Free knowledge in times of pandemic. Study of articles on “covid-19" and the “covid-19 pandemic” on wikipedia

Abstract

This article studies articles about “Covid-19" and the “Covid-19 pandemic” in four language versions of Wikipedia (English, Spanish, Italian and Portuguese). The study periods start with the official naming of the Covid-19 disease on February 2020 by the World Health Organization and the announcement of the pandemic on March 11 2020, respectively. In both cases, the period goes up to April 11 2020. The study addresses the creation and reading of these publications, analyzing whether they are built upon scientific and health references or information from the general press. The findings show that that the Wikipedists responded quickly and generated collaborative works, with articles based on and built around a scientific and health perspective.