The Role of Local Content in Wikipedia: A Study on Reader and Editor Engagement

Abstract

About a quarter of each Wikipedia language edition is dedicated to representing “local content”, i.e. the corresponding cultural context (geographical places, historical events, political figures, among others). To investigate the relevance of such content for users and communities, we present an analysis of reader and editor engagement in terms of pageviews and edits. The results, consistent across 15 diverse language editions, show that these articles are more engaging for readers, and especially for editors. The highest proportion of edits on cultural context content is generated by anonymous users, and also administrators engage proportionally more than plain registered editors. In fact, looking at the first week of activity of every editor in the community, administrators already engage proportionally more than other editors in content representing their cultural context. These findings indicate the relevance of this kind of content both for fulfilling readers' informational needs and stimulating the dynamics of the editing community.