“Anyone can edit Wikipedia,” the adage goes.
asserted
adage → edit → Wikipedia
But, it turns out, a relatively small number actually do.
What is worthy of a digital page in the world’s largest and most-read encyclopedia is decided by roughly 270,000 active volunteers, enthusiasts who populate the online resource with information on anything from 19th-century medicine to TikTok trends.
asserted
who → turn → trends
Inevitably, some subjects are sidelined – the global south, notable women – but a new batch of Wikipedian recruits are waging war on one neglected topic: the arms industry.
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batch → sideline → topic
Last week, in a classroom in central London, two dozen volunteers huddled around laptops and free servings of vegan Ethiopian food for what is known as a “wikithon”, an event of collective and in-person Wikipedia editing.
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what → huddle → editing
Some were veteran editors in their 70s, others young students who had never registered an account before.
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who → register → account
But their targets include subjects such as Palantir, Project Maven and Nitro-Chem.
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targets → include → Palantir
“Wikipedia pages about the arms industry, in general, are not always super-detailed,” said the group’s co-founder Agnes Cameron.
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founder → say → industry
The intention of the wikithon, started by fellows from the n-Space programme at Somerset House Studios, was “to put better quality and more well organised information on the arms industry in the public domain”, the specialist technician said.
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technician → start → domain
Attenders at the monthly event are trained in how to add to the internet’s most popular reference site.
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Attenders → train → site
But while editing Wikipedia is surprisingly simple – just a few clicks to publish a change – ethical complications quickly bubble up.
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complications → edit → change
“The interesting thing about Wikipedia editing is that you’re encouraged to edit things you care about,” Cameron said.
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Cameron → encourage → things
“What it looks like to have a conflict of interest is an interesting question.”
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looks → look → interest
Although Cameron enjoys editing pages about food in her spare time, her interests are also political.
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interests → enjoy → time
“We’re toeing quite a difficult line,” she said.
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she → toe → line
“Difficult lines are important to toe.”
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lines → toe → ?
Despite personal and political reasons for wanting to spread information on arms manufacturers and sellers, finding journalistic balance means using Wikipedia in good faith.
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finding → want → faith
Cameron said attenders’ chosen subject matter meant that it was “really important” that they followed Wikipedia’s standards to the letter.
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they → say → letter
“This is not an anti-arms industry campaigning event.
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This → campaign → ?
This is an event really about factual information on Wikipedia,” she said.
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she → say → Wikipedia
When it comes to information, Wikipedia’s rules demand that no original research is included on its pages and conclusions are not drawn.
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conclusions → come → pages
The main goal of the arms industry wikithon, then, was to pull together publicly available information from other sources into one place.
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goal → pull → place
Wikipedia has been repeatedly criticised for its lack of diversity in editors and its coverage.
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Wikipedia → criticise → editors
It has been accused of geographical bias towards the west, with most articles focused on the US and western Europe.
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articles → accuse → US
In 2018, the female Nobel prize winner Donna Strickland, a physicist, was deemed “not important enough” for a Wikipedia entry.
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winner → deem → entry
With a wider range of ages, genders and racial backgrounds at the wikithon, the trainee editors were helping to rebalance the scale, said Hannah Cobb, a co-founder of the event.
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Cobb → help → event
“There’s a very specific idea of who edits Wikipedia … that doesn’t tend to be the demographic of who shows up,” she said.
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she → ’ → Wikipedia
Everyone remembers that at school you were taught not to trust it because anyone could write it.”
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anyone → remember → it
Previous arms industry wikithons organised by Cameron and Cobb in Manchester and London have drawn in more than 60 would-be Wikipedians at a time, including activists, journalists, Quaker members – and even Cameron’s own mother.
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wikithons → organise → activists
Newcomers to the group were interested in how Wikipedia could be used to broaden public knowledge of confusing geopolitics, said Cobb.
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Cobb → use → geopolitics
“There is a sense of powerlessness when it comes to countering the narrative by big tech, by governments, by the military industrial complex at large,” she said.
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she → be → complex
But for the arms industry page editors, those feelings can disappear over a few hours: “When you write something on Wikipedia, it appears immediately on the internet.
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it → disappear → internet
I think that experience alone is quite empowering for people.”
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experience → think → people
Cobb spoke of a sense of wonder “when people realise how easy it is to actually contribute”, but attenders have a respect for Wikipedia’s commitment to rigour and quality control.
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attenders → speak → rigour
And though dedicated to accuracy, the group prefers to not advertise the details of its edits over concerns that the work could be undone by other editors in bad faith.
uncertain
work → dedicate → faith
Cameron said it was unclear if Wikipedia’s wider editorial culture would take offence over how the event was run.
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event → say → offence
Real-world politics often spill on to Wikipedia, and editors often disagree publicly about changes.
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editors → spill → changes
The site has also been covertly used as an informational battleground.
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site → use → battleground
The seasoned editor Ksenia Coffman made extensive edits to remove what she found to be flattering and sympathetic entries about Nazi party officials across Wikipedia, and in 2021, the Croatian-language version of Wikipedia was found to have been commandeered by nationalist, far-right organisers who made ideologically motivated edits.
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who → make → edits
Cameron hopes that the regular meetings can be formalised into a WikiProject, when organised groups of editors collaborate to improve certain topic pages.
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groups → hop → pages
She hoped her group could be adopted by WikiProject Military history, which she called “far and away the most active project on Wikipedia by miles.
uncertain
she → hop → miles
…and 3 more, not listed.
The Aporia
