it is a real information. On the downside, the citation is not very strict, meaning that we can use books or sites that are not verified for their credibility, so false information can still be spread. People could create their own sites with fake info, that they could use to cite on Wikipedia. This thing should be improved, to make sure that Wikipedia remains a trusted source for its users. The experience of writing and editing was very interesting, and it felt like a personal contribution in helping educate the people that need it. Writing for Wikipedia is as easy as writing a basic essay, you do not have to use a very complicated speech, you can keep it simple, as long as you follow the rules and do not share your opinions in your articles. Citing the information is also very easy, as Wikipedia created a very explanatory way to do so. All we have to do is to complete it with the links or with the information about the books used.Creating your own working page is also really easy, you just have to complete with some standard information about yourself. This is the link to my Wiki page, if you want to find out more information about me: https://w.wiki/Cm5M.
The page I created is about a Romanian book written by Bogdan Petriceicu Hașdeu. The book is called Duduca Mamuca. I chose this author because, unfortunately he is almost forgotten in the literary field, even though his works are very important for the creation of the Romanian literature. I chose this book especially because how controversial it was. It was so controversial that Bogdan Petriceicu Hașdeu was sued for immorality, like Flaubert was for Madame Bovary(https://w.wiki/CjMi).
I strongly encourage everyone to try to make at least some simple edits first in the articles that already exist and then to write their own page, so you can visualize the way your own page should look like.