Writing the Revolution

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Foreword by Ethan Zuckerman

Advance praise:

“With a refreshing narrative style, Ford pulls you into the action of fact creation on Wikipedia and shows like no one else what is at stake in doing so. A new benchmark for Wikipedia research.”

Nathaniel Tkacz, Reader, University of Warwick; author of Wikipedia and the Politics of Openness

Writing the Revolution is a ground-breaking study of contemporary digital historiography. Written with immense critical flair, this book invites us to think about how great and minor events of our age are being framed.”

Stephen Coleman, Professor of Political Communication, University of Leeds

“This book powerfully shows how social, economic, and political facts are forged in the knowledge factory of Wikipedia. It is impossible to understand how histories are made in the contemporary world without letting Ford take you on this fascinating journey.”

Mark Graham, Professor of Internet Geography, University of Oxford

Reviews:

Wikipedia Signpost, Andreas Kolbe (2022, 28 November): “Ford’s Writing the Revolution provides a more clear-eyed explanation of what Wikipedia is, who Wikipedians are, and why it matters, than any other book published to date. It reveals a profoundly human project – full of human talent and human flaws – as well as a writer whose own humanity shines through in the way she relates the stories of the Wikipedians involved.”

Financial Times, Becky Hogge (2022, 4 November): “Ford’s writing is highly engaging. Her tenderness for the Wikipedians who people her story means that she never condemns them, even as she questions how their motives fit within Wikipedia policy. As a piece of ethnography, the book should sit alongside Georgina Born’s 2004 study of the BBC, Uncertain Vision, a work, like this one, that looks behind the curtain and reveals the recognisably human and fallible activity powering a great cultural institution.”

LibraryJournal, Karen Bordonaro (2022, 1 November): “Ford pushes readers to more deeply understand how pieces of information become accepted, often unquestioned facts online and issues a call to promote data literacy. Highly recommended.”

Extras:

Shaping History: Why I spent 10 years studying one Wikipedia article” (2022, November 25), Friday essay for The Conversation

5 key insights from Writing the Revolution” (2023, February 15), Next Big Idea Club Magazine.

Lists:

Nominee: Season 19 of the Next Big Idea Club (2022)

Radical Reads, 2022, History Workshop

Interviews:

New Books Network podcast (2022, December 21) Interview with Jen Hoyer, New Books Network.

Can we trust Wikipedia? How to nurture truth in the Digital Age Heather Ford in conversation with Andrew Keen (2022, November 21) Keen On.

A Kenyan Superhero vs Wikipedia (2022, September 21) Think Digital Futures, 2SER Radio.

Wikipedia the Last Bastion of Truth Online (2021, December 21) Reimagining the Internet (podcast).

Book launches/talks:

17 November, 2022: Book launch at the Worlds of Wikipedia Conference, University of Sydney, Camperdown, Sydney, NSW, Australia

2 February, 2023: Book talk for MASTS, USC Annenberg, Los Angeles, with Mike Ananny