The Signpost
Letter S symbol
Cover of The Signpost – February 24, 2016
Cover of The Signpost (February 24, 2016)
TypeWeekly newspaper
FormatOnline
Owner(s)Wikipedia community
Founder(s)Michael Snow
PublisherEnglish Wikipedia
Editor-in-chiefGamaliel and Go Phightins!
LaunchedJanuary 10, 2005
LanguageEnglish
WebsiteThe Signpost
Free online archivesFree online archives

The Signpost (previously known as The Wikipedia Signpost[1]) is the English Wikipedia’s free internal newsletter.[2][3][4] It is managed by the Wikipedia community and is published online, usually weekly.[2][5] Each edition contains stories and articles related to the Wikipedia community.[6][7] Contributions to the newsletter are made by a wide range of editors.[2]

The publication was founded in January 2005 by Wikipedia administrator and later Chair of the Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees, Michael Snow.[2][1][8] It was originally titled The Wikipedia Signpost and later shortened to simply The Signpost.[1][9] The newsletter reports on Wikipedia events including Arbitration Committee rulings,[10] Wikimedia Foundation issues,[11] and other Wikipedia-related projects.[12]

The Signpost has been the subject of academic analysis in publications including Sociological Forum,[13] the social movements journal Interface[14] and New Review of Academic Librarianship;[15] and was consulted for data on Wikipedia by researchers from Los Alamos National Laboratory and Dartmouth College.[16] It has garnered generally positive reception from media publications including The New York Times,[17] The Register,[18] Nonprofit Quarterly,[19] and Heise Online.[20] The book Wikipedia: The Missing Manual called The Signpost essential reading for ambitious new Wikipedia editors.[21]

History

The publication was launched in January 2005 under the original name The Wikipedia Signpost and was later renamed simply to The Signpost.[9][1] It was founded by Michael Snow, a Wikipedia administrator and later chair of the Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees.[1][8] Similar efforts had already been started previously with Wikipedia:Announcements by Larry Sanger on November 20, 2001;[22][23] Wikimedia News on the Meta-Wiki, November 14, 2002;[24] and Wikipedia-Kurier in the German Wikipedia, December 10, 2003.[25]

Wikipedia administrator Michael Snow founded The Signpost and later was chair of the Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees.[1][8]
Wikisource has original text related to this article:
Welcome to the inaugural edition of The Wikipedia Signpost

In its inaugural edition, Snow wrote: "I hope this will be a worthwhile source of news for people interested in what is happening around the Wikipedia community."[26] He said the name of The Signpost came from the fact that Wikipedia editors "sign" their "posts" when discussing articles on talk pages.[26]

Snow stepped down from his duties as editor with The Signpost in August 2005 and Wikipedia user Ral315 took over as editor, writing in his first post in the position: "I'd like to personally thank Michael for his work on the Signpost; it was a great idea that really helped Wikipedians learn more about the happenings on Wikipedia."[27] Ral315 carried out a survey for The Signpost in September 2007, and based on respondents estimated a weekly readership of approximately 2,800 Wikipedia users.[28] After leaving his post as editor, Snow continued to contribute as a writer to The Signpost until his appointment to the Board of Trustees of the Wikimedia Foundation in February 2008.[29]

Wikipedia community members working together on The Signpost at a conference in New York City (July 25, 2009)

In July 2008, editor Ral315 wrote about transparency for The Signpost, acknowledging that at request of the Wikimedia Foundation, the newsletter had decided not to publish an article about a then-pending legal case filed against Wikimedia.[30] The Signpost editor explained: "I feel this was an unfortunate, but necessary, move" — because the newsletter's affiliations with the Wikimedia Foundation could mean publishing an article about the lawsuit "might have had a severe effect on the case."[30]

The editor-in-chief worried about the future impact of this editorial decision: "I'm still rather troubled by the very nature of this situation, because it was the first time that I've felt pressured by the Wikimedia Foundation not to write or publish a story. This also leaves us with a dangerous precedent that I'm hoping only to keep in the most serious cases."[30]

The Signpost published its 200th issue in November 2008.[31] By that time, a total of 1,731 articles had been published authored by 181 contributors.[31] Wikipedia user Ragesoss took over as editor of the newsletter in February 2009, in an issue which featured a new layout for the publication.[32] Ragesoss resigned as editor in June 2010, and Wikipedia user HaeB took over in this role as the publication was debating changing its name from The Wikipedia Signpost to The Signpost.[33] In 2010, sister internal Wikipedia publications managed by volunteer contributors to the website included the podcast The Wikipedia Weekly and newsletter The Wikizine.[34][35]

HaeB resigned from his role as editor after being hired in a position with the Wikimedia Foundation in July 2011, and commented: "it would make it too much of a conflict of interest if I were to continue to make final editorial decisions for a community-run publication."[36] After three interim editors-in-chief,[37] Wikipedia user The ed17 took over in May 2012 as the eighth individual in this role.[38] He had previously served as editor of the internal newsletter Bugle for the WikiProject dedicated to improving military history articles on Wikipedia.[38] International Business Times noted in a 2013 article that The Signpost had performed investigative journalism which uncovered a direct link between the firm Wiki-PR and conflict-of-interest editing on Wikipedia.[39]

2015 reporting by The Signpost on changes to freedom of panorama copyright restrictions in Europe was covered by publications in multiple languages including German,[40] Italian,[41] Polish,[42] and Russian.[43]

After its June 2015 reporting on the likelihood of increased copyright restrictions in Europe involving changes to freedom of panorama,[44] The Signpost was consulted for information on the matter by publications in multiple languages including: English,[45][46] German,[40] Italian,[41] Polish,[42][47] and Russian.[43]

Heise Online highlighted use of a papal conclave image in The Signpost article about controversy with the Wikimedia Foundation's executive director Lila Tretikov — and said this symbolized pressure on the organization's Board of Trustees.[48]

Wikipedia users Gamaliel and Go Phightins! became editors-in-chief of The Signpost in January 2015; The Ed17 noted that during his tenure the publication grew to expand its role to include reporting on the wider Wikimedia movement in addition to the English Wikipedia itself.[49] In a January 2015 article reflecting back on the publication's history for its tenth anniversary, Gamaliel stressed further improvements to the newsletter depended on collaboration and involvement from the Wikipedia community, and invited users to contribute suggestions and join the editing team.[50]

In their first formal issue of the newsletter as editors-in-chief, users Go Phightins! and Gamaliel wrote about the unique role of The Signpost: "We will strive to maintain our voice and standing as an independent entity, separate from the WMF, Wikimedia chapters, WikiEd, or other entities."[51]

In January 2016, both Fortune and Ars Technica relied upon The Signpost, in their reporting of a vote of no confidence by Wikipedia editors against Arnnon Geshuri joining the Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees.[52][53]

While reporting in February 2016 on controversy and confusion at the Wikimedia Foundation on whether or not its current executive director Lila Tretikov would remain in the position, The Signpost illustrated its article on the subject with a picture of smoke emanating from a chimney — in reference to the papal conclave procedure used to select a new Pope.[48] Heise Online reported on this image choice by The Signpost, and wrote that it evidenced pressure on the Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees to take action.[48] Andreas Kolbe, writing for the The Signpost, wrote "that the creation of a successful search engine would transform volunteers into 'unpaid hamsters.'"[54]

Content

The Signpost publishes stories related to the Wikipedia community, the Wikimedia Foundation, and other Wikipedia-related projects.[7][11][12][6] It is provided free of charge.[3][4] The Wikipedia community manages composition of the publication and it is generally released on a weekly basis.[2][5] Readers may choose to receive the newsletter by email or to receive notices of new issues at their user "Talk" page; a third option is to have the latest issue's table of contents displayed on their user page.[21]

The newsletter helps to notify Wikipedia editors about ongoing collaborative projects to improve articles on the site together.[55] The publication is a routine location for centralized notices on recently published academic studies about Wikipedia.[9] The Signpost includes a section called the "Arbitration Report", formerly "The Report on Lengthy Litigation", which details proceedings from Wikipedia's Arbitration Committee.[10] All the archives are available to read which is a fast way to learn about the history of Wikipedia.[2]

Scholarly analysis

In a 2009 article in the peer-reviewed academic journal Sociological Forum, Piotr Konieczny characterized The Signpost as an example of a subcommunity within the larger Wikipedia community.[13] Writing in the social movements journal Interface the same year, Konieczny evidenced The Signpost among the "complexity and richness of those organizations" that make up the social strata of mannerisms in which individuals may volunteer their time to the website.[14]

Researchers from Los Alamos National Laboratory and Dartmouth College relied upon archives from The Signpost to track Wikipedia editing outages, and presented their findings at the 2011 IEEEIWIC/ACM International Conference on Web Intelligence.[16] In a study of Wikipedia and its reputation in higher education published in 2013 in the journal New Review of Academic Librarianship, researcher Gemma Bayliss regularly reviewed the Twitter feed of The Signpost to be certain her scholarship on the website was current.[15]

Reception

"If you expect to continue editing at Wikipedia ... subscribe to ... The Wikipedia Signpost."

 —John Broughton, Wikipedia: The Missing Manual[21]

The New York Times in 2007 called The Signpost a "mocked-up newspaper" and classed this among evidence that Wikipedia exhibited a retro style and "its own special brand of kitsch".[17] In his 2008 book Wikipedia: The Missing Manual, John Broughton recommended The Signpost as essential reading for aspiring Wikipedia contributors: "If you expect to continue editing at Wikipedia for any length of time, by all means subscribe to the weekly internal newsletter, The Wikipedia Signpost."[21]

Fortune characterized The Signpost as "Wikipedia’s insider newspaper".[52] The Register's executive editor Andrew Orlowski in a 2016 article described The Signpost as "Wikipedia's own plucky newsletter."[18] The Ars Technica's tech policy editor Joe Mullin stated that in February 2016, internal documents were leaked to and posted by The Signpost in respect to the Knight Foundation's "Knowledge Engine" grant for a Wikimedia Foundation search engine project.[56] Writing about the Knowledge Engine controversy, the editor-in-chief of Nonprofit Quarterly, Ruth McCambridge, referred to The Signpost and directed her more technically minded readers to its pages "to better understand what was being planned."[19] Torsten Kleinz, writing for German tech portal Heise Online in an article about the same events, similarly said, "When official communications ground to a halt, the Signpost community newsletter jumped into the breach, brought unknown facts to light and initiated an informed discussion."[20]

See also

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f Cohen, Noam (March 5, 2007). "A Contributor to Wikipedia Has His Fictional Side". The New York Times. p. C5. Retrieved February 29, 2016.
  2. ^ a b c d e f Phoebe Ayers; Charles Matthews; Ben Yates (2008). How Wikipedia Works: And how You Can be a Part of it. No Starch Press. p. 345. ISBN 978-1-59327-176-3. Retrieved March 1, 2016.
  3. ^ a b Koebler, Jason (February 16, 2016). "The Secret Search Engine Tearing Wikipedia Apart". Vice. Archived from the original on February 23, 2016. Retrieved March 1, 2016.
  4. ^ a b Geoffroy, Romain (January 16, 2014). "Une employée de Wikipédia débarquée pour avoir monnayé ses articles". Les Inrockuptibles (in French). Archived from the original on August 17, 2014. Retrieved March 1, 2016.
  5. ^ a b Dobusch, Leonhard (January 12, 2014). "Interview mit Dirk Franke über „Grenzen der Bezahlung" in der Wikipedia". Netzpolitik.org (in German). Archived from the original on November 17, 2015. Retrieved March 1, 2016.
  6. ^ a b Rosen, Rebecca (February 6, 2013). "If You Want Your Wikipedia Page to Get a TON of Traffic, Die While Performing at the Super Bowl Half-Time Show". The Atlantic. Archived from the original on March 1, 2016. Retrieved March 1, 2016.
  7. ^ a b Jemielniak, Dariusz (2014). Common Knowledge?: An Ethnography of Wikipedia. Stanford University Press. p. 231. ISBN 978-0804797238. Retrieved March 1, 2016.
  8. ^ a b c McCarthy, Caroline (July 18, 2008). "Wikimedia Foundation edits its board of trustees". CNET. Archived from the original on March 1, 2016. Retrieved March 1, 2016.
  9. ^ a b c Okoli, Chitu; Mehdi, Mohamad; Mesgari, Mostafa; Nielsen, Finn Årup; Lanamäki, Arto (October 24, 2012). "The people's encyclopedia under the gaze of the sages: A systematic review of scholarly research on Wikipedia". SSRN. doi:10.2139/ssrn.2021326. Retrieved March 1, 2016.
  10. ^ a b Oz, Ayelet (September 1, 2014). "The Legal Consciousness of Wikipedia". SSRN. Harvard Law School. doi:10.2139/ssrn.2572381. Retrieved March 1, 2016.
  11. ^ a b Paroutis, Sotirios; Heracleous, Loizos; Angwin, Duncan (February 1, 2013). Practicing Strategy: Text and Cases. SAGE Publications. p. 237. ISBN 978-1-4462-9047-7. Retrieved March 1, 2016.
  12. ^ a b Waters, John K. (2010). The Everything Guide to Social Media. Adams Media. pp. 180, 270. ISBN 978-1440506314.
  13. ^ a b Konieczny, Piotr (March 2009). "Governance, Organization, and Democracy on the Internet: The Iron Law and the Evolution of Wikipedia". Sociological Forum. 24 (1). John Wiley & Sons: 167. JSTOR 40210340 – via JSTOR. ((cite journal)): |access-date= requires |url= (help); Unknown parameter |subscription= ignored (|url-access= suggested) (help)
  14. ^ a b Konieczny, Piotr. "Wikipedia: community or social movement?" (PDF). Interface: A Journal for and about Social Movements. 1 (2): 212–232. ISSN 2009-2431. Archived from the original (PDF) on June 7, 2012. Retrieved March 1, 2016.
  15. ^ a b Bayliss, Gemma (January 2013). "Exploring the Cautionary Attitude Toward Wikipedia in Higher Education: Implications for Higher Education Institutions". New Review of Academic Librarianship. 19 (1): 39. doi:10.1080/13614533.2012.740439. ISSN 1361-4533. Retrieved March 1, 2016 – via EBSCO Host.
  16. ^ a b Yan, Guanhua; Arackaparambil, Chrisil (2011). "Wiki-watchdog: Anomaly detection in Wikipedia through a distributional lens". Proceedings of the 2011 IEEE/WIC/ACM International Conferences on Web Intelligence and Intelligent Agent Technology – Volume 01. IEEE Computer Society Washington. pp. 257–264. doi:10.1109/WI-IAT.2011.86. ISBN 978-0-7695-4513-4. Retrieved March 1, 2016.
  17. ^ a b Dee, Jonathan (July 1, 2007). "All the News That's Fit to Print Out". The New York Times Magazine. Archived from the original on March 4, 2016. Retrieved February 29, 2016.
  18. ^ a b Orlowski, Andrew (January 12, 2016). "Wikimedia Foundation bins community-elected trustee". The Register. Archived from the original on February 4, 2016. Retrieved March 1, 2016.
  19. ^ a b McCambridge, Ruth (February 16, 2016). "Knight Foundation Grant Request Tears at Wikipedia's Community". Nonprofit Quarterly. Archived from the original on February 24, 2016. Retrieved March 1, 2016.
  20. ^ a b Kleinz, Torsten (February 27, 2016). "Kommentar: Wie geht es weiter mit der Wikimedia Foundation?". Heise Online (in German). Archived from the original on February 27, 2016. Retrieved March 1, 2016.
  21. ^ a b c d Broughton, John (January 25, 2008). Wikipedia: The Missing Manual: The Missing Manual. O'Reilly Media, Inc. p. 454. ISBN 978-0-596-55377-7. Retrieved March 1, 2016.
  22. ^ Sanger, Larry (November 20, 2001). "Wikipedia:Announcements (renamed to Wikipedia:Milestones in 2011)". Wikipedia. Retrieved March 1, 2016.
  23. ^ Lima, Kilo (June 13, 2011). "Wikipedia:Announcements moved to Wikipedia:Milestones". Wikipedia. Retrieved March 1, 2016.
  24. ^ Mav (November 14, 2002). "Wikimedia News". Meta. Retrieved March 1, 2016.
  25. ^ Elian (December 10, 2003). "Wikipedia-Kurier – Das internationale Wiki-Nachrichtenblatt" (in German). German Wikipedia. Retrieved March 1, 2016.
  26. ^ a b Snow, Michael (January 10, 2005). "From the editor: Welcome to the Signpost!". The Wikipedia Signpost. Retrieved March 1, 2016.
  27. ^ Ral315 (August 15, 2005). "From the editor: As Michael Snow stopped operations on the Signpost last week, I chose to step in as editor". The Wikipedia Signpost. Retrieved March 1, 2016.((cite news)): CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
  28. ^ Ral315 (September 24, 2007). "From the editor: Last week, I asked readers to respond to a survey, in order to help us make the Signpost more relevant". The Wikipedia Signpost. Retrieved March 1, 2016.((cite news)): CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
  29. ^ Ral315 (February 18, 2008). "From the editor: This week, I'd like to congratulate and thank Michael Snow". The Wikipedia Signpost. Retrieved March 1, 2016.((cite news)): CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
  30. ^ a b c Ral315 (July 7, 2008). "From the editor: Transparency". The Wikipedia Signpost. Retrieved March 1, 2016.((cite news)): CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
  31. ^ a b Ral315 (November 24, 2008). "From the editor: 200th issue". The Wikipedia Signpost. Retrieved March 1, 2016.((cite news)): CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
  32. ^ Ragesoss (February 16, 2009). "From the editor: A new leaf". The Wikipedia Signpost. Retrieved March 1, 2016.
  33. ^ *Ragesoss, Mono and Pretzels (June 7, 2010). "From the team: Changes to the Signpost". The Wikipedia Signpost. Retrieved March 1, 2016.
  34. ^ Chen, Shun-Lin (April 30, 2010). "Wikipedia: A Republic of Science Democratized". Albany Law Journal of Science and Technology. 20 (2). ISSN 1059-4280. OCLC 23860428. Retrieved March 1, 2016.
  35. ^ Reagle, Joseph Michael (2010). Good Faith Collaboration: The Culture of Wikipedia. History and Foundations of Information Science. MIT Press. pp. 9, 178. ISBN 978-0262014472.
  36. ^ HaeB (July 11, 2011). "From the editor: Stepping down". The Signpost. Retrieved March 1, 2016.
  37. ^ Jarry1250 (September 19, 2011). "From the editor: Changes to The Signpost". The Signpost. Retrieved March 1, 2016.((cite news)): CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
  38. ^ a b The ed17 (May 21, 2012). "From the editor: New editor-in-chief". The Signpost. Retrieved March 1, 2016.((cite news)): CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
  39. ^ Halleck, Thomas (November 8, 2013). "Wikipedia And Paid Edits: Companies Pay Top Dollar To Firms Willing To 'Fix' Their Entries". International Business Times. Archived from the original on January 31, 2016. Retrieved March 3, 2016.
  40. ^ a b Diener, Andrea (June 27, 2015). "Geben Sie Panoramafreiheit, Sire!". FAZ – Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (in German). Archived from the original on June 29, 2015. Retrieved March 5, 2016.
  41. ^ a b "Libertà di Panorama: a rischio in Europa con una riforma del copyright". Blogo: Informazione libera e indipendente (in Italian). June 22, 2015. Archived from the original on June 23, 2015. Retrieved March 5, 2016.
  42. ^ a b "Chcesz robić zdjęcia znanych budowli Europy? Spiesz się. To mogą być ostatnie tygodnie". Gazeta Wyborcza (in Polish). June 24, 2015. ISSN 0860-908X. Archived from the original on June 27, 2015. Retrieved March 5, 2016.
  43. ^ a b "ТРЕВОГА! Свободная съемка на улицах Европы – под угрозой" (in Russian). June 23, 2015. Archived from the original on June 27, 2015. Retrieved March 5, 2016.
  44. ^ Heald, J. (June 17, 2015). "Three weeks to save freedom of panorama in Europe". The Signpost. Retrieved March 5, 2016.
  45. ^ Cheesman, Chris (June 23, 2015). "Photography of public buildings under threat after European rule change, MEP warns". Amateur Photographer. Archived from the original on March 4, 2016. Retrieved March 5, 2016.
  46. ^ Taylor-Hochberg, Amelia (June 22, 2015). "Photographing public art and architecture in the EU may soon cost you". Archinect. Archived from the original on September 5, 2015. Retrieved March 5, 2016.
  47. ^ "Parlament Europejski zlikwiduje "wolność panoramy"? Fotograf będzie potrzebował zezwolenia na zdjęcie zabytku". Gazeta.pl (in Polish). June 22, 2015. Archived from the original on June 25, 2015. Retrieved March 5, 2016.
  48. ^ a b c Kleinz, Torsten (February 25, 2016). "Revolte bei Wikimedia: Chefin Lila Tretikov tritt zurück". Heise Online (in German). Archived from the original on February 27, 2016. Retrieved March 3, 2016.
  49. ^ The ed17 (January 21, 2015). "From the editor: Introducing your new editors-in-chief". The Signpost. Retrieved March 1, 2016.((cite news)): CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
  50. ^ Gamaliel (January 21, 2015). "Anniversary: A decade of the Signpost". The Signpost. Retrieved March 1, 2016.
  51. ^ Go Phightins! and Gamaliel (January 28, 2015). "From the editor: An editorial board that includes you". The Signpost. Retrieved March 1, 2016.
  52. ^ a b Groden, Claire (January 26, 2016). "Wikipedia Members Vote Against New Board Member". Fortune. Archived from the original on February 20, 2016. Retrieved March 4, 2016.
  53. ^ Mullin, Joe (January 25, 2016). "Wikipedia editors revolt, vote 'no confidence' in newest board member". Ars Technica. Archived from the original on February 25, 2016. Retrieved March 4, 2016.
  54. ^ Lonon, Sherri (March 2, 2016). "Wikipedia Search Engine to Take on Google – Or Not". Business Administration Information. Archived from the original on March 3, 2016. Retrieved March 3, 2016.
  55. ^ Brooks, David (January 16, 2011). "More than a dozen people help out with Telegraph's Wikipedia project". The Telegraph. Archived from the original on March 27, 2015. Retrieved March 1, 2016.
  56. ^ Mullin, Joe (February 29, 2016). "Wikimedia Foundation director resigns after uproar over "Knowledge Engine"". Ars Technica. Archived from the original on March 1, 2016. Retrieved March 1, 2016.

Further reading

External links

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