The profiles of many of the greatest women in history are to be updated on Wikipedia, as the Royal Society hosts what it dubs an ‘edit-a-thon’.
Part of the Royal Society’s annual celebrations of the legacy of Ada Lovelace, the pages to be updated will include some of the most prominent women in engineering and technology.
Ada Lovelace worked with Charles Babbage, the founding father of the modern day computer in many people’s eyes.
Whilst no final list of the profiles to be updated has yet been released, there are many under consideration.
The drive is aimed at promoting the visibility of women throughout history.
Choosing Wikipedia to promote their role is a sensible move. As many working in SEO will know, the natural relevance of the pages makes them always rank well in searches.
The success of Wikipedia in the search engines is one of the reasons for the drive, with RS fellow Uta Frith asking a BBC reporter:
“Can you immediately come up with a handful of names of female staff in technology? Is that because there aren’t any or because they’re sort of invisible?
“It’s a catch-22 – if you can’t find them easily in a place like Wikipedia, you won’t know anything about them. You’ll think they are not important.”
The UCL cognitive development professor went on to say:
“I hope this event will be the start of many more, where we can also improve the visibility of living female scientists.”
The event takes place on 19th October.
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