TikTok "partnering" with Wikipedia?
Elon, Netanyahu, night owls, TikTok as search engine, and more!
🔔 Wiki Briefing
TikTok search results boost Wikipedia
Google has ruled the search landscape for more than 20 years now, notwithstanding recent complaints about its declining quality. And for many years Wikipedia has been the highest-ranked site in its search results. Now TikTok is following Google's lead and is inserting Wikipedia links into its search results, as reported by The Verge. Why? Because it knows that its mostly-Gen Z users are using it as a search engine. And no search engine is complete without Wikipedia.
For years, journalists have speculated about whether the next development in technology will be the one that displaces Wikipedia as the internet's all-purpose reference desk. It still hasn't happened yet. Wikipedia's readership has grown steadily in recent years, with its biggest month ever coming in March of this year. And now that TikTok—the next big thing that really did happen—is also pointing its users to Wikipedia for information, it's a strong indicator that Wikipedia will retain its influence in future decades.
One more note: TikTok's spokesperson describes this as a "partnership" with Wikipedia, but in a comment on the Wikipedia Weekly Facebook group Wikimedia Foundation partnerships director Jose Vargas downplayed the connection: no services are exchanged, no money is changing hands. One suspects that calling it a "partnership" sounds better for TikTok—Wikipedia has credibility to spare.
📰 In the News
Who’s taking cheap shots at Wikipedia now?
Elon Musk and Benjamin Netanyahu grabbed some easy headlines by complaining about Wikipedia in a Twitter (er, X) Spaces event last week. Referring to a famous line often attributed to Churchill, Musk said: "History is written by the victors, but not if your enemies are still alive and have a lot of time on their hands to edit Wikipedia." Netanyahu added: "History is written by the people who can harness the most number of editors." These comments deserve no more rigorous examination than the spirit in which they were uttered, but it sure sounds like Bibi thinks Wikipedia is about overpowering your adversaries, not arriving at consensus. Meanwhile, one wonders if either man would like Wikipedia better if they knew it is not a democracy.
📚 Research Report
Night-owl readers are anime fans
A team of researchers at the Wikimedia Foundation have been studying how readers navigate Wikipedia as a website, and have made their preliminary findings available on Meta-Wiki. One interesting result: certain Wikipedia pages are more likely to be accessed at different times of the day. Articles about chemistry, physics and mathematics are viewed more in daytime hours. Articles about movies and TV are viewed more in the evening. Articles about video games, anime, and internet culture are viewed more during late-night hours.
🧩 Wikipedia Facts
The current size of Wikipedia is equivalent to more than 3,300 volumes of Encyclopedia Britannica. In 1990, the price range for a 32-volume set of Britannica was between $1,000 and $3,000. According to that math, the complete set of Wikipedia would run you somewhere around $100,000 and $300,000—and that's before inflation.
💡 Tips & Tricks
Did you know you can find out traffic figures for any Wikipedia article? To find it, start by clicking on the “View history” link at the top of an article. Then click on "Pageviews" in the external tools section near the top. It's that simple!
