The Latvian Wikipedia ( lv, Vikipēdija latviešu valodā ) is the

Latvian-language Latvian ( ), also known as Lettish, is an Eastern Baltic language belonging to the Baltic branch of the Indo-European language family, spoken in the Baltic region. It is the language of Latvians and the official language of Latvia as well as ...

edition of the free online encyclopedia

Wikipedia Wikipedia is a multilingual free online encyclopedia written and maintained by a community of volunteers, known as Wikipedians, through open collaboration and using a wiki-based editing system. Wikipedia is the largest and most-read refer ...

. It was created on 6 June 2003. With more than articles, it is currently the -largest Wikipedia as measured by the number of articles and the second-largest Wikipedia in a

Baltic language The Baltic languages are a branch of the Indo-European language family spoken natively by a population of about 4.5 million people mainly in areas extending east and southeast of the Baltic Sea in Northern Europe. Together with the Slavic lang ...

. As of February 2021, it was the most visited language Wikipedia in

Latvia Latvia ( or ; lv, Latvija ; ltg, Latveja; liv, Leţmō), officially the Republic of Latvia ( lv, Latvijas Republika, links=no, ltg, Latvejas Republika, links=no, liv, Leţmō Vabāmō, links=no), is a country in the Baltic region of ...

. It ranked before the Russian Wikipedia and the

English Wikipedia The English Wikipedia is, along with the Simple English Wikipedia, one of two English-language editions of Wikipedia, an online encyclopedia. It was founded on January 15, 2001, as Wikipedia's first edition, and, as of , has the most arti ...

History

The Latvian Wikipedia was created alongside the Serbian,

Kannada Kannada (; ಕನ್ನಡ, ), originally romanised Canarese, is a Dravidian language spoken predominantly by the people of Karnataka in southwestern India, with minorities in all neighbouring states. It has around 47 million native s ...

, Walloon,

Wolof Wolof or Wollof may refer to: * Wolof people, an ethnic group found in Senegal, Gambia, and Mauritania * Wolof language, a language spoken in Senegal, Gambia, and Mauritania * The Wolof or Jolof Empire, a medieval West African successor of the Mal ...

, and Xhosa Wikipedias. The oldest article is "Psihologija", which was published on 6 June 2003 and redirected to "Psiholoģija" (psychology) on 7 December 2004. The main page was added four months after the first article, on 6 October 2003. The edition's initial growth was slow and some articles about important aspects of Latvian culture were missing at first. The article about

Jāņi Jāņi () is an annual Latvian festival celebrating the summer solstice. Although astronomically the solstice falls on 21 or 22 June, the public holidays—Līgo Day and Jāņi Day—are on 23 and 24 June. The day before Jāņi is known as Līg ...

, for instance, was not written until March 2008. The Latvian Wikipedia's growth rate has been very stable since 2006. On 30 September 2013, the

VisualEditor VisualEditor (VE) is an online rich-text editor for MediaWiki-powered wikis that provides a direct visual way to edit pages based on the "what you see is what you get" principle. It was developed by the Wikimedia Foundation in partnership with ...

was made available to logged-in users, and by 7 October 2013, it was available to all users on the Latvian Wikipedia. The Latvian Wikipedia turned 10 years old on 6 June 2013. A commemorative logo was uploaded for the occasion, and small parties among the community's "Wikiholics" ensued, as it is customary whenever a new milestone is reached. The edition surpassed 50,000 articles on 17 August 2013.

Name and logo

On 22 September 2004, the first Latvian "Wikipēdija" logo was uploaded, and on 1 June 2005, the name was changed to "Vikipēdija". In Latvian media, the words "Wikipedia" and "Vikipēdija" are used interchangeably to refer to both Wikipedia in general and to the Latvian edition specifically, but "Vikipēdija" is more common. In response to the

Zolitūde shopping centre roof collapse On 21 November 2013 the roof of a Maxima shopping centre in the Zolitūde neighbourhood of Riga, Latvia, collapsed at 17:41 local time resulting in the deaths of 54 people, including three rescue workers, and injuries to another 41 people. An u ...

disaster of 21 November 2013, the Latvian Wikipedia, just as several other Latvian websites, changed its logo for three days to include black and the image of a candle.

Related projects

A separate Latgalian Wikipedia ( ltg) was created on 18 March 2011. Latgalian is spoken in

Latgale Latgale ( ltg, Latgola; ; ger, Lettgallen; be, Латгалія, Łathalija; pl, Łatgalia; la, Lettgallia), also known as Latgalia is one of the Historical Latvian Lands. It is the easternmost region and is north of the Daugava River. While m ...

, the eastern part of Latvia, and its

standardized Standardization or standardisation is the process of implementing and developing technical standards based on the consensus of different parties that include firms, users, interest groups, standards organizations and governments. Standardization ...

form is recognized and protected as a variety of Latvian language by Latvian law, although it is debated whether it is a

dialect The term dialect (from Latin , , from the Ancient Greek word , 'discourse', from , 'through' and , 'I speak') can refer to either of two distinctly different types of Linguistics, linguistic phenomena: One usage refers to a variety (linguisti ...

of Latvian or a separate language. Neciklopēdija, the Latvian edition of

Uncyclopedia Uncyclopedia is a satirical online encyclopedia that parodies Wikipedia. Its logo, a hollow "puzzle potato", parodies Wikipedia's globe puzzle logo, and it styles itself "the content-free encyclopedia", parodying Wikipedia's slogan of "the fre ...

, is a satirical website created on 30 November 2005 to parody the Latvian Wikipedia. An article outlining the internal politics between the Latvian Wikipedia's administrators and its most active users was written on 10 March 2011. Since 11 June 2014, a "!Bang" command on

DuckDuckGo DuckDuckGo (DDG) is an internet search engine that emphasizes protecting searchers' privacy and avoiding the filter bubble of personalized search results. DuckDuckGo does not show search results from content farms. It uses various APIs of o ...

gives users the ability to redirect search queries to the Latvian Wikipedia by typing in their browser's URL bar.

Milestones

Latvian Wikipedia Marathon

The ( lv, Latvijas Vikipēdijas maratons) was a project that brought together the Latvian Wikipedia community with several private partners in a joint effort with the aim of expanding the Latvian Wikipedia to activate the usability of the Latvian language in the learning process, cognition and research work.

Policies

Since 31 October 2012, the Latvian Wikipedia displays a notice encouraging users to sign a petition on the Latvian social initiative platform

ManaBalss.lv ManaBalss.lv (literally ''My Voice'' in English) is a civic organization based in Latvia and launched in June 2011 to provide a possibility for the citizens of Latvia to promote their initiatives and gain support for these initiatives for further ...

in an effort to change the Latvian copyright law, which permits taking pictures of architectural works and monuments, but only for non-commercial purposes. According to the petition, "such restrictions are not reasonable for buildings, monuments, sculptures and other three-dimensional works that cannot be fully reproduced in two dimensions". If the law changed, pictures of Latvian public buildings would become valid on Wikimedia Commons. * As opposed to the English Wikipedia, it is not required to be logged-in to create a new article on the Latvian Wikipedia. * Many users use personalized license templates on the images they upload locally to have them grouped. * Unlike most major Wikipedias, the Latvian Wikipedia adopted

gadgets A gadget is a mechanical device or any ingenious article. Gadgets are sometimes referred to as '' gizmos''. History The etymology of the word is disputed. The word first appears as reference to an 18th-century tool in glassmaking that was develo ...

very late, in May 2014.

Images

The Latvian Wikipedia has an Exemption Doctrine Policy (''Godprātīga lietošana'') that allows local uploads of non-free,

fair use Fair use is a doctrine in United States law that permits limited use of copyrighted material without having to first acquire permission from the copyright holder. Fair use is one of the limitations to copyright intended to balance the interests ...

images and audio/video files (with copyright restrictions). However, users are encouraged to release their work under a Creative Commons license and upload it on Wikimedia Commons instead, thus making it accessible throughout all editions of Wikipedia. This stance is similar to the English Wikipedia's, and in contrast to some other editions, which rely strictly on

Wikimedia Commons Wikimedia Commons (or simply Commons) is a media repository of free-to-use images, sounds, videos and other media. It is a project of the Wikimedia Foundation. Files from Wikimedia Commons can be used across all of the Wikimedia projects in ...

for images, sound, and other media files, including i.a. the

Spanish Spanish might refer to: * Items from or related to Spain: **Spaniards are a nation and ethnic group indigenous to Spain **Spanish language, spoken in Spain and many Latin American countries **Spanish cuisine Other places * Spanish, Ontario, Cana ...

Swedish Swedish or ' may refer to: Anything from or related to Sweden, a country in Northern Europe. Or, specifically: * Swedish language, a North Germanic language spoken primarily in Sweden and Finland ** Swedish alphabet, the official alphabet used by ...

Polish Polish may refer to: * Anything from or related to Poland, a country in Europe * Polish language * Poles, people from Poland or of Polish descent * Polish chicken *Polish brothers (Mark Polish and Michael Polish, born 1970), American twin screenwr ...

Basque Basque may refer to: * Basques, an ethnic group of Spain and France * Basque language, their language Places * Basque Country (greater region), the homeland of the Basque people with parts in both Spain and France * Basque Country (autonomous co ...

Czech Czech may refer to: * Anything from or related to the Czech Republic, a country in Europe ** Czech language ** Czechs, the people of the area ** Czech culture ** Czech cuisine * One of three mythical brothers, Lech, Czech, and Rus' Places *Czech, ...

Danish Danish may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to the country of Denmark People * A national or citizen of Denmark, also called a "Dane," see Demographics of Denmark * Culture of Denmark * Danish people or Danes, people with a Danish ance ...

Volapük Volapük (; , "Language of the World", or lit. "World Speak") is a constructed language created between 1879 and 1880 by Johann Martin Schleyer, a Catholic priest in Baden, Germany, who believed that God had told him in a dream to create an i ...

and

Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...

Wikipedias. Content and images from the Latvian Wikipedia often appear on Latvian news websites.

Statistics

As of , the Latvian Wikipedia's articles account for approximately % of all the articles written in a Baltic language, an increase from 24% in 2014. This makes it the second-largest edition in the family after Lithuanian, which accounts for %. In 2018, the most popular articles were " Latvija" (Latvia), " 2018. gada Pasaules čempionāts hokejā" (2018 IIHF World Championship), and "

Rīga Riga (; lv, Rīga , liv, Rīgõ) is the capital and largest city of Latvia and is home to 605,802 inhabitants which is a third of Latvia's population. The city lies on the Gulf of Riga at the mouth of the Daugava (river), Daugava river where ...

", the capital of Latvia. , the Latvian Wikipedia had 49

featured articles * For general information about "articles", see Article (disambiguation). * For the specific use in publishing, see Article (publishing). * For the concept of "feature stories", or focusing on an issue for in-depth investigation, see feature story ...

(') and a moderate ratio of 0.5 featured articles per 1000 articles, 110

good articles __NOTOC__ Click any of the topics above for a list of good articles on that topic. Good Articles ...

('), 19

featured lists Contents * #Art and architecture, Art and architecture * #Astronomy and spaceflight, Astronomy and spaceflight * #Awards, decorations and vexillology, Awards, decorations and vexillology * #Biology, Biology * #Business, economics and finance, ...

('), and 18 Wikiprojects (''Vikiprojekts''). It currently has a moderately high depth indicator of ,Depth is a rough indicator of a Wikipedia's collaborative quality showing how frequently its articles are updated. A higher depth usually indicates that articles are more often edited. which is greater than other than that of Wikipedias in other Baltic languagesThe Latgalian, Lithuanian, and Samogitian Wikipedias have a depth indicator of , , and respectively. and some of the largest editions including Polish (), Dutch (), and Swedish (). , according to the list of Wikipedias by sample of articles at Meta-Wiki, which is based on the list of articles every Wikipedia should have, the Latvian Wikipedia ranked 60th out of 295 editions, with a score of 23.18/100. It lacked no article from the list of vital articles, but contained three times more stubs than articles.

Community

Although there is still no

Wikimedia chapter Wikimedia chapters are national or sub-national not-for-profit organizations created to promote the interests of Wikimedia projects locally. Chapters are legally independent of the Wikimedia Foundation The Wikimedia Foundation, Inc., or ...

in Latvia, the Wikimedia Foundation officially recognized the Wikimedians of Latvia User Group ( lv, Latvijas vikimedisti) on 5 March 2015. It is an active user group representing all Wikimedians in Latvia. In 2014, the Latvian Wikipedia was the third most read edition in

, after the

and the Russian Wikipedia. It is also the seventh most read edition on the island of

Guernsey Guernsey (; Guernésiais: ''Guernési''; french: Guernesey) is an island in the English Channel off the coast of Normandy that is part of the Bailiwick of Guernsey, a British Crown Dependency. It is the second largest of the Channel Islands ...

, where there is an emerging Latvian diaspora of approximately 1,500 to 2,000 migrant workers. Despite Latvian having less than 2 million speakers, the edition enjoys a relatively high level of community participation, with 54 editors per million speakers. At around articles per thousand speakers, the Latvian Wikipedia has an above-average number of articles per speaker. These figures were based on an estimate of 1.8 million speakers of Latvian. Its editing community currently consists of administrators (% of all active users) and active contributors, of which on average between 12 and 20 are very active every month,A very active user is one with 100+ edits in the main namespace of a given project over the last 30 days. and there are in total 62 users with over 1,000 edits (excluding bots), and 20 approved

bots The British Overseas Territories (BOTs), also known as the United Kingdom Overseas Territories (UKOTs), are fourteen territories with a constitutional and historical link with the United Kingdom. They are the last remnants of the former Bri ...

, assisting users in the editing process. Around 90% of both views and edits originate from Latvia, where Wikipedia is the 12th most visited website.

Gallery

File:Wikipedia-logo-lv-040922.png, The Latvian Wikipedia's original logo. Note that "Wikipēdija" was spelled with a 'W' from 22 September 2004 to 1 June 2005 File:Wikipedia-logo-lv-50K.png, The Latvian Wikipedia's 50,000 articles commemorative logo (17 August 2013) File:Wikipedia-logo-lv 100000.png, The Latvian Wikipedia's 100,000 articles commemorative logo (24 January 2020) File:Wikipedia-logo-v2-lv-131123.png, The logo displayed in memory of the victims of the

(23–26 November 2013)

Notes

References

External links

*
Latvian Wikipedia

Twitter page of the Latvian Wikipedia
* Embassy of the Latvian Wikipedia (English, French, German, Polish, and Russian) {{Wikipedias Latvian Latvian-language encyclopedias Internet properties established in 2003 Latvian-language websites