Wikipedia Outreach
People working on this
Description
A significant amount of energy at Wikipedia goes into removing non-notable articles and linkspam. We know Wikipedia editors already. Let's invite them to use AboutUs when removing content that's inappropriate for Wikipedia, by either moving content to from Wikipedia to AboutUs, or adding AboutUs external links to Wikipedia articles.
Benefits…
…for web site owners
- Search engine optimization: unlike Wikipedia, AboutUs does not apply "NOFOLLOW" tags to external links,[1] so search engines will index sites linked from AboutUs articles. Adding external links to a Wikipedia article affords no SEO benefits (although many web site owners do not know this.)
- AboutUs does not have a notability standard for its articles, nor does it require that they be written from a neutral point of view. Web site owners should have more flexibility in presenting their sites how they like at AboutUs than they would at Wikipedia.
…for Wikipedia
Wikipedia likes to welcome new editors to its community, but its restrictive policies are often off-putting to newcomers. The option of redirecting newcomers to AboutUs will be helpful to Wikipedia editors looking to promote and model genuine collaboration while keeping Wikipedia true to its ideals. Might be good to collaborate with the folks at wikipedia:Wikipedia:WikiProject Spam.
…for AboutUs community
AboutUs gets exposure, and an infusion of new content and new contributors, who obviously need/want a place to write about themselves and their projects.
Done when
- We have here examples of Wikipedia admins linking to an appropriate AboutUs landing page in their edit summaries or on talk pages
- Page created, initial WP contributor vanished from WP and does not seem interested in AU. -Peteforsyth 01:47, 20 December 2007 (PST)
- Page created, initial WP contributor remains engaged at WP, but does not seem interested in AU. -Peteforsyth 01:47, 20 December 2007 (PST)
steps to get to DoneDone
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Do we need an affordance? Where Wikipedia admins can easily move the content to AboutUs and easily leave talk page messsages for the editor.- Ted, what's an affordance? I don't understand this question. -Peteforsyth 01:47, 20 December 2007 (PST)
- Even if we need one, we can't get one in the near-term due to other AboutUs development priorities. What you're doing by hand is perfect, Pete. I'm not clear on the definition of affordance myself, but maybe I can describe it? Mediawiki has UploadFile as a feature, yes? AboutUs then built an affordance UploadPortrait which is a special case, and makes it easier for the user in the specific situation of a person's photo for their PersonalPage. Things have shifted since this was written, so we can just remove this whole section, methinks. TedErnst (talk) 07:59, 20 December 2007 (PST)
- Ted, what's an affordance? I don't understand this question. -Peteforsyth 01:47, 20 December 2007 (PST)
Discussion
- There is some concern about licensing, that the Wikipedia and AboutUs licenses are not compatible or do not allow wholesale copying from WP to AU.(?) Simon and Ted were discussing. Seems to me that since WP content is available under the GFDL, and AU content is available under GFDL "and/or" CC, it should be OK. Can somebody clarify this? I am most definitely not a lawyer!! -Peteforsyth 01:47, 20 December 2007 (PST)
- My limited understanding of the problem is that WP GFDL requires any use of the content to be GFDL as well, while content on AU is also GFDL, people are allowed to take AU content and release it elsewhere under CC-only, due to the "or". If that was an "and", maybe this wouldn't be an issue. Hopefully CC and Free Software Foundation will fix this incompatibility in our lifetimes. :-) TedErnst (talk) 08:02, 20 December 2007 (PST)