Jack+Johnson+Discussion

1. There have been over 1,500 revisions made to this page from the time it was first created on August 15, 2002 to November 2, 2010. There weren't a lot of revisions to begin with on the page in either 2002 or 2003, but from 2004 on there has been a steady influx of revisions made on the page, with a few surges in January 2005 and all of 2009, specifically the months of January and February. This page was viewed 25,488 in October 2010 alone.

2. The original post had quite a bit of information but lacked any and all use of format or organization; it was simply a bulleted list of facts, with some likely untrue statements as well. It wasn't until July of 2004 that the original categories of Early Life, Controversy, Later Days, and Legacy were added to the page. Soon after that, in January 2005, there was a surge of information backed by a number of references and external links to other pages. In the summer of 2005 new categories were added including, pop culture (references to the Boxer in pop culture today), quotes, and other interests. Over the past five years, categories have been added and subtracted including jail time, information about a specific fight known as "The Fight of the Century", and his invention created in prison. In January 2010, a chart was made showing Jack Johnson's entire career, including who he fought, where they were from, whether he won, how he won, and any titles that came from the fight. Since that revision, there have been only small grammatical changes, and small additions to personal life and pop culture references as they arise.

3. The quality of the writing has improved greatly since its creation in 2002. The writing is well done, with little to no grammatical mistakes and gives information in a scholarly, and yet easy narrative way. I found it interesting that contributors would use "Johnson" to refer to the boxer in the text, but no one used only his first name, "Jack". There are plenty of reliable references used to back up the factual information used in the article, which includes books, internet sources, and multi-media sources like film. Overall, the writing seems to be somewhat neutral and unbiased, and any writing showing opinion, seems to be overwhelming general opinions that are not offensive or entirely inaccurate.

4. The discussion surrounding this article was very interesting to me, due not only to the subject of discussion but also the range of topics being discussed. One of the biggest themes that seems to be shown in many of the discussions is that of race. Jack Johnson was a major element to African-Americans in professional sports, and was imprisoned, seemingly because of his race. There are discussions on a posthumous pardon for him as well as discussions of concern on the necessity of racial overtones to the article. There were also discussions that led to the addition to new and helpful information. I did not see any discussions that became heated, all seem to have been discussed logically and dealt with quickly.

5. There are two very active contributors to the Jack Johnson page, with the usernames of Cgingold and Quadell. They have each made over 20 contributions or changes to the article since 2007 and 2005 respectively. When I tried to look for information on Cgingold, his/her user page said that due to personal issues, Cgingold would not be on Wikipedia for an indefinite period of time. Quadell on the other hand, had plenty of information about his presence on Wikipedia. He writes that he loves Wikipedia and works to have every contribution neutral, free, and reliable. He has been a user on Wikipedia for 6 and a half years, and an administrator for 6 years, 3 months. He has made over 100,000 contributions to Wikipedia and is ranked number 89th of active Wikipedians.