Wikidata: the new Rosetta Stone
Data in itself is not knowledge. It is information. With the emergence of a new, very dense ecology of data that is accessible to everybody, we run the risk of trying to over-simplify the world: a description, no matter how detailed, will not necessarily make us understand something. Knowing that Dostoyevsky was born in 1821 and died in 1881 and that he was an existentialist is not the same as understanding Dostoyevsky or existentialism. Now more than ever, we need tools that will help us to contextualise information, to develop our own point of view, and to generate knowledge based on this information, in order to promote a society with a strong critical spirit. And we shouldn’t forget that data in itself is not objective either, even though it supposedly purports to be neutral. Data selection is a bias in itself. The decision of whether or not to analyse the gender, origin, religion, height, eye colour, political position, or nationality of a human group can condition the subsequent analysis. Codifying or failing to codify a particular item of information within a data set can both inform and disguise a particular reality. Data is useless without interpretation.
The impact of the emergence of Wikipedia on traditional print encyclopaedias is common knowledge. What will be the impact of Wikidata? In line with the wiki philosophy, the work is done collaboratively in an asymmetric but ongoing process. We can all collaborate in the creation and maintenance of the content, but also of the vocabulary, of the properties of different items, and of the taxonomies used to classify the information. We are deciding how to organise existing information about the world, and we are doing it in an open, participatory manner, as an example of the potential of technology. We know that human knowledge evolves cumulatively, and that Western culture is essentially inherited. Our reality is determined, in a sense, through the technological, social, political, and philosophical advances of those who came before us. This means that today’s generations don’t have to discover electricity all over again, for example. We enjoy the fruits of the efforts of our ancestors. But the Internet, for the first time, allows us to be involved in a phenomenon that will mark human history: we are defining and generating a new information ecosystem that will become the foundation for a possible cognitive revolution. And we are lucky to be able to participate, question, and improve it as it evolves. Together, we can participate in a historic project on a par with humanity’s greatest advances. We can create a new Rosetta Stone that can serve as an open, transparent key to unlock the secrets of today’s world, and perhaps as a documentary source for future generations or civilisations. Let us take responsibility for it.
This article originally appeared on the CCCB Lab blog of the Centre de Cultura Contemporània de Barcelona and is reprinted here with the permission of the author.
Discuss this story
How old was someone, knowing that he was born in 1821 and died in 1881? Maybe 1881-1821=60 years old. But born 1821-01-01, died 1881-12-31 gives 61 years old, while born 1821-12-31, died 1881-01-01 gives 59 years old. But there are countries where the birth of a child is her first anniversary. But there are lunar years. And what remains is something between 58 and 63 years old. When someone is reported as 1821--1881, this is even worse. And therefore, the question is not about what is written in the database, but about the confidence we can give to the way the data were collected to build the database. E.g. what says Wikidata about the death of Kim Hong-do ? Pldx1 (talk) 08:25, 30 November 2015 (UTC)[reply]
“doctors who graduated before they turned 20” – How would this query look like?--Kopiersperre (talk) 15:41, 30 November 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Wikimedia-l discussion, Slate article
There is an ongoing discussion about Wikidata's quality issues and their wider implications on the Wikimedia-l mailing list: http://www.gossamer-threads.com/lists/wiki/foundation/654001
A key fact here is that at present, only about 20% of Wikidata content is referenced to a reliable source. About half is unreferenced, and about a third is only referenced to a Wikipedia. [1]
For wider context, see yesterday's article in Slate exploring the links between Wikidata and Google's Knowledge Graph: "Why Does Google Say Jerusalem Is the Capital of Israel?" Andreas JN466 15:54, 1 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Mass updates
Wikidata has some way to go but has the potential to be a massive help to building and maintaining Wikipedia. For me, the biggest advantage is the ability to store information in once place that's referenced in many Wikipedia articles, and updated suddenly. The example was given of election results; I'm still finding many articles that list incorrect members of parliament or local councillors because they haven't been updated and there's no central reference of which articles contain such information. Another prime example is census data; many UK geography articles still list the population as at the 2001 census, not the (more recent) 2011 census or any of the subsequent population estimates from the Office for National Statistics.
Working through articles that find such information to update them is time consuming and mindnumbingly dull. Because we prefer to write information in prose, writing a bot to do it isn't really an option; using templates could work but would be much harder to update than Wikidata's slick user interface is. Out of date governance and demographic information is a big problem in geographical articles and Wikidata solves that problem for us; that alone is reason enough to embrace it and welcome it with open arms. Yes, it has flaws, but let's remember it's in its infancy. When someone views an article and sees a population figure that's 14 years out of date, it doesn't make us look good. So I say let's put the effort in to make WikiData work for us. WaggersTALK 11:26, 4 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]