On 11/7/10, Michael Peel <em...@mikepeel.net> wrote: > > On 6 Nov 2010, at 20:54, MZMcBride wrote: > >> Liam Wyatt wrote: >>> Whilst I don't support or advocate for Wikimedia projects including >>> advertising, I would like to ask a hypothetical question. Would people's >>> opinions towards ads would be different if google's ads were to be >>> incorporated ONLY on the Search page: >>> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Search in the whitespace on the >>> right. >>> >>> This is by far the most popular individual page >>> http://wikistics.falsikon.de/2009/wikipedia/en/ and ads there would be >>> able >>> to be served in a way that is both relevant to the end-user (based on the >>> term being searched for) and yet without having to "sell out" our article >>> pages. On the other hand it would mean we could no longer say "we have >>> zero >>> ads" and it would create a lot of angry Wikimedians (possibly me >>> included) >>> making the "slippery slope" argument. >> >> Careful there. >> >> A lot of people (and scripts) go through "Special:Search" because it >> follows >> links much better. For example: >> >> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Search?search=mw:MediaWiki works >> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/mw:MediaWiki doesn't work >> >> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Search?search=wikia:un:UN:N works >> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wikia:un:UN:N doesn't work >> >> As far as I'm aware, this is the only reliable way currently (and for the >> past few years) to resolve interwiki prefixes in an automated and accurate >> way. I can't say for sure, but I have a strong feeling that this is the >> reason that "Special:Search" gets so many hits. > > Erm... how many people actually know what an interwiki is? I doubt it's a > significant number. Combine that with how many people would think about of > that particular usage of Special:Search, and I suspect that you're talking > very small numbers. Certainly, I've never thought of that in ~ 5 years of > using Wikipedia.
If Special:Search is being used in automation (and it is; it is a page generator in pywikipediabot), a few people can really bugger up the stats and any assumptions based on them. -- John Vandenberg _______________________________________________ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
