Announcing "Wikipedia in 60 Seconds"

After more than five years (!) of writing this blog, I am pleased to announce that I’ll be launching a new Wikipedia-related publication tomorrow. Don’t worry, The Wikipedian isn’t going anywhere! I’ll keep updating it as often (or not so often) as I always have. But it’s time to try something new—something a little closer to The Wikipedian’s intended mission than this site has evolved to become.

The original idea, as I explained in my first blog post, was to explain Wikipedia to outsiders from the position of someone who was sort of an insider. At this point, I am more of an insider than I’ve ever been, and so the content of this blog tends to focus on various news, events and controversies mostly interesting to Wikipedia regulars but which I suspect might appeal to general readers.

But I think it’s time to return to the insight which inspired me first: for as much as people depend on Wikipedia, its inner-workings are inscrutable to most. One reason is because the rule set is not easy to understand. It takes time, and is best learned one small piece at a time. I didn’t become an expert on Wikipedia overnight, and no one can.

My solution is a brand new newsletter called "Wikipedia in 60 Seconds”—every Wednesday from now until probably forever, I will send out an email explaining just one policy or guideline from Wikipedia, or a concept related to the rules. Because I’m doing this as a project of Beutler Ink, the digital content agency I lead, you’ll have to sign up over there. The first one will be going out around lunchtime tomorrow, and I hope you’ll join us!