This post is taken from an article on the e-intiatives wiki.
Citizens, customers, and stakeholders are increasingly gathering information about your organisation and its services from third parties. One of the most common places to look is Wikipedia (a user-generated encyclopaedia, written by volunteers from around the world, with the goal of providing “every single person on the planet free access to the sum of all human knowledge”). As well as this, if there is an article on your organisation on Wikipedia, it will be one of the largest referrers of traffic to your website. This all means you have a vested interest to ensure the information on Wikipedia about you is up-to-date and accurate. Keep in mind:
99% of Wikipedians do not want to harm or help your brand, nor do they want to provide a platform for you to shamelessly promote yourself or for your critics to shamelessly attack you. They just want a complete, accurate and neutral encyclopedia.
Te Ara’s mutually beneficial relationship with Wikipedia
Superficially, Te Ara, an encyclopaedia run by the Ministry for Culture and Heritage, seems to be a competitor of Wikipedia: they offer the same service. However, unlike consumers of shoes or cars, consumers of information need not (and seldom do) choose one or the other: their produce is complementary and their relationship is mutually beneficial. Wikipedia relies on sites like Te Ara as references for their content, and Te Ara relies on sites like Wikipedia linking to Te Ara as a resource, in turn directing traffic there.
Cooperating with Wikipedians versus storming their castle
In July of 2008, the Te Ara team approached a New Zealand Wikipedia administrator to propose a symbiotic deal: they would add a reference to Te Ara on all correlating articles on Wikipedia. After discussion by the New Zealand Wikipedian community, it was agreed that this was indeed a good idea. An informative user page was created (providing further transparency to any Wikipedians who had missed the original discussion), and links were added.
Key points that made this a smart approach
- Te Ara went to where their customers are, versus sitting back and hoping they’d turn up.
- When uncertain, Te Ara recognised that they were visitors, and asked for guidance.
- Te Ara were completely transparent at all times.
- Te Ara did their best to respect the rules of their hosts.
This can be contrasted to copying and pasting your corporate website content into the Wikipedia article on your organisation for “cross-channel consistency” (ignoring the fact that Wikipedia is not your channel).
I applaud the Te Ara team, who once again displayed a modern and sensible approach to service delivery.
