All anyone needs to know about how Wikipedia works was demonstrated by my own experience upon setting up an account. Doing so gives you your own Wikipedia page which mirrors the format of all the main entries. So you have a home page where you can 'define' yourself, there is a discussion page where people can leave messages or discussion points and an edit page where you can post any changes.

Upon setting up my account, I immediately went to my new home page and scribbled a couple of lines to the effect that the page was under construction. Then I noticed that there was a message on my discussion page. Opening it up I found a welcome note from someone called Sceptre, including some links to useful resources for newbies.

Out of curiosity I went to Sceptre's homepage. This revealed a lot to me about the nature of Wikipedia and the Wikipedia community. Sceptre is a member of the Wikipedia welcoming committee. This is a group of volunteers who take it upon themselves to send welcome messages to new users. This is not an automatic process. Although I found that the message I received was based on a template, Sceptre would still have had to monitor the new user log (people are currently registering at the rate of about 2 per minute!), go to my page and post the message. This effort on Sceptre's part definitely had the presumably desired effect of making me feel at home right from the start of my Wikipedia journey.

I discovered that Sceptre is also a member of the Wikipedia Counter Vandalism Unit. This is a group of people who monitor Wikipedia for instances of deliberate attempts to deface, delete or add misleading information to Wikipedia articles. Although Wikipedia effectively polices itself through the contributions of its users, these volunteers try to catch things quickly and catch the less obvious edits which may be missed by others. How effectively does this address the problem? In 2002 IBM decided to find out. They carried out a study to see how quickly malicious edits are corrected. Amazingly, they found that most were restored to their former glory in less than five minutes.

So I have learnt that Wikipedia has an active community of altruistic volunteers, who actively encourage improvement to the site and work actively to maintain the integrity of its entries. Wikipedia is a triumph of benevolence over malevolence, a testament to what can emerge out of potential anarchy when people put their minds to it. I'm looking forward to setting out on my journey.

As a footnote, I forgot to mention that Sceptre is fourteen years old.

In my previous blogging life, I found myself increasingly using Wikipedia as a valued resource, often shedding unexpected light on subjects I thought I knew something about. I found myself often going off on tangents, completely forgetting my original enquiry. Then I discovered the lure of the 'Random Article' button, through which Wikipedia reveals its true greatness.

Suddenly you find yourself propelled on a journey of discovery, quantum leaping from one unrelated subject to another. Knowing that the text of each article is freely editable by anyone who feels the urge gives the material an added dimension. For example, alighting upon an article about the town of Sweetwater, Florida, nestled among the usual geographical and statistical information was the following statement:

The town founders were primarily Russian Circus midgets. Many of the original homes were miniature scale houses built to accommodate the midgets.

A prankster at work I thought, but checking other sources I found that it was indeed true. Sweetwater was actually colonised by retired Russian circus dwarves who built tiny houses for themselves.

Three thoughts occurred to me in quick succession. The first was that the joy of 'random articling' one's way through the world's knowledge was akin for me to the joy of travel, never knowing what was around the next corner, who one would bump into and what one would discover. The second thought was that it would be great to chronicle the journey I was taking. The third was: wouldn't it be great to enrich this experience by improving Wikipedia along the way through my own research into the subjects I came across? I figure that all I can contribute to Wikipedia is the factual information. My thoughts on what I find will find an outlet here.

So here I am. I've created the blog and I'm ready to depart on my journey. Only one thing left to do: create my Wikipedia account...