Research:WMF Strategy document: Research about contributors/What we don't know

This page lists some (not-yet-prioritized) things we don't know about Wikimedia's content contributors. Some may be important to find out, some may not.

Contributor stats

Stats we don't yet have:

• Which wikis (across all projects) have the most number of active contributors? Which have least? This table gives you registered accounts and admins, but having active contributors would be better. (Note: could easily prioritize pulling this data, if it was deemed important)
• Which language projects are still growing in terms of contributors, vs which are showing the usual decline story? (Note: because "growing" or "declining" needs clearer definition, this is considered original research that could be done in the future, if deemed important)
• Which countries are showing growth in contributors, vs which are showing the usual decline story? (same as above)

Trends

• We know the gender gap is large, but how has it changed over time? (Note: this is pretty much impossible to know given that we don't have good historical baselines or consistent collection methodologies for historical data on things like gender)
  • See also m:Research:Ideas/How_has_the_retention_of_female_editors_been_affected_by_the_decline?
• What other websites are the best external benchmark for our potential content contributors?

Contributor needs

Needs of today's multimedia content contributors

• Last study was done in 2009/2010, and focused on usability in order to grow multimedia content contributors.
• No systematic research on the needs of Commons contributors has been done since then, though the multimedia landscape has significantly changed.
• Many Wikimedians participating in the 2009 study didn't know about Commons at all. English as the community's lingua franca was also seen as a barrier for contributors coming from a non-English wiki. Are these still true today?
• The Upload Wizard and an illustrated licensing tutorial for Commons were resulting products. Do these continue to meet the needs of Commons contributors? What else is getting in their way today?
• Prior research and product outcomes focused on content creators. What about contributors who either curate multimedia content or want to use it on projects like Wikipedia? What are their needs (search, categorization, metadata, etc)?
• Since 2012, a growing number of image contests like WikiLovesMonuments have introduced new photo contributors to Commons, creating significant spikes in contributors. The survival rates of new contributors in these contests is low (1.7% of the 2012 participants made at least one edit and 1.4% uploaded at least one new file to Commons six months after the event), but half of existing editors participate year over year, and global community organizers are key connectors that support local growth of WML around the world. What are the needs of these contest-based contributors, and the community organizers who support them?

Needs of Wiktionary or other project contributors

• If Wiktionary is the second-most contributed to project in the Global South, what do those contributors need to be successful? Is this a useful entrypoint for contributing to Wikipedia?

Community-facing integration

• How do various teams at the WMF track contacts with content contributors?