Community Wishlist Survey 2023/Larger suggestions/Report problem button for reader

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Report problem button for reader

  • Problem: Reader might find a problem with the text (article), but are not willing (for whatever reason, we won't discuss them here) to edit out the problem themselves. It could be factual error, possible error (the reader is uncertain), technical error, or other kind of problems.
  • Proposed solution: Provide tools for anonymous reader (or logged in Wikimedian as well) to give a quick feedback about the quality of the article.
  • Is this article useful for you? (yes/no)
  • Report error (with comments)

Then the reports would be automatically compiled, visible for public, and could be sorted by highest number of reports for active editors to handle the problem.

Technically I realize this would be challenging, but Wikimedia should stop treating the reader as passive observer whose only option after spotting mistake are either edit themselves or ignoring them.

I envision that there's a way to reset the usefulness and errors reported (that have been handled) so they keep being relevant and not outdated.

  • Is this article useful for you? (yes/no) -> the value would reset each month? They would be tabulated in a special statistics (i.e. the most useful/un-useful article of January 2023), similar, but more useful IMO than monthly pageviews.
  • Report error (with comments) -> It could automatically saved in the talk page (therefore increasing the usefulness of the talk pages), and admins/editors could mark them as resolved/won't be resolved/invalid/etc.. [Don't forget to automatically add the permalink to the version the reporter read]
  • Who would benefit: The general quality of the Wikipedia (or other projects) would hopefully increase, since we could easily identify problematic contents early and handle them soon, before getting worse (an uncaught vandalism for days, etc.). Admins and active editors would be glad if they could catch these vandalism and/or inaccuracies earlier. (rather than for example waiting for it to go viral on social media). Anonymous general reader would feel empowered and acknowledged, and they can participate easier without having to edit and/or creating account
  • More comments: In light of the unavailability of quality measurement that are common in social media (likes/disliks, thumbs up/down) or engagement measurements (comments), it's quite hard to know which content are problematic from the reader point of view (reader numbers > editor numbers). Some of the bad actors (or frustrated reader who didn't make the effort to edit the problem themselves) may vent out by posting in social media with the screenshot of the problematic content/vandalism, and such would be detrimental to the movement in general.
  • Phabricator tickets:
  • Proposer: ✒ Bennylin 10:47, 1 February 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Discussion

  • See mw:Article feedback/Version 5. That was an official WMF project for about two years. Got chopped because the community found the burden of reviewing and moderating feedback too heavy, and the WMF didn't want to invest a lot of resources (after already investing a lot of resources and not gaining acceptance). --Tgr (talk) 05:48, 5 February 2023 (UTC)[reply]
    Having said that… this rejection and burden, to a large extent, was because the feedback went into a separate system, with separate reviewers and no RC bots reverting vandalism etc. So maybe if it just dumped reports on talk pages and then used the new section index of discussion tools or something to keep track of them and compile some reports out of. —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 11:08, 5 February 2023 (UTC)[reply]
  • I think this could be useful, but only if it provides a structured method for users who may be unfamiliar with the nuances of a particular area of content to provide useful input to whatever community is focused on that area. For example, I work a lot on Commons Categories for Discussion. When browsing a category, there is a link "Nominate category for discussion" which allows a user to start a new discussion on a category and give a free form comment about why. This is handy, but we do get a reasonable number of discussions on the CfD page that are not well formed and are hard to act on. Even when it is clear why the submitting user has posted (e.g. they simply say "duplicate category"), then experienced users have to prompt for more details (response rate is often low), or do research on their own to figure out the situation. Often, the discussion ends up getting closed (or left in backlog) without action and the user sees no result so is not interested in improving their engagement with the process. Thus I think it is best if it is a more structured process that prompts the user to share exactly what is the problem, what they would like to see get done, and (contextual to the specific issue being reported) detailed information to allow responders to quickly address the issue. This will necessitate specific communities being able to actively participate in crafting this process and refining it over time to facilitate that community's needs. Joshbaumgartner (talk) 21:34, 10 February 2023 (UTC)[reply]
  • This could be helpful, too, for individuals who feel uncomfortable editing a page due to lack of sourcing and/or connection to the subject. I recently had some trying to reach out for help on a Talk page, then contacting someone in a related Wiki Project because their own Wikipedia page had incorrect information on it (in this case, their date of birth). They did not feel comfortable editing it but wanted the information updated. I feel like this could cause some issues with spamming, but I think it fits well into the overarching goals of Wikipedia. I wonder if instead of going to a general location, the related projects could be pinged, so the notification could be added for relevant users. Significa liberdade (talk) 22:24, 10 February 2023 (UTC)[reply]
  • Just recently watching the promotional video of the next gen search engine, (youtu. be/rOeRWRJ16yY?t=1432) even they put thumb up, thumb down button for query results now (and I suspect report for problem as well). ✒ Bennylin 15:57, 14 February 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Voting

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