https://wiki.tachyony.co.uk/w/index.php?action=history&feed=atom&title=Wikipedia%3AReaderWikipedia:Reader - Revision history2026-05-15T21:34:45ZRevision history for this page on the wikiMediaWiki 1.35.5https://wiki.tachyony.co.uk/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Reader&diff=5266&oldid=prevTachyony: Imported page2021-12-19T17:26:34Z<p>Imported page</p>
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{{Wikipedia essay|WP:READER|WP:READERS}}<br />
{{nutshell|A reader is someone who simply visits Wikipedia to read articles, not to edit or create them. <br> They are the sole reason for which Wikipedia exists.}}<br />
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[[File:Matthias stom young man reading by candlelight.jpg|right|thumb|225px|<center>''It is '''[[WP:READER|The Reader]]''' that we should consider on [[User:Beyond_My_Ken/thoughts|each and every edit]] we make to Wikipedia.''<p></center>]]<br />
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A '''reader''' is someone who visits [[Wikipedia]] articles to ''read'' rather than ''edit'' the [[WP:Content|content]]. [[WP:Editor|Editors]], often referred to as [[WP:Wikipedians|Wikipedians]] if logged in, also read Wikipedia of course, but other than reading they also edit the pages to help build the encyclopedia.<br />
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Wikipedia currently has {{NUMBEROFARTICLES}} articles that are edited by {{NUMBEROFACTIVEUSERS}} active editors. Since 2007, Wikipedia has been one of the ten most popular websites<ref>{{cite web|url=http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia.org_is_more_popular_than...|title=Wikipedia.org is more popular than...|publisher=[[Wikimedia Foundation]]|accessdate=17 June 2012}}</ref> and the [[Main Page]] receives hundreds of millions of hits per month. In June 2012 it had 227 million hits.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://stats.grok.se/en/201205/Main%20Page|title=Wikipedia article traffic statistics|publisher=stats.grok.se|accessdate=17 June 2012}}</ref> Individual articles vary in popularity depending on the shifting [[Zeitgeist]].<br />
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The majority of visitors are readers so it is important that pages and articles are optimised for this readership.<br />
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==Reader demographics==<br />
[[File:Fragonard,_The_Reader.jpg|thumb|left|150px|About 45% of the readership is female.]]<br />
According to the [[meta:Research:Wikipedia Readership Survey 2011/Results|2011 readership survey]], the average reader is 36 years old, which is older than the average editor at the English Wikipedia. About 45% of readers are female, but only about 15% of editors are female.<br />
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About half of readers—and the overwhelming majority of readers in Canada, the United States, the United Kingdom, Germany, Australia and Japan—visit Wikipedia more than once a week.<br />
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==Project versus content==<br />
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Wikipedia can be divided into content and project pages, although not all pages fit neatly into this dichotomy. Some pages may be both types and there is disagreement as to what does actually constitute content. Article pages are clearly part of the content of Wikipedia, as are categories that contain content articles.<br />
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The Help and Wikipedia [[WP:NS|namespaces]] are a mix of content and project pages although the vast majority of Wikipedia namespace pages are used for the project itself. {{tl|Reader-facing page}} may be used to tag talk pages that are intended for non-editing readers.<br />
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This bit needs work and may be contentious.<br />
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Templates pages themselves should be considered to be project pages since as a standalone page they are of little use to the reader. Templates are of most use to readers when they are part of an actual article.<br />
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File pages (images, documents, audio and video clips) could be primarily thought of as project pages but readers may want to visit them to glean further information. <br />
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==Attracting new editors==<br />
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It is important to attract editors to help with the project but this should not be done at the expense of readability. Virtually every page on Wikipedia has an associated "Talk" page for any related discussion and this is one of the links where new editors can jump to the project side and become involved. There are other links from content to project: the [[Wikipedia:Community portal|Community portal]] link on the left hand side of the pages can be used, and the maintenance and warning templates often contain links to the project side.<br />
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==See also==<br />
*[[Wikipedia:Readers first]] – communicate information so that readers can easily understand it<br />
*[[Wikipedia:Dear Reader]] – readers may be different from you, so avoid using culturally-specific language<br />
*[[Wikipedia:Wikipedia is for readers]] – overview of the history of related rules on Wikipedia<br />
*[[User:Barkeep49/Elite]] – editors are the elite of Wikipedia<br />
*[[Wikipedia:Lists of popular pages by WikiProject]]<br />
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==References==<br />
{{reflist}}<br />
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{{Wikipedia essays}}<br />
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[[Category:Wikipedia help]]</div>Tachyony