Death and Wikipedia

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Sydwhunte was the first to update the Elizabeth II Wikipedia article following her death. Screenshot of Elizabeth II Wikipedia article.jpg
Sydwhunte was the first to update the Elizabeth II Wikipedia article following her death.

Editors of the online encyclopedia Wikipedia tend to update Wikipedia articles with information about deaths quickly after people die. [3] [4] Web developer and Wikipedia editor Hay Kranen coined the term "deaditor" to refer to these editors. [5] Articles about people often have large spikes in views just after they die. For example, the article about designer Kate Spade averaged 2,117 views in 48-hour periods before her death. In the 48 hours after her death, it got 3,417,416, an increase of 161,427%. [6] [7] [8]

The media have remarked on the site's quick updates after the deaths of people such as Michael Jackson [9] and Elizabeth II. [5] [10] [11]

In 2009, English-language Wikipedia adopted new quality control measures to verify information on the biographies of living people, including claims of death. [12]

When a biographee dies of a disease, the progress of that disease may also be described. [13]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">History of Wikipedia</span>

Wikipedia, a free-content online encyclopedia written and maintained by a community of volunteers, began with its first edit on 15 January 2001, two days after the domain was registered. It grew out of Nupedia, a more structured free encyclopedia, as a way to allow easier and faster drafting of articles and translations.

<i>Time</i> (magazine) American news magazine and website

Time is an American news magazine based in New York City. For nearly a century, it was published weekly, but starting in March 2020 it transitioned to every other week. It was first published in New York City on March 3, 1923, and for many years it was run by its influential co-founder, Henry Luce.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Anne, Princess Royal</span> Daughter of Elizabeth II (born 1950)

Anne, Princess Royal is a member of the British royal family. She is the second child and only daughter of Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, and the only sister of King Charles III. Anne was born 3rd in the line of succession to the British throne and is now 17th, and has been, since 1987, Princess Royal, a title held for life.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">English Wikipedia</span> English-language edition of Wikipedia

The English Wikipedia is the primary English-language edition of Wikipedia, an online encyclopedia. It was created by Jimmy Wales and Larry Sanger on January 15, 2001, as Wikipedia's first edition.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Obituary</span> Short biography of someone who recently died

An obituary is an article about a recently deceased person. Newspapers often publish obituaries as news articles. Although obituaries tend to focus on positive aspects of the subject's life, this is not always the case. According to Nigel Farndale, the Obituaries Editor of The Times: "Obits should be life affirming rather than gloomy, but they should also be opinionated, leaving the reader with a strong sense of whether the subject lived a good life or bad; whether they were right or wrong in the handling of their public affairs."

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mary Berry</span> English food writer and television presenter (born 1935)

Dame Mary Rosa Alleyne Hunnings is an English food writer, chef, baker and television presenter. After being encouraged in domestic science classes at school, she studied catering at college. She then moved to France at the age of 22 to study at Le Cordon Bleu culinary school, before working in a number of cooking-related jobs.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Reliability of Wikipedia</span>

The reliability of Wikipedia and its user-generated editing model, particularly its English-language edition, has been questioned and tested. Wikipedia is written and edited by volunteer editors who generate online content with the editorial oversight of other volunteer editors via community-generated policies and guidelines. This editing model is highly concentrated, as 77% of all articles are written by 1% of its editors, a majority of whom have chosen to remain anonymous. The reliability of the project has been tested statistically through comparative review, analysis of the historical patterns, and strengths and weaknesses inherent in its editing process. The online encyclopedia has been criticized for its factual reliability, principally regarding its content, presentation, and editorial processes. Studies and surveys attempting to gauge the reliability of Wikipedia have mixed results. Wikipedia's reliability was frequently criticized in the 2000s but has been improved; it has been generally praised in the late 2010s and early 2020s.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Personality and image of Elizabeth II</span> Public depiction of Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom

The image of Elizabeth II, Queen of the United Kingdom and other Commonwealth realms and Head of the Commonwealth from 1952 to 2022, was generally favourable throughout her years as a reigning monarch. Conservative in dress, she was well known for her solid-colour overcoats and matching hats, which allowed her to be seen easily in a crowd. She attended many cultural events as part of her public role. Her main leisure interests included horse racing, photography, and dogs, especially her Pembroke Welsh corgis. She ate jam sandwiches every day since childhood. Some of her other favorite foods were fish and chips, chocolate perfection pie, scones with jam and clotted cream, salmon from the River Dee and Morecambe Bay potted shrimp. Her views on political issues and other matters were largely subject to conjecture. She never gave a press interview and was otherwise not known to discuss her personal opinions publicly.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Elizabeth II</span> Queen of the United Kingdom from 1952 to 2022

Elizabeth II was Queen of the United Kingdom and other Commonwealth realms from 6 February 1952 until her death in 2022. She was queen regnant of 32 sovereign states over the course of her lifetime and remained the monarch of 15 realms by the time of her death. Her reign of over 70 years is the longest of any British monarch and the longest verified reign of any female head of state in history.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Japanese Wikipedia</span> Japanese-language edition of Wikipedia

The Japanese Wikipedia is the Japanese-language edition of Wikipedia, a free, open-source online encyclopedia. Started on 11 May 2001, the edition attained the 200,000 article mark in April 2006 and the 500,000 article mark in June 2008. As of October 2023, it has over 1,390,000 articles with 13,685 active contributors, ranking fourth behind the English, French and German editions.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Death hoax</span> False report of a persons death

A death hoax is a deliberate report of someone's death that is later proven to be untrue. In some cases it might be because the person has intentionally faked death.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Vandalism on Wikipedia</span> Act of editing Wikipedia in a malicious manner

On Wikipedia, vandalism is editing the project in an intentionally disruptive or malicious manner. Vandalism includes any addition, removal, or modification that is intentionally humorous, nonsensical, a hoax, offensive, libelous or degrading in any way.

Operation London Bridge was the funeral plan for Queen Elizabeth II. The plan included the announcement of her death, the period of official mourning, and the details of her state funeral. The plan was created as early as the 1960s and revised many times in the years before her death in September 2022.

Liam Charles is a British baker, television presenter and contestant from Series 8 of The Great British Bake Off. He is currently a presenter on Bake Off: The Professionals and a judge on Junior Bake Off.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Wikipedia coverage of the COVID-19 pandemic</span> Wikipedias response to a global pandemic

The COVID-19 pandemic was covered in Wikipedia extensively, in real-time, and across many languages. This coverage extends to many detailed articles about various aspects of the topic itself, as well as many existing articles being amended to take account of the pandemic's effect on them. Wikipedia and other Wikimedia projects' coverage of the pandemic – and how the volunteer editing community achieved that coverage – received widespread media attention for its comprehensiveness, reliability, and speed. Wikipedia experienced an increase in readership during the pandemic.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Queue for the lying-in-state of Elizabeth II</span> Queue of mourners for Queen Elizabeth II

A queue of mourners waited to file past the coffin of Queen Elizabeth II while she lay in state at Westminster Hall in London, England, from 14 to 19 September 2022. Elizabeth II died on 8 September 2022.

Coverage of American politics in Wikipedia is a subject that has received substantial attention from the media. Since its founding in 2001, Wikipedia has provided coverage of five United States presidential elections, and six mid-term elections at the federal level, as well as numerous "off-year" state elections and special elections.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Death and state funeral of Elizabeth II</span> 2022 death and state funeral of the United Kingdoms Queen

On 8 September 2022, at 15:10 BST, Elizabeth II, Queen of the United Kingdom and the other Commonwealth realms, died at Balmoral Castle in Scotland, at the age of 96. Elizabeth's reign was the longest of any British monarch. She was succeeded by her eldest son, Charles.

References

  1. Rauwerda, Annie (September 9, 2022). "Who the hell updated Queen Elizabeth II's Wikipedia page so quickly?". Input. Archived from the original on 20 October 2022. Retrieved 20 October 2022.
  2. Mannix, Liam (September 13, 2022). "Evidence suggests Wikipedia is accurate and reliable. When are we going to start taking it seriously?". The Sydney Morning Herald . Retrieved 20 October 2022.
  3. Harrison, Stephen (16 August 2018). "Meet the People Who Quickly Update Wikipedia Pages When a Celebrity Like Aretha Franklin Dies". Slate Magazine.
  4. Thomas, Rhys (5 October 2022). "Inside the world of Wikipedia's deaditors". The Face .
  5. 1 2 McNamee, Kai (2022-09-15). "Fastest 'was' in the West: Inside Wikipedia's race to cover the queen's death". NPR . Archived from the original on 2023-01-15. Retrieved 2023-01-22.
  6. Samora, Russell (August 2018). "Life After Death on Wikipedia". The Pudding. Retrieved 2023-01-14.
  7. Goldenberg, Russell (August 2018). "Life After Death on Wikipedia". The Pudding .
  8. Rosen, Rebecca J. (6 February 2013). "If You Want Your Wikipedia Page to Get a Ton of Traffic, Die While Performing at the Super Bowl Half-Time Show". The Atlantic.
  9. Steiner, Thomas; van Hooland, Seth; Summers, Ed (13 May 2013). "MJ no more: Using concurrent wikipedia edit spikes with social network plausibility checks for breaking news detection". Proceedings of the 22nd International Conference on World Wide Web. pp. 791–794. doi:10.1145/2487788.2488049. ISBN   9781450320382. S2CID   15540545.
  10. Lukpat, Alyssa (18 September 2022). "When Queen Elizabeth II Died, Wikipedia's 'Deaditors' Were Ready". Wall Street Journal.
  11. Parsons, Jeff (9 September 2022). "How Wikipedia responded when news of the Queen's death broke". Metro.
  12. Cohen, Noam (24 August 2009). "Wikipedia to Limit Changes to Articles on People". The New York Times.
  13. Mahroum, Naim; Bragazzi, Nicola Luigi; Sharif, Kassem; Gianfredi, Vincenza; Nucci, Daniele; Rosselli, Roberto; Brigo, Francesco; Adawi, Mohammad; Amital, Howard; Watad, Abdulla (June 2018). "Leveraging Google Trends, Twitter, and Wikipedia to Investigate the Impact of a Celebrityʼs Death From Rheumatoid Arthritis". JCR: Journal of Clinical Rheumatology. 24 (4): 188–192. doi:10.1097/RHU.0000000000000692. PMID   29461342. S2CID   3442166.