Contributing to the Internet

Since our discussion about contributing to and correcting things we find on the internet, my experiences while using sites such as Wikipedia, Yelp, and Reddit have been quite different. Even though all three of these sites thrive on the contributions of their readers, I never felt the need to add anything; I assumed that anything I would be able to contribute, someone else with more authority or knowledge would just add later. However, this logic is pretty flawed. If I feel this way about the impact I could have on what’s available on the internet, or lack thereof, then odds are a majority of other internet users feel the same way. But then I started thinking, why shouldn’t I post about the experience I had at a restaurant on Yelp or give my opinion on a question posted on Reddit? I take advantage of the experiences that other internet users post all the time, so I really should give back to these communities by sharing what I have to offer.

Taking this class and talking about information aggregation on the internet was the push I needed to contribute to consumer based internet sites, but what makes other people? I asked all of my roommates if they had ever edited a Wikipedia page or posted a review on Yelp and out of the four of them, only one had posted something on Yelp, and the only reason she did was because it was a horrible experience. Instead of only posting a review when I have a really good or really bad experience, from now on I want to try and review as many places that I can. By contributing to information sources, such as Yelp, I am able to increase the information available to a larger network that can then use the information to aid in the decision making process. And hopefully, as more people use these types of sites, they will feel compelled to contribute, just like I did.