Wikipedia keeps a permanent public record of every change to every article. These guides explain what that record means — edit wars, quality ratings, who really edits the encyclopedia, and how to read the data for yourself.
Edit wars are one of the strangest and most revealing things that happen on Wikipedia. Here is exactly what they are, why they start, how Wikipedia tries to stop them, and how to spot one yourself.
Read the guide →Featured Article, Good Article, B-Class, Stub — Wikipedia grades its own articles on a formal scale. Here is what each rating actually means and how editors decide.
Read the guide →A tiny fraction of readers ever edit Wikipedia, and a tiny fraction of those do most of the work. Here is who is really behind the encyclopedia, and how to read an editor list.
Read the guide →Wikipedia keeps a complete record of every change ever made to every article. Here is how to actually read that history, decode the jargon, and tell signal from noise.
Read the guide →Some articles are edited a handful of times a year. Others are fought over daily. What makes a Wikipedia page controversial, and what the edit data reveals about it.
Read the guide →When something big happens, Wikipedia changes within minutes. Here is how news events leave a fingerprint in an article’s edit timeline and pageview charts.
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