Discussions/Submissions/What is Wikipedia's role in breaking news?

Title: What is Wikipedia's role in breaking news?
Proposed by: Joe Sutherland (foxj)
Description: As Wikipedia grows larger and covers more and more topics, increasingly its coverage of breaking news events has become more comprehensive and, in many cases, outpaces mainstream media. We'll discuss the consequences of these developments, and what this means for Wikipedia as an encyclopedia based on verification but which allows for real-time editing.
Purpose: To discuss how verifiability of information conflicts with real-time updating of information in breaking news situations, and to take a closer look at some case studies of recent events.
Targeted participants: Those interested in the media and breaking news coverage, and how it is handled through the eyes of an encyclopedia.
Preparatory readings or materials:
- Ford, H.: Infoboxes and Cleanup Tags: Artifacts of Wikipedia Newsmaking.
- Keegan, B., Gergle, D. and Contractor, N.: Hot Off the Wiki: Structures and Dynamics of Wikipedia’s Coverage of Breaking News Events.
- Keegan, B.: The news on Wikipedia in 2014.
- Sutherland, J.: How Wikipedia responds to breaking news.

Hi Joe, thank you for your proposal. Can you expand on what the purpose of this discussion is? Thanks, --Gnom (talk) 14:29, 16 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]

While the topic needs more work on defining a good scope, I like the theme and the direction. It is also one of the few 'editorial' discussions. Effeietsanders (talk) 14:21, 8 May 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Hi Gnom and Effeietsanders. Apologies for the delay. I think it's looking less likely that I will actually be able to chair this particular discussion, but the purpose of it would be to better understand Wikipedia's changing role in news coverage, and how the community collaborates on the writing of these articles. I think this is more of a "mass-collaboration" in general discussion than one specific to Wikipedia. Foxj (talk) 17:28, 19 May 2016 (UTC)[reply]
@Foxj: We used your submission as inspiration for this discussion topic: The balance of references and footnotes: How far to go for optimal quality. Hope you'll join! Effeietsanders (talk) 13:51, 28 May 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Amazing - I'll try to make it there! I'll definitely be at the conference. :) Foxj (talk) 14:25, 28 May 2016 (UTC)[reply]