Thursday, May 07, 2009

Proof positive that not enough women edit Wikipedia

Read 'em and weep:

7 comments:

Unknown said...

So I've been wondering about this. Why do you think the demographics of WP editors are so lop-sided? Why are there so few of us females relative to males on WP? I don't think lots of women have been run off by pictures of our anatomy... but maybe I'm wrong.

Lise Broer said...

Maybe because Cary Bass, who is volunteer coordinator to the Wikimedia Foundation, posted today that the most recent study found 32% of Wikipedia's contributors were women.

I don't think it's the pictures of women's anatomy themselves that run people off. It's the environment that encourages. The end result is offsite harassment and police reports, which does convince females it's just not worth it. As one of the site's better known female contributors I'm one of the people who gets contacted privately for advice.

Sad situation.

Unknown said...

I wonder how much of the harassment has anything to do with our sex... or is it more a matter of how we react to the harassment? I have been on the receiving end of harassment which caused me to change my username, and easily could have run someone off. It had nothing to do with the fact that I'm female, however.

Lise Broer said...

Am wary of reasoning that treads close to blaming the victim.

Unknown said...

Let me clarify. I am most definitely not blaming victims of harassment for it. I am wondering about how much of the harassment is sexual versus something else in nature. (No doubt, at least some of it is based on sexism, some on homophobia, some on unclassifiable jerkery of the perpetrator. I do not have a good handle on what the ratios would be of the various subtypes.) I am also speculating that perhaps women tend to leave at a higher rate than men as a result. However, I do not condone harassment at all or blame the victim for it or for any reaction to it.

pfctdayelise said...

32%? What study is that? Is that something different to this? http://blog.wikimedia.org/2009/04/16/first-preliminary-results-from-unu-merit-survey-of-wikipedia-readers-and-contributors-available/ Because I get 13% from that.

Lise Broer said...

Cary was citing it in a site discussion.