View source for Research:Productive new editor

{{Metric infobox
 | name = Productive new editor
 | filename = Wiki_metrics.productive_new_editor.svg
 | measures = [[R:Editor productivity|Editor productivity]]
 | specification = {{/spec}}
 | wmf-standard = {{/Standard}}
 | aliases = [[R:Productive newcomer|Productive newcomer]]
 | related-metrics = [[Research:Newly registered user|Newly registered user]] • [[Research:New editor|New editor]] • [[Research:Productive edit|Productive edit]]
 | status = completed
 | repository = Demo: [https://github.com/halfak/Productive-new-editor-demonstration https://github.com/halfak/Productive-new-editor-demonstration]
}}
'''Productive new editor''' is a [[R:Standardized_user_classes|standardized user class]] used to measure the number of first-time editors in a wiki project over time who make [[R:Productive edit|productive contributions]].  It's used as a proxy for [[R:editor productivity|editor productivity]], and to a lesser extent, [[R:editor activation|editor activation]].  A "productive new editor" is a [[R:new editor|new editor]] who saves revisions to [[R:content namespace|content namespace]] pages that are not [[R:revert|revert]]ed.

== Discussion == 

=== Excluding edits to deleted content === 
Spammers and other non-productive new editors tend to create articles that are non-productive and those articles tend to be deleted rather than the edits to the articles being reverted (and therefore excluding them from the [[R:productive edit|productive edit]] criteria).  Edits to articles that are deleted by the end of a new editor's first week since registration are ''not'' included in counts of productive edits.

=== The '''''n''''' productive edits threshold ===
Like choosing an <math>n</math> for any metric based on counts (e.g. [[R:new editor|new editor]] and [[R:active editor|active editor]]), choosing a threshold is somewhat arbitrary.  Choosing a higher threshold will result in a smaller proportion of [[R:newly registered user|newly registered user]]s being considered productive.

=== The '''''t''''' time cutoff ===
There are a few ways that the timespan for identifying productive edits can be drawn. The two most common ways are based on time bounds and events. A time-bounded approach is based on the use of some <math>t</math> cutoff to limit observations to a certain amount of time after a user registered their account.  An event-based approach will use some event as the starting point to count user contributions. Another candidate time-span includes edits that a newcomer performed in their first [[R:edit session|edit session]].  Since ''productive new editor'' qualifies the activity of a [[Research:New editor|new editor]] we set <math>t = 1\text{ day}</math>, which effectively makes the class of productive new editors a proper subset of new editors. We analyze the effect of choosing a different value for <math>t</math> below.

=== Time to revert cutoff ===
Because a revert can theoretically occur years after the original edit, r
[[en:Censoring_(statistics)]]
everts are only counted if they occurred within 48 hours of the original edit. For more details, see [[Research:Revert|Research:Revert#Time to revert cutoff]].

=== Limitations === 
* This metric represents productivity as a binary attribute of a user, it does not measure ''how productive'' a new editor is.  New editors who make many productive edits and contribute substantial amounts of content will look identical (under this metric) to new editors who fix a few typos.
* The most clever vandalism/vandals may go unnoticed for more than 48 hours.

=== Lag time ===
Generation of this metric will need to be delayed by <math>t + 2 \text{ days}</math> after users' registration dates in order to allow <math>t \text{ days}</math> days for newly registered users to make edits and an additional <math>2 \text{ days}</math> for other editors to have a chance to revert them.  In the case of the WMF Standard parameterization, this works out to <math>1 + 2 = 3 \text{ days}</math>.

== Analysis ==
Besides the variables describing a [[R:productive edit|productive edit]], there are two variables used in this metric:
* The value of <math>n</math>
* The value of <math>t</math>

Given that the raw number of '''productive new editors''' is highly dependent on the raw number of [[R:new editor|new editor]]s, this metric is best examined as a proportion.  Given that identifying reverts is computationally difficult, the following plots were generated by randomly sampling [[R:newly registered user|newly registered user]]s stratified by registration month.

=== German Wikipedia === 
<center>
{{inline figure
 | filename = Monthly.productive_new_editors.per_new_editor.dewiki.svg
 | size = 350px
 | id = Productive new editors per [[R:new editor|new editor]]
 | caption = The proportion of productive new editors is plotted by registration month for two values of <math>t</math>.
}}
{{inline figure
 | filename = Monthly.productive_new_editors.per_newly_registered_user.dewiki.svg
 | size = 350px
 | id = Productive new editors per [[R:newly registered user|newly registered user]]
 | caption = The proportion of productive new editors is plotted by registration month for two values of <math>t</math>.
}}
</center>

=== English Wikipedia === 
<center>
{{inline figure
 | filename = Monthly.productive_new_editors.per_new_editor.enwiki.svg
 | size = 350px
 | id = Productive new editors per [[R:new editor|new editor]]
 | caption = The proportion of productive new editors is plotted by registration month for two values of <math>t</math>.
}}
{{inline figure
 | filename = Monthly.productive_new_editors.per_newly_registered_user.enwiki.svg
 | size = 350px
 | id = Productive new editors per [[R:newly registered user|newly registered user]]
 | caption = The proportion of productive new editors is plotted by registration month for two values of <math>t</math>.
}}
</center>

=== Spanish Wikipedia === 
<center>
{{inline figure
 | filename = Monthly.productive_new_editors.per_new_editor.eswiki.svg
 | size = 350px
 | id = Productive new editors per [[R:new editor|new editor]]
 | caption = The proportion of productive new editors is plotted by registration month for two values of <math>t</math>.
}}
{{inline figure
 | filename = Monthly.productive_new_editors.per_newly_registered_user.eswiki.svg
 | size = 350px
 | id = Productive new editors per [[R:newly registered user|newly registered user]]
 | caption = The proportion of productive new editors is plotted by registration month for two values of <math>t</math>.
}}
</center>



=== French Wikipedia === 
<center>
{{inline figure
 | filename = Monthly.productive_new_editors.per_new_editor.frwiki.svg
 | size = 350px
 | id = Productive new editors per [[R:new editor|new editor]]
 | caption = The proportion of productive new editors is plotted by registration month for two values of <math>t</math>.
}}
{{inline figure
 | filename = Monthly.productive_new_editors.per_newly_registered_user.frwiki.svg
 | size = 350px
 | id = Productive new editors per [[R:newly registered user|newly registered user]]
 | caption = The proportion of productive new editors is plotted by registration month for two values of <math>t</math>.
}}
</center>

=== Polish Wikipedia === 
<center>
{{inline figure
 | filename = Monthly.productive_new_editors.per_new_editor.plwiki.svg
 | size = 350px
 | id = Productive new editors per [[R:new editor|new editor]]
 | caption = The proportion of productive new editors is plotted by registration month for two values of <math>t</math>.
}}
{{inline figure
 | filename = Monthly.productive_new_editors.per_newly_registered_user.plwiki.svg
 | size = 350px
 | id = Productive new editors per [[R:newly registered user|newly registered user]]
 | caption = The proportion of productive new editors is plotted by registration month for two values of <math>t</math>.
}}
</center>

=== Portuguese Wikipedia === 
<center>
{{inline figure
 | filename = Monthly.productive_new_editors.per_new_editor.ptwiki.svg
 | size = 350px
 | id = Productive new editors per [[R:new editor|new editor]]
 | caption = The proportion of productive new editors is plotted by registration month for two values of <math>t</math>.
}}
{{inline figure
 | filename = Monthly.productive_new_editors.per_newly_registered_user.ptwiki.svg
 | size = 350px
 | id = Productive new editors per [[R:newly registered user|newly registered user]]
 | caption = The proportion of productive new editors is plotted by registration month for two values of <math>t</math>.
}}
</center>

=== Factor comparison of '''''n''''' and '''''t''''' ===
<center>
{{inline figure
 | filename = Monthly.productive_new_editors.n_factor.svg
 | size = 450px
 | id = Factor of '''''n'''''
 | caption = The factor of difference between proportions of productive new editors for different values of <math>n</math> is plotted.
}}
{{inline figure
 | filename = Monthly.productive_new_editors.t_factor.2.svg
 | size = 450px
 | id = Factor of '''''t'''''
 | caption = The factor of difference between proportions of productive new editors for different values of <math>t</math> is plotted.
}}
</center>

== Usage ==
User interface experiments at the Wikimedia Foundation apply the productive new editor metric across an entire [[:w:Cohort (statistics)|cohort]] to generate the [[R:productive newcomer proportion|productive newcomer proportion]].  For example, in an A/B test, we might compare the proportion of productive new editors in a control group to a test group.  This allows us to have a very basic understanding of whether the A/B test led to more new editors making productive contributions.

See the following research reports for examples of this type of usage:
* [[Research:Article feedback/Stage 3/Conversion and newcomer quality|Article feedback/Stage 3/Conversion and newcomer quality]]
* [[Research:VisualEditor's effect on newly registered_editors/Results|VisualEditor's effect on newly registered_editors/Results]]
* [[Research:Onboarding new Wikipedians/OB6|Onboarding new Wikipedians/OB6]]

== References == 
<references />