View source for Connecting Every Bit of Knowledge: the Structure of Wikipedia’s First Link Network

{{Infobox work
| title = Connecting Every Bit of Knowledge: the Structure of Wikipedia’s First Link Network
| date = 2017
| authors = [[Mark Ibrahim]]<br />[[Christopher M. Danforth]]<br />[[Peter Sheridan Dodds]]
| doi = 10.1016/j.jocs.2016.12.001
| link = http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1877750316304471
| plink = https://www.arxiv.org/pdf/1605.00309v2
}}
'''Connecting Every Bit of Knowledge: the Structure of Wikipedia’s First Link Network''' - scientific work related to [[Wikipedia quality]] published in 2017, written by [[Mark Ibrahim]], [[Christopher M. Danforth]] and [[Peter Sheridan Dodds]].

== Overview ==
Abstract Apples, porcupines, and the most obscure Bob Dylan song—is every topic a few clicks from Philosophy? Within [[Wikipedia]], the surprising answer is yes: nearly all paths lead to Philosophy. Wikipedia is the largest, most meticulously indexed collection of human knowledge ever amassed. More than information about a topic, Wikipedia is a web of naturally emerging relationships. By following the first link in each article, authors algorithmically construct a directed network of all 4.7 million articles: Wikipedia's First Link Network. Here, authors study the English edition of Wikipedia's First Link Network for insight into how the many articles on inventions, places, people, objects, and events are related and organized. By traversing every path, authors measure the accumulation of first links, path lengths, groups of path-connected articles, and cycles. Authors also develop a new method, traversal funnels, to measure the influence each article exerts in shaping the network. Traversal funnels provide a new measure of influence for directed networks without spill-over into cycles, in contrast to traditional network centrality [[measures]]. Within Wikipedia's First Link Network, authors find scale-free distributions describe path length, accumulation, and influence. Far from dispersed, first links disproportionately accumulate at a few articles—flowing from specific to general and culminating around fundamental notions such as Community, State, and Science. Philosophy directs more paths than any other article by two orders of magnitude. Authors also observe a gravitation toward topical articles such as Health Care and Fossil Fuel. These findings enrich view of the connections and structure of Wikipedia's ever growing store of knowledge.