Editing patterns

The table below shows the editing patterns of a number of Wikipedia editors, illustrating the variety in which editors use the different 'spaces' (article, user, policy) of Wikipedia. The most recent 5,000 edits of each editor were selected, and categorised as follows.

• edits to the type of Wikipedia page broadly associated with adding or building ‘content’, namely the pages and talk pages of articles, templates, categories and portals (‘A’).
• edits to the the type associated with social interaction in Wikipedia, namely the pages and talk pages of Wikipedia editors themselves (‘U’).
• edits to the type of page broadly associated with the policy, politics and governance of Wikipedia, whose pages and talk pages are prefixed by ‘Wikipedia:’ (‘W’).

We calculated the total number of edits in each category, and the maximum number of edits to any single page in each category. In the table, columns 2-4 show the maximum edits per page, by category. For example, the editor ‘Wehwalt’ has a maximum of 630 edits to a single article page, WOSlinker only 3. The editor known as Georgewilliamherbert has 1,156 edits to a single ‘Wikipedia’ page, user edward none to any Wikipedia page.

Columns 5-7 show the total number of edits by category. Column 8 shows the sum of columns 5-7 as a completeness check (this does not always total 5,000, due to edits that could not be categorised). Column 9 shows the ratio of edits in article space to edits in user space

A high maximum number means the editor has focused on a particular page. The number is most meaningful in article space. A high maximum probably signifies a content creator. Content creators typically make many edits to one article, doing many different kinds of edit (re-arranging paragraphs, adding words, deleting words). A low maximum usually means a 'Wiki gnome' of some kind. Gnomes go from article to article fixing a single problem in each (changing single-spaced hyphen to double-spaced, changing 'teh' to 'the' and so on. High maximum numbers in the 'Wikipedia' space often (though not invariably) mean that the editor is a frequent visitor to the Wikipedia administrators noticeboard.

User	A max	U max	W max	A total	U total	W total	Total total	A/U ratio
Wehwalt	630	273	124	3090	1101	735	4926	2.81
COGDEN	586	123	97	3959	614	398	4971	6.45
Nev1	451	103	22	4537	297	157	4991	15.28
Ceoil	376	522	34	3465	1389	128	4982	2.49
Karanacs	361	305	137	2324	1408	1266	4998	1.65
Bishonen	342	911	293	1535	2402	1058	4995	0.64
ErrantX	319	291	251	2822	1227	946	4995	2.30
Andonic	315	61	366	2423	1690	879	4992	1.43
SlimVirgin	305	217	258	3228	583	1181	4992	5.54
Moni3	299	399	42	3038	1663	290	4991	1.83
Mifter	281	108	115	2289	2212	497	4998	1.03
Slrubenstein	278	52	204	3199	847	931	4977	3.78
Victuallers	268	60	115	3742	796	460	4998	4.70
HJ Mitchell	264	411	268	2107	1845	1045	4997	1.14
Ealdgyth	261	175	17	3961	742	244	4947	5.34
Malleus Fatuorum	256	439	78	3465	993	524	4982	3.49
Jayen466	209	168	153	2778	817	1375	4970	3.40
GiacomoReturned	202	727	148	1397	2657	732	4786	0.53
Tznkai	187	297	290	750	1406	2843	4999	0.53
Kirill Lokshin	169	131	273	1070	329	3587	4986	3.25
Johnbod	141	142	51	3794	460	731	4985	8.25
Marine 69-71	138	750	16	3132	1807	47	4986	1.73
The Cunctator	116	74	167	3865	420	638	4923	9.20
SGGH	92	149	844	2326	1241	1415	4982	1.87
FT2	75	280	138	1669	941	2372	4982	1.77
Beeblebrox	70	231	154	1791	1443	1765	4999	1.24
MuZemike	66	213	213	1701	1846	1453	5000	0.92
David Gerard	66	145	35	4251	326	375	4952	13.04
Alansohn	64	19	4	4582	344	74	5000	13.32
Wetman	61	68	139	4470	348	176	4994	12.84
Baseball Bugs	55	331	807	860	1197	2894	4951	0.72
Geni	54	38	50	3433	766	790	4989	4.48
Calmer Waters	45	97	44	3339	1443	216	4998	2.31
Tiptoety	38	325	154	874	2207	1919	5000	0.40
Smalljim	34	45	24	3147	1741	111	4999	1.81
JaGa	32	34	29	4726	89	185	5000	53.10
Risker	28	418	181	1318	1487	2190	4995	0.89
Roger Davies	28	259	221	1441	864	2689	4994	1.67
Sandstein	27	427	106	1875	1046	2071	4992	1.79
Neelix	27	29	104	4509	237	229	4975	19.03
AGK	25	617	221	706	2043	2241	4990	0.35
Georgewilliamherbert	24	316	1156	1073	2079	1848	5000	0.52
Fram	24	86	46	4155	451	394	5000	9.21
Tnxman307	23	244	244	1198	2149	1650	4997	0.56
The wub	22	44	82	2569	2232	196	4997	1.15
Xezbeth	20	2	1	4969	20	7	4996	248.45
Andres	19	26	5	4934	41	15	4990	120.34
Orangemike	16	177	136	2216	1835	946	4997	1.21
Coren	14	749	198	275	1732	2992	4999	0.16
Billinghurst	14	65	21	4416	368	205	4989	12.00
WOSlinker	12	23	7	3747	1117	129	4993	3.35
Arjun01	11	195	194	2093	2310	594	4997	0.91
Merovingian	11	21	2	4957	41	2	5000	120.90
JohnCD	10	258	244	1060	3141	798	4999	0.34
Snowolf	9	37	20	3186	1693	113	4992	1.88
Timotheus Canens	8	339	458	973	1329	2693	4995	0.73
Hersfold	7	510	72	768	2916	1306	4990	0.26
Wknight94	7	16	3	2577	2411	10	4998	1.07
Courcelles	6	17	11	4750	46	203	4999	103.26
edward	4	18	0	4975	25	0	5000	199.00
J04n	4	6	3	4964	16	19	4999	310.25
Gaius Cornelius	3	1	2	4990	7	3	5000	712.86