Comment by lien | Hacker News Reader

Comment by lien | Hacker News Reader

Wikipedia is an interesting place. I am not sure what classifies articles for deletion, but it feels like only people who live in the Internet industry take part in actively running and editing the articles. I don't think of it as a male dominant community (even though I am female), but it feels like to me that only for people who are only care about stuff they know. It feels more like a closed minded community than having a woman problem.

My previous company was a chip and Wi-Fi module startup (ZeroG Wireless). I had requested our company name to be created around 2009. At that point, we had been around for 4 years and we had taken $30m in funding. However, we were never granted a section on Wikipedia.

On the other hand, plenty of internet companies who were around than launch much shorter than that and their names are currently on Wikipedia, for example, Pownce. I am sure that many others are granted a Wikipedia entry for being around less, accomplishing less than what we did. The only difference is that these were Internet startups and ZeroG was not.

Some people simply need to wake up and stop living in their own bubble. Let's hope that one day they can realize that others do care about things that the community doesn't care.

> My previous company was a chip and Wi-Fi module startup (ZeroG Wireless). I had requested our company name to be created around 2009. At that point, we had been around for 4 years and we had taken $30m in funding. However, we were never granted a section on Wikipedia.

There are a lot of ways to get yourself discredited on Wikipedia, but trying to get an article written about yourself, your company, your band, or anything else you are intimately involved in is the most reliable.

I never attempted to write about my company. I submitted a request to have my company created as an entry. You need to have your company name created first before anyone can write about you.

I never said you did attempt to write about your company.

> You need to have your company name created first before anyone can write about you.

No you don't. If you're logged in and you go to a blank page, you can just start writing something there, unless the page has been specifically blocked from page creation because someone keeps putting spam there.

I would say that the combination of not knowing how Wikipedia works, asking other people to do something for you, and on top of that, trying to get an article written about yourself, your company, your band, or anything else you are intimately involved with is a perfect way to get yourself ignored and discredited.

All I did was request my company name to be created. I never attempted to write the article myself.

I didn't find a way of writing on a blank page like you did, the situation may have changed. Well if you did, you're definitely more knowledgeable than me about Wikipedia, but please don't tell me what I did and did not do.

I am OK if Wikipedia deletes my article if it's their policy. My issue is that they did not treat my company the same as the the rest of the world due to own ignorance.

> I am not sure what classifies articles for deletion, but it feels like only people who live in the Internet industry take part in actively running and editing the articles.

In short, someone who knows enough about Wikipedia processes reads it and decides it should be deleted will put it up under the Articles for Deletion.

It's pretty natural that people who are more comfortable with the web will be more comfortable making Wikipedia edits; I've been a small-timer since college (I've made maybe 15 edits in whole). It'd be worthwhile for Wikipedia to make a push towards getting a better representation in their ranks: at the very least, they'd be able to draw on a larger body of knowledge and perspective.

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