Community Insights/Frequently asked questions

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Community Insights

If you arrived at this page from the survey, use the back button to return to the survey when you are finished reading this page. Thank you!

How long does the survey take?[edit]

The 2022 survey should only take about 10 to 30 minutes to complete. The length of the survey has been reduced by more than 50% since 2020.

How were people selected to take the survey?[edit]

We are reaching out to people in three ways. First, if you are an online contributor, you may have received an email with an on-wiki notification asking if we can send you the survey. We only sent this notice to some contributors, not all, because we are using sampling. By using sampling, only a randomly selected group of contributors are invited to take the survey. We are using sampling for two reasons. First, we want to make sure the results we report fully represent people across the movement. Second, we do not want to overburden every user with the survey every year.

If you are a program leader, affiliate representative, or volunteer developer, you may also get an email or see the survey on a mailing list or on social media. We do this because we don't have any single place that volunteer developers, affiliates, or program leaders do their Wikimedia activities. They use many different tools and many different places, so we need to do a different type of sampling process for these people.

For more information about our sampling process, please visit the sampling strategy page.

What questions are being asked in the survey?[edit]

For the 2022 survey, we are asking questions to help track our progress toward the Wikimedia Foundation's Strategic Direction. We're interested in how we can better support our communities, especially concerning the Wikimedia community's experience with safety and inclusion in online and offline spaces, experience with Wikimedia's technical infrastructure, and resources and support available for project organizers and affiliates. You will also see different questions depending on your role in the movement, whether as an editor/contributor, developer, organizer, admin, and/or affiliate representative. Some of the questions you might see could be about:

  • The online and offline activities you participate (or would like to participate) in.
  • Your experience with collaboration, communication, and respectful interaction in the movement.
  • Your awareness of as well as opinions about various Wikimedia programs.
  • General demographic information such as where you live or languages you speak.

I am an editor and I did not get an invitation to take the survey on my talk page. Can I still take it?[edit]

Not everyone was invited to take the survey because we used random sampling to avoid overburdening Wikimedia communities. You are welcome to take the survey if you wish, and can send a message to surveys(_AT_)wikimedia.org to do so.

Please note that the survey is hosted by a third-party service (Qualtrics) and is governed by this Wikimedia Foundation privacy statement.

How is this survey related to the movement strategy or strategic direction?[edit]

Since 2019, we have asked the community questions that will help track the progress the Wikimedia movement is making toward the goals of the Medium Term Plan and ultimately toward the Wikimedia 2030 movement strategic direction. As we work towards these goals, what we learn from the Community Insights Survey helps the Wikimedia Foundation understand how it can better support all Wikimedia communities.

Will the data be made available under an open access policy?[edit]

Potentially. This is a complicated process and we don't have the resources to commit to share the data openly yet. We are more likely to be able to share the data with Wikimedia affiliates or researchers who sign a non-disclosure agreement. It will take time to organize and manage the databases in a way that can be shared with others.

Why are we doing this survey? How will the data be used?[edit]

The data from this survey will directly influence the work of teams at the Wikimedia Foundation. It will help us evaluate our progress toward important elements of the Medium Term Plan and Wikimedia 2030 movement strategic direction, and it will provide a structured way for Wikimedia Foundation staff to incorporate communities' feedback and experiences into the work they do.

When will the analysis be released?[edit]

Our goal for releasing a comprehensive report of the 2022 survey data on Meta is November 2022.

There is a mistake in the survey. Who do I contact?[edit]

Please email surveys(_AT_)wikimedia.org and we will get back to you promptly.

How can my organization do a survey like this?[edit]

Visit the survey support desk to learn more about how to do a survey.

How do I ask a question that is not answered by this FAQ?[edit]

We all love asking questions and we are happy to hear yours. Please post to the talk page if you have an additional question that is not posted here. You are welcome to ask questions not already covered here on the Community Insights Discussion page. This page is watched by Foundation Staff who will be happy to offer clarifications and expand this FAQ. If you prefer a more private communication method you can also reach out directly to tandic-ctr(_AT_)wikimedia.org. You can write in any language, but replies will be in English.

How can I opt out of this survey?[edit]

For those of you who agree to receive a link to take the survey, you will receive an email with the survey link. You might also receive 1-3 follow-up emails if you don't complete the survey. You can unsubscribe from these reminders whenever you would like.

I took the survey in a language other than English, and I found the translation quality to be poor. What are you doing to fix this?[edit]

The survey is written in English, and translating it takes a lot of work. The initial translations are done by a third-party service, and some translations, but not all, have been reviewed and revised by volunteers. If you have feedback about the quality of a translation into your language, please contact us at surveys(_AT_)wikimedia.org.

The survey doesn't seem to have my language available.[edit]

For the Community Insights survey, we prioritize languages that are as wide-reaching as possible. For the 2022 survey, the following language versions are available:

  • Arabic
  • Indonesian[1]
  • Bangla[1]
  • Catalan[2]
  • Simplified Chinese
  • Czech[2]
  • Dutch
  • English
  • Persian[2]
  • Finnish[2]
  • French
  • Greek[2]
  • German
  • Hebrew[2]
  • Hindi[1]
  • Hungarian[2]
  • Italian
  • Japanese
  • Korean[1]
  • Polish
  • Brazilian Portuguese
  • Romanian[2]
  • Russian
  • Spanish
  • Swedish[2]
  • Thai[1]
  • Turkish[1]
  • Ukrainian
  • Vietnamese[1]
  1. a b c d e f g added in 2020
  2. a b c d e f g h i added in 2022

We are pleased to add nine language versions of the survey for 2022! As time goes by and more of the survey questions stay the same from year to year, we hope to continually expand the languages available and improve the quality of all language versions.