I’m in Stockholm for the Swedish chapter’s third Wikipedia Academy, and I spent most of today with Swedish journalists.
I was talking with Robert Brännström, Editor-in-Chief of IDG Sweden, about the characteristics that distinguish people who edit Wikipedia from those who only read it. There are lots – I’d say that relative to the average person, Wikipedia editors are geekier, more curious, more introverted, they tend to be smarter, and are perhaps more inclined to be obsessive. But if I had to pick a single characteristic that’s common to all editors, I’d say it’s confidence. All Wikipedia editors share the belief that they know something worth sharing with others.
Robert immediately started laughing, and introduced me to the word wikipetter. It’s derived from the Swedish word viktigpetter, which apparently means something like know-it-all, smarty-pants, smart-ass or “big head.” Wikipetter is apparently in fairly common use among Swedes — a quick search turned up quite a few definitions.
I hesitate to say this, because maybe Swedish Wikipedians consider the word wikipetter insulting. And probably they are tired of hearing about it, considering there have been no fewer than twelve lengthy debates about whether the Swedish Wikipedia should include an article about the Wiki Petter concept. (The outcome, I gather, is always no.) But nonetheless: I think it’s charming that the Swedish people have developed a special word for smarty-pants Wikipedians. If you know of other words like wikipetter, please tell me in the comments.
(By the way the title for this post was taken from a comment here, on this usability consultant’s blog. The Google translation made me laugh: it is “Long live Wikipettrar! (Is not a Wiki Petter self).”)
29 November 2010: I’ve just updated this post to correct the spelling of viktigpetter, which Lennart Guldbrandsson kindly informed me I’d gotten a bit wrong.
The downside of confidence, of course, is over-confidence, which can come across as cockiness or hubris.
Most of the notable political drama in WikiCulture swirls around RfCs (Requests for Comment), ANIs (Administrator Noticeboard Incidents) and CRs (Community Reviews).
These processes are collectively known as “The Spammish Inquisition” (as in “No One Expects the Spammish Inquisition“).
These processes explore the most common tragic character flaw (hamartia), namely hubris.
When in 2009 WMDE elected a new president, I wrote the headline “Who’ll be the King of Know-it-alls?”, but we do not have such a nice word specifically for WP.
[…] intervjuade Sue Gardner. Gardner själv skrev om Calandrella och Wikipedia Academy (och i ett tidigare inlägg om wikipettrar, som jag skrivit om också). Mathias Klang och Kristina Alexanderson brukar lägga […]