Andrew  Lihhttp://andrewlih.comTwitter:  Fuzheado    Email:lih@american.edu

Understanding  the  New  Digital  Public  Sphere(PR  in  a  Wikipedia  Age)

PRSA  WebinarAugust  19,  2013

Associate  professor  of  journalismAmerican  University  School  of  Communication

Andrew  Lihauthor  of    The  Wikipedia  Revolution

andrew@andrewlih.comTwitter:  Fuzheado

article view sourcediscussion history

HOW A BUNCH OF NOBODIES CREATED THE WORLD’S

GREATEST ENCYCLOPEDIA“Imagine a world in which every single person

on the planet is given free access to the sum of

all human knowledge. That’s what we’re doing.”

—Jimmy Wales

With more than 2,000,000 individual articles on

everything from Aa! (a Japanese pop group) to

Zzyzx, California, written by an army of volunteer

contributors, Wikipedia is the #8 site on the World

Wide Web. Created (and corrected) by anyone with

access to a computer, this impressive assemblage

of knowledge is growing at an astonishing rate of

more than 30,000,000 words a month. Now for the

first time, a Wikipedia insider tells the story of how

it all happened—from the first glimmer of an idea to

the global phenomenon it’s become.

Andrew Lih has been an administrator (a trusted

user who is granted access to technical features)

at Wikipedia for more than four years, as well as a

regular host of the weekly Wikipedia podcast. In The

Wikipedia Revolution, he details the site’s inception

in 2001, its evolution, and its remarkable growth,

while also explaining its larger cultural repercussions.

Wikipedia is not just a website; it’s a global commu-

nity of contributors who have banded together out of

a shared passion for making knowledge free.

Featuring a Foreword by Wikipedia founder Jimmy

Wales and an Afterword that is itself a Wikipedia

creation.

U.S. $24.99

ANDREW LIH was an academic in new media and

journalism for ten years, at Columbia University

and Hong Kong University. He has been a com-

mentator on new media, technology, and journal-

ism issues on CNN, MSNBC, and NPR. Lih is

based in Beijing.

Become a part of The Wikipedia Revolution yourself,

and try your hand at editing the last chapter at: http://

www.wikipediarevolution.com/wiki/Main_Page

Jacket design by Ervin Serrano

Jacket photographs: globe by Frank Whitney/Jupiterimages;

puzzle by Shutterstock

Author photograph by Mei Fong

3/09

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Wikipedia RevolutionFrom Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Jump to: navigation, search

This article is about the book. For the different, similar terms related to Wikipedia, see

Wikipedia (terminology).

For Wikipedia’s non-encyclopedic visitor introduction, see Wikipedia:About.

Wikipedia Revolution (pronunciation ) is the story of the free,[1] multilingual ency-

clopedia project supported by the non-profit Wikimedia Foundation. The website’s name

is a portmanteau of the words wiki (a technology for creating collaborative websites) and

encyclopedia. Wikipedia’s 10 million articles have been written collaboratively by volun-

teers around the world, and almost all of its articles can be edited by anyone who can

access the Wikipedia website.[2] Launched in 2001 by Jimmy Wales and Larry Sanger,[3] it

is currently the largest and most popular[1] general reference work on the Internet.[4][5][6]

The Wikipedia Revolution traces Wikipedia’s phenomenal success back to its roots, and

profiles the people who have contributed to its stated mission of giving every single person

free access to the sum of all human knowledge.

THE WIKIPEDIA REVOLUTION

ANDREW LIH

How a Bunch of Nobodies Created the W

orld’s Greatest Encyclopedia

ISBN: 978-1-4013-0371-6

ANDREW L IH

From the Introduction to The Wikipedia Revolution by Wikipedia founder, Jimmy Wales

By now, it’s hard not to use the Internet without experiencing Wikipedia in

searches and surfing. It has become an incredibly useful Internet resource in

many languages. Yet when you use Wikipedia, you may not understand the

philosophy behind it.

This book tells the story of how Wikipedia began and evolved from a traditional

encyclopedia into the intricate global community that it is today.

Core policies

• Neutral point of view (NPOV)

• Verifiability (V) and reliable sources (RS)

• Conflict of interest (COI)

NPOV

• ...representing fairly, proportionately, and, as far as possible, without bias, all of the significant views that have been published by reliable sources on a topic.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Neutral_point_of_view

COI

• Cannot promote your own interests or those of other individuals, companies, or groups

• Paid advocates are very strongly discouraged from direct article editing, and should instead propose changes on the talk page of the article in question

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Neutral_point_of_view

Case of Wikipedia

Why? Wikipedia tops the Google searches

“If the news is that important, it will find me.”

– Unnamed teenager at a focus group, NY Times, March 27, 2008

Public relations in a new digital public

sphere?

PRSA 1982

• Traditional definition

“Public relations helps an organization and its publics adapt mutually to each other.”

http://www.prsa.org/AboutPRSA/PublicRelationsDefined/Old%20Definition

PRSA 2011/2012

• Crowdsourced definition

“Public relations is a strategic communication process that builds mutually beneficial relationships between organizations and their publics.”

http://www.prsa.org/AboutPRSA/PublicRelationsDefined

CIPR

• “Public relations is the discipline which looks after reputation, with the aim of earning understanding and support and influencing opinion and behaviour. It is the planned and sustained effort to establish and maintain goodwill and mutual understanding between an organisation and its publics”

http://www.cipr.co.uk/content/about-us/about-pr

Highlights

• PRSA: “process” and “relationship” are key upgrades

• CIPR: “maintain goodwill” and “mutual understanding”

• What does this mean in social media/digital public sphere?

Strategies

• Understand these communities

• Learn and respect their norms

• Be transparent

• The alternative is far worse

Bad strategies

• Astroturfing (fake grassroots)

• Fake/sock puppet accounts

• Undue influence

Wikipedia

• CREWE - Corporate Representatives for Ethical Wikipedia Editing

• Chartered Institute of Public Relations (CIPR) Wikipedia Best Practice Guidance

COI history

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conflict_of_interest_editing_on_Wikipedia

CREWE

• Phil Gomes, Edelman Digital

“It’s imperative, however, that the public relations industry demonstrate by cooperation and good behavior that it can work with the Wikipedia community instead of taking the quick, easy-fix route.”

http://www.edelmandigital.com/2012/09/10/public-relations-and-wikipedia-the-unnecessary-impasse/

Bell Potinger (2011)

• Analysis of the edits demonstrated that the changes had both added positive information and removed negative content, including the removal of information regarding the drug conviction of a businessman and Bell Pottinger client, and changing information about the arrest of a man convicted for commercial bribery....head of digital at Bell Pottinger blamed the incident on Wikipedia's “confusing” editing system and “the pressure put on us by clients to remove potentially defamatory or libellous statements very quickly, because Wikipedia is so authoritative."

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/wikipedia-founder-attacks-bell-pottinger-for-ethical-blindness-6273836.htmlhttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conflict_of_interest_editing_on_Wikipedia#cite_note-independentbell-58

CIPR warning

• There is another interpretation of public relations, commonly referred to as "spin". If this is your mode of operation then you are urged to steer clear of Wikipedia altogether in the performance of your job.

http://www.cipr.co.uk/sites/default/files/CIPR_Wikipedia_Best_Practice_Guidance.pdf

CIPR warning

• “You are reminded that ‘dark arts’ are the antithesis of best practice public relations. Intentional deceit and anonymous or incognito activities are breaches of professional codes of conduct.”

http://www.cipr.co.uk/sites/default/files/CIPR_Wikipedia_Best_Practice_Guidance.pdf

CREWE Flowchart

CREWE Flowchart

Wikipedia has...

• Volunteers who are copyright, research, reference and topic experts

• Superior technical and logistical to even top firms

• Database and system administrators

• Edit history is forever

http://www.cipr.co.uk/sites/default/files/CIPR_Wikipedia_Best_Practice_Guidance.pdf

Followup

• Join/understand Wikipedia and start editing articles with no COI

• Download and understand CREWE Flowchart

• Monitor the Facebook CREWE grouphttps://www.facebook.com/groups/crewe.group/

Andrew  Lihhttp://andrewlih.comTwitter:  Fuzheado    Email:lih@american.edu

Understanding  the  New  Digital  Public  Sphere(PR  in  a  Wikipedia  Age)

PRSA  WebinarAugust  19,  2013

Associate  professor  of  journalismAmerican  University  School  of  Communication