Wikipedia and World Wide Argument Web (DERI meeting 2010-12-03)

Constructing knowledge through argument: Wikipedia and World Wide Argument Web
Jodi Schneider, Alexandre Passant, John Breslin
DERI Meeting
2010-12-03
Galway, Ireland

Outline
The Vision
Research Progress
Future Plans
2

World Wide Web & Argument
3

World Wide Argument Web (WWAW)
4
What if instead of following mailing lists, blogs, online magazines, scientific journals…
You could follow ARGUMENTS?
Who is arguing about this topic? Or product? Or idea?
Is their view positive or negative?
Are their ideas credible?
Are they trustworthy? Do people I trust, trust them?
What arguments are they making?

Arguments on Wikipedia
5

Wikipedians argue on Talk pages
6

7
Digital Enterprise Research Institute
www.deri.ie
Talk pages need semantics
Lots of conversations
Viégas: “the fastest growing areas of Wikipedia are devoted to coordination and organization”
When are people agreeing/disagreeing?
Not well understood!
Very little study of Talk pages
Largest study: 60 pages, 2 types. Discovered: Featured Articles have10x discussion!
Immense variation between pages
Data from Stvilia
7

My Research Questions
8
What do Wikipediansdo on Talk pages?
What kind of arguments happen on Talk pages?
Can we add structure to make pages “fit” how editors and readers use them?

Three ways of understanding Talk pages
9
Interviews with editors and administrators
What do Wikipediansdo on Talk pages?
Hand content analysis of 100 Talk pages
What kind of arguments happen on Talk pages?
A semantic annotation infrastructure
Can we add structure to make pages “fit” how editors and readers use them?

1. Interviews
10
Administrators
Frequently monitor conversations
Know + meet co-editors
Make community-related edits such as adding infoboxes
More likely to move/rename articles and Talk pages
Editors
Mostly read Talk pages
“Get the scoop”—what’s controversial? More details?
More likely to read older conversations
May learn policy and procedures

2. Content Analysis
11
100 Talk pages
5 categories of pages
Most editors (of the article)
Most visits (to the article)
Controversial
Featured Articles
Random
15 classifications

12
www.deri.ie
Classification Examples
12

Our SIOC WikiTalk ontology
WikiDiscussionItem
ReferenceItem
ReferenceToEdit
ReferenceToGuidelinesOrPolicies
ReferenceToInternalResources
ReferenceToRevertsOrControversialOrRemovedMaterial
ReferenceToVandalism
RequestItem
RequestEditingCoordination
RequestHelpElsewhere
RequestInfo
RequestPeer-review
http://rdfs.org/sioc/wikitalk

3. Semantic markup for Talk pages
Develop a content-based semantic model
Hand markup Wikipedia Talk pages with RDFa
Query to find comments meeting specified criteria
JavaScript and SPARQL
Formative evaluations
Browsing talk pages with & without highlight plugins to identify particular comments
15

Structuring Talk Pages: Semantics
Reusing existing models (FOAF/SIOC)
Article: sioct:WikiArticle
Link article to the Talk page: sioc:has_discussion
Discussions: sioc:Thread
Individual comments: sioc:Post
Commenter: foaf:Person / sioc:UserAccount
New elements from the previous categorization
http://rdfs.org/sioc/wikitalk
Focus on references and requests:
Difficult to imagine people marking their own comment as off-topic; however, labeling “request for help” is plausible
Relevant for querying and retrieving information

17
www.deri.ie
Example RDFa markup
17

Using the markup: JavaScript bookmarklets
18
Highlight posts based on the ontology class – e.g. ReferenceToEdit

Retrieve RequestInfo posts in WikiProject Computing
SELECT ?commment ?page
WHERE
{
?page sioc:links_to <http://en.wikipedia.org/ wiki/ Template:WikiProject_Computing > .
?comment sioc:has_container ?page ;
a sioc:Post ; a siocwt:RequestInfo .
}
19

Retrieve posts by novices which have no replies
SELECT ?comment ?reply ?user ?name
WHERE
{
?comment a sioc:Post ; sioc:has_creator ?user .
OPTIONAL { ?user sioc:name ?name . }
OPTIONAL { ?comment sioc:has_reply ?reply . }
FILTER (!BOUND(?name)) FILTER (!BOUND(?reply))
}
20

Back to the World Wide Argument Web
21

Arguing all over the Web
Wikipedia is not the only place people argue.
Research questions:
What related arguments are there?
What new arguments that I haven’t seen are there?
Should I believe this argument?
22

Arguments at BBC’s Have Your Say
A simple argument:
“Banning new drivers from driving at night would be a knee-jerk reaction to a particular statistic.
Cars differ from public transport in that you can go anywhere at any time so why take this
advantage away?”
23

Analysis
The simplest argument:
<claim, reason>
Claim:
Banning new drivers from driving at night would be a knee-jerk reaction
Reason:
With a car you can go anywhere at any time
Incomplete!
24

Exampleat BBC’s Have Your Say
A Case:“I think the proposed restrictions on young drivers are completely unrealistic and unfair. When I was 18 and bought my first car I was studying for my A-levels during the day and therefore needed to work in the evenings to earn my own money and pay for the upkeep of my car. I finished work between 11pm and midnight. If these restrictions had been in place I would have had three options: 1-give up my job (I think we can all agree that the current government is aiming to encourage more people to work and take pride in earning their own money, not rely on state handouts or their parents. 2 - Walk home alone in the dark (clearly this is not a sensible option either for obvious reasons) 3 - demand my parents pick me up and drop me off to work each night (this is also unreasonable as many young people cannot rely on their parents for many reasons e.g. if their parents are also working late or cannot drive).”
25

WWAW-related questions
What’s possible now?
What can the Social Web and Social Semantic Web contribute?
How can we make the WWAW as easy to use as Web2.0 tools?
26

Parts of the WWAW exist
27
An interchange format
Argument Interchange Format
Argument schemes
‘Argument from Position to Know’, ‘Argument from Expertise’, …
Argument-related ontologies
IBIS, ScholOnto, SWAN/SIOC, …
Prototype interfaces
Argument blogging, Arvina, MAgtALO, …
RDF and OWL-based systems
Avicenna, ArgDF

Argument blogging (AIF+DGDL)
28
Source: Wells, Gourlay, & Reed, “Argument blogging,” CMNA 2009

Generate argument maps from conversations (Arvina, MAgtALO)
29
Snaith, Lawrence, & Reed, “Mixed initiative argument in public deliberation,”ODET 2010

Collating blog comments
Collation & querying across the Web
30
Sindice SIOC plugin for WordPress blogs: did a commenter post on other websites?

Challenge: Adapt for the Social!
People don’t want to classify their comments.
Many assumptions are implicit.
“Don’t make me think!”
Not all arguments are equally effective—and not everyone is susceptible to the same arguments!
31

Social Semantic Web
32

Social Semantic Web research
Trust & credibility layer
Golbeck, Computing with Social Trust, Springer 2008
Hartig, Querying Trust in RDF Data with tSPARQL, ESWC 2009
33
http://www.w3.org/2007/03/layerCake.svg

Summary
We can increase the effectiveness of Wikipedia Talk pages by understanding how they are used
We add semantic structure to Wikipedia Talk pages which can be used to extract socially useful info
The World Wide Argument Web is an exciting research area with an existing infrastructure and a need for Social Semantic Web expertise
34

Thank You!
35
Questions & Comments?
Contact:
jodi.schneider@deri.org

Our Wikipedia-Related Research
“Understanding and Improving Wikipedia Article Discussion Spaces.” In SAC 2011 (Web Track), TaiChung, Taiwan, March 21-25, 2011.
“Enhancing MediaWiki Talk pages with Semantics for Better Coordination - A Proposal.” In The Fifth Workshop on Semantic Wikis: Linking Data and People Workshop at 7th Extended Semantic Web Conference (ESWC), Crete, Greece, May 31, 2010.
“A Content Analysis: How Wikipedia Talk Pages Are Used.” In WebSci2010, Web Science Conference. Raleigh, NC,April 26 & 27 2010.
36

References
Stvilia,Twidale, Smith & Gasser, "Information Quality Work Organization in Wikipedia," JASIST 2008. doi: 10.1002/asi.2081
Viégas, Wattenberg, Kriss & Ham, "Talk Before You Type: Coordination in Wikipedia," HICSS 2007. doi: 10.1109/HICSS.2007.511
Rahwan,Zablith & Reed, “Laying the foundations for a World Wide Argument Web,” Artificial Intelligence 2007.doi: 10.1016/j.artint.2007.04.015
Walton, Reed & Macagno, Argumentation Schemes.
37

Further image credits
Slide 3
The WWW 2003-11-23 http://www.opte.org/maps/
Argument – author unknown – via via http://blog.pappastax.com/index.php/2009/11/23/seth-godin-on-online-arguments/
Slide 4
Wikipedia logo
Slide 31
http://www.cafepress.com/+ask_dad_magnet,55304381
Talk pages screenshots from
http://en.wikipedia.org/Talk: {articlename}
3838

Most popular (article visits)
Common pattern for Featured Articles, controversial articles, too.

http://jodischneider.com	125
http://whap.weebly.com	2
http://www.multisoft.com	1
http://grupologin.com.br	1
http://www.slideshare.net	1
http://www.ewavemd.com	1
http://devnology.nl	1
http://jujo00obo2o234ungd3t8qjfcjrs3o6k-a-sites-opensocial.googleusercontent.com	1
http://www.govloop.com	1
http://drizzlin.com	1
http://www.google.com	1

Wikipedia and World Wide Argument Web (DERI meeting 2010-12-03)

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