Meaning of WikiGnome | Babel Free

Definitions

A wiki editor (such as Wikipedia) that primarily makes minor and uncontroversial edits such as fixing typos and grammar mistakes.

Examples

“To meet its goal of encapsulating the sum of human knowledge, Wikipedia draws on the talents of different kinds of editors. [Bryan] Henderson is an archetypical WikiGnome, a contributor who specializes in fixing typos, repairing broken links, adding categories and, yes, correcting grammar.”

“On another front, one of the site's most prolific editors has made thousands of revisions, almost all of them correcting perceived misusages of the phrase "comprised of" across the site's millions of articles. Far from being treated as an eccentric outlier, this editor is celebrated, recognized as an exemplary WikiGnome, a class of editors committed to "tying up little loose ends and making things run more smoothly."”

“[Steven] Pruitt considers himself a WikiGnome (according to Wikipedia, "a wiki user who makes useful incremental edits without clamouring for attention"), and he works the gamut, though much of his recent focus is on "authority control" — linking entries to worldwide library catalogues — and especially on categorizing articles.”

CEFR level