#WikiCite - Thank you #Orcid ! - #IcanHazWikidata

The question "I have an ORCiD profile, how do I get it in Wikidata" was asked on Twitter. Using Magnus's tool public information was imported and as a result information can be shown in Scholia.

Paolo Cignoni made a request using the #IcanHazWikidata hash tag and his papers were imported and it shows nicely in Scholia. It includes several of his co-authors, for the ones in white we have no indication for their gender in Wikidata. That is easy to fix.

There are probably a lot of co-authors missing.. One way of finding the missing co-authors is by adding "/missing" to the Scholia link. You can check for an ORCiD identifier and add a found identifier. You identify the papers already known to Wikidata and they are attributed to the co-author or, to a citing author.. I added a John W Goodby to make the picture more complete. It is easy and mostly obvious what to do.

What makes all this possible? Open data and a bit of effort.. As you can see in the later picture, just running Magnus's tool for a few co-authors changes the outlook considerably.

Are you a scholar and do you want to see your initial Scholia information? Just add your Ordid ID in a tweet with the #IcanHazWikidata hash tag.
Thanks,
      GerardM

#Knowledge - three types of knowledge and why "academic" is only one and overrated

There are three types of knowledge; they are academic, professional and knowledge from experience. The scheme to the right was published by Jaap van der Stel. He works in the field of psychiatry and is known for his work on addiction in combination with the use of peers in the recovery from addiction.

In the Wikimedia world, we insist on the primacy of academic knowledge and up to a point it serves us well. Operationally it means that much of the studies are done outside of the WMF, they may point out whatever but they hardly ever make an operational difference. When the internal WMF researchers study a subject, they are typically directed to study particular phenomena and it may point to operational issues. Issues that are either addressed by the WMF itself or adopted by the community.

When scientists make a compilation of all the sources in all the Wikipedias, it is academic work when the result is static. It may indicate what sources are used multiple times but it does not help any editor weed out sources that are biased or false. Magnus started work on a tool that knows about all the sources in two Wikipedia and Wikispecies.  It is updated in real time and that  gives it valid operational credentials.

I know from experience that there are issues with source information as we have it in Wikidata. We cannot invalidate sources by reference. We are only strong in the biomedical field and adding new information is not at all user friendly.

Now this user experience does not get much of a priority for valid operational reasons but the effect is that Wikidata is only useful for the geeks. Its lack of usability prevents its data to be used on Wikipedias in the "other" languages. It is where there is little or no academic nor operational interest.
Thanks,
      GerardM

As it is all about #DATA, let's use #Wiki principles to make it truly #Wikidata

#Wikidata is very much like a toddler; it is learning to stand on its feet. The #W3C did not put it in the centre of the data universe like it did DBpedia. It has however a few enormous advantages over DBpedia; Wikidata exists to be used.

The first use of Wikidata was to solve a data problem for Wikipedia. The interwikis are used and it is a success. Because of the LUA integration, Wikipedias are using Wikidata to provide information in their info-boxes .. an example ..

What people seem to forget is that Wikidata is also a Wiki. This means that the data may be wrong and, it is still the best information we have. As a Wiki, it is important that we aim to collaboratively work towards perfection. We identify Pablo Neruda in Wikidata with seven external data sources, 100 Wikipedias and Commons. With all these external sources, it should not be hard to corroborate all the "other" information like his date of birth, the year of his noble price etc.

Really all this academic "ontology" stuff is absolutely relevant and important in its own domain. The use of Wikidata however is not academic. Its use is to help us bring the sum of all knowledge to whoever is interested. It will be wonderful when we can use the data and the expertise from other resources as initial information or as corroboration of what has already been stated.

We know how over time quality improves. We know that a community makes light work of what is academically speaking not feasible. So let us ditch academic preconceptions and let us concentrate at the work that is at hand; getting the sum of all knowledge in good order for us to serve it to whoever is in need of knowledge.
Thanks,
        GerardM