Grants talk:PEG/bluerasberry/open access release funding for paper on Wikipedia in classroom/Report

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Hi Bluerasberry. Thank you for this complete grant report and all your work on the project. It's exciting to read the article and blog post, and see the reach it has gotten through other online channels. As you wrote, "making this paper accessible with open access is a long-term investment in the integration of Wikipedia and universities." In the near-term, have the authors had any sense that there is a positive reaction to their calls to action? Do you have more thoughts about increasing understanding between academia and the wiki community in regards to projects like these? Thanks again for your work. We're excited to see the longer-term effects of this paper! Cheers, Alex Wang (WMF) (talk) 03:24, 5 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]

AWang (WMF) Those are great questions because they point to what is important about this project and also what challenges we are facing.
Is there a positive reaction? - I am attempting to organize responses to this paper at en:Wikipedia:Why Medical Schools Should Embrace Wikipedia. This paper has been presented at 5-7 academic conferences in the last six months, and its routine acceptance as a conference submission is one measure of a positive reaction. I expect that anyone could publish a similar paper and tour the conference circuit as well, if they liked. Another near term effect is that this paper seems to sometimes act as a key for successfully cold-contacting university staff who would not otherwise reply to solicitations. A professor who is thinking of doing something with Wikipedia can cite this paper as their due diligence for establishing to their peers that Wikipedia partnerships are normal. Right now, Wikipedia still has a brand image of being abnormal and risky and I am already enjoying the effects of countering objections with this paper.
Do you have more thoughts about increasing understanding - Yes. There are some fundamental needs which the academic community has but which the Wikimedia community has so far had trouble addressing. Two big misconceptions that I see in the field of medicine is the strange assumption that there are many high quality alternatives to Wikipedia's information and also that the alternatives get much more traffic than Wikipedia's health articles get. This paper addresses those misconceptions enough to justify a student outreach project but those misconceptions could be addressed more directly. If there is really someone with capacity to discuss and collaborate then I am at hand to say more. Otherwise, I am doing my own thing with Consumer Reports, WM New York City, Wiki Project Med, and others. Thanks. Blue Rasberry (talk) 16:24, 5 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]