USP’s Center for Metropolitan Studies (CEM), aiming to disseminate knowledge in social sciences on the platform, has partnered with Wikimedia Brasil. With 4.5 billion monthly visits annually, Wikipedia has established itself as one of the largest informational portals in the online environment. At the same time, the website is one of the main sources for artificial intelligence platforms.
Edney Cielici Dias, doctor of Political Science and project coordinator at CEM, details how and why this idea began to be developed. “Wikipedia has been around since the early 2000s, but even so, the production of social sciences in Portuguese is relatively small. Conversations began from there. In Brazil and Latin America, this knowledge is not as widely disseminated, which is why it is important to embrace the issue of disseminating social sciences with quality.”
Quality content
The portal is open for editing and posting by the public, and the information posted on Wikipedia in Portuguese often has questionable quality. According to Dias, the volume of entries in social sciences on the platform does not exceed 600 items, many of which are of irregular production. “Some are of good quality; others are summaries, and some lack references. This is a general problem with Wikipedia. “Especially in Portuguese and other languages that are not English, it needs to be improved and have greater involvement from specialists,” he adds.
In this environment, with many long-time editors, it is important to proceed carefully when attempting to make changes to posts in order to avoid any issues. “You may come across an entry, even one that is well-rated and has had a lot of interaction, but you still notice gaps in it. So you first need to point out these gaps, start a discussion, and only then make the changes,” the coordinator concludes.
The future of the project
Within the field of social sciences, CEM is one of the pioneers in Brazil in editing Wikimedia content. Thus, it is common for the project to adapt gradually to the portal’s conditions and style. “We are learning. At first, we set a goal to intervene in 150 entries. Considering the current number of entries, it is a considerable number. But there is a learning curve,” says the coordinator.
Dias also mentions that the project faces the challenge of bringing research on public policies and fighting inequality to a broader audience, for free. “We live in a world of misinformation, so it’s about highlighting quality information in this field of diffusion, which is the most extensive and most used by artificial intelligence, in a way that also inspires other centers and institutions to participate in this endeavor,” he adds.
English version: Nexus Traduções
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