wikipedia – Jonathan Frei

First drafts of Wikipedia entries

Jonathan Frei — Wed, 12 Nov 2014 04:37:43 +0000

First Drafts of History is a Tumblr that collects screen shots of the first versions of various Wikipedia entries.

Some of them are humorously incomplete and surprisingly accurate.

Common misconceptions–visualized

Jonathan Frei — Mon, 06 Oct 2014 12:23:00 +0000

The data visualization site, Information is Beautiful, recently published an infographic of Common MythConceptions, which borrows its data from Wikipedia’s list of common misconceptions. This is related to my earlier post on the list.

Common misconceptions

Jonathan Frei — Fri, 05 Sep 2014 18:45:24 +0000

Wikipedia’s list of common misconceptions is by no means complete or authroatative, but it is packed with tons of interesting—and well cited—factoids. This list is nearly as fun as the list of logical fallacies and the list of cognitive biases. (via Kottke.org)

Fugue state

Jonathan Frei — Tue, 29 Jan 2013 14:46:00 +0000

Fugue state

A fugue state, formally dissociative fugue or psychogenic fugue (DSM-IV Dissociative Disorders 300.13^[1]), is a rare psychiatric disorder characterized by reversible amnesia for personal identity, including the memories, personality and other identifying characteristics of individuality. The state is usually short-lived (ranging from hours to days), but can last months or longer. Dissociative fugue usually involves unplanned travel or wandering, and is sometimes accompanied by the establishment of a new identity.

Wikipedia Redefined

Jonathan Frei — Tue, 14 Aug 2012 10:24:00 +0000

Wikipedia Redefined

Dear Jimmy Wales:

Please let NEW! redesign Wikipedia. I think they will give you their work for free. The exposure on such a large site will be more valuable to them than a check from the WikiMedia foundation.

Thanks,

Everyone that uses Wikipedia despite its looks

Wikipedia Redefined

Jonathan Frei — Tue, 14 Aug 2012 10:24:00 +0000

Wikipedia Redefined

Dear Jimmy Wales:

Please let NEW! redesign Wikipedia. I think they will give you their work for free. The exposure on such a large site will be more valuable to them than a check from the WikiMedia foundation.

Thanks,

Everyone that uses Wikipedia despite its looks

Wikipedia article traffic statistics

Jonathan Frei — Wed, 11 Jul 2012 10:27:01 +0000

Wikipedia article traffic statistics

This list of the top 1,000 Wikipedia articles is rather disappointing.

The most comprehensive and up-to-date encyclopedia in the world looks like a movie trivia website or a People Magazine subsection when you look at its most popular pages.

Could Wikipedia write itself?

Jonathan Frei — Fri, 06 Apr 2012 10:40:41 +0000

Could Wikipedia write itself?

Rebecca J. Rosen reports in The Atlantic on an effort to automate more of the updates in Wikipedia through the new project called Wikidata.

The current plans are for the project to roll out in three phases over the next year. The first phase, set to be completed by this August, is the centralization of all the different points of data in Wikipedia across languages whose updates could be coordinated. The second phase allows for people to begin collaboratively building the database’s datasets. They hope to finish that by the end of this year. The final phase “will allow for the automatic creation of lists and charts based on the data in Wikidata.” By March of next year Wikimedia Deutschland hopes to turn the database over to the Wikimedia Foundation.

There’s more information about Wikidata on Wikimedia.org.