How does Wikipedia actually work
Have you ever wondered how Wikipedia works? It’s a completely free encyclopaedia which exists online and can be edited by anybody. Millions of people use Wikipedia every single day and just because it can be edited by anyone doesn’t mean there aren’t rules and guidelines to it. The reason it works so well is because of the great idea that lots of different people from a variety of different backgrounds combined can create and edit a much larger online encyclopaedia.
Another important benefit of doing it this way is that it’s kept up to date far more easily. Most of the people who write and edit the articles are not paid and do it voluntarily. Furthermore, there is a huge community of editors that work together to solve any conflicting facts with the eventual hope of one day creating a more perfect encyclopaedia. Currently, Wikipedia is the largest reference website and gains hundreds of millions of visitors every single month.
Wikipedia is a type of wiki and was created in 2001. It has become so large that it is now in the Top 100 largest web sites in the world. The reason for this rapid growth is down the simplicity of wikis, which just means that any group of people can edit the content. It is also their openness and inclusivity for anyone to contribute, that allows wikis to be as popular as they are.
Nevertheless, people claim that’s the very reason that Wikipedia can’t always be trusted and sometimes people do put things there which are not correct. This has also been done may times in the form of jokes on influential leaders. However, editors do regularly check the content that is posted and will remove things that are deemed incorrect. It is always a good idea to compare with other trustworthy websites when you are doing your own research though.
Cop26 Running into overtime
The battle against climate change is getting more and more important especially with Cop26 going on. To understand what is going on, it is important to know what the Conference of Parties (COP) actually is. It is an annual event which brings together many governments from all around the world, in order to address the problems being faced with climate change. The very first meeting dates back to 1995, which was held in Berlin, Germany.
Cop26 is the twenty-sixth meeting, which was scheduled to take place last year, however it had to be postponed due to the global pandemic. The conference is taking place in Glasgow, in the United Kingdom and there is a big focus to look at how private money is spent to deal with the crisis. There is a greater need for governments of prosperous countries to aid countries of much poorer nations to help them mitigate the effects of climate change, as well as adapt to the changing environment.
There is a drive for many governments to create a new fund called the Glasgow Finance Alliance for Net Zero (GFANZ). If rumours are true then this could be worth around $130 trillion, which will come from more than 450 financial institutions worldwide, this includes banks, pension funds, governments and other private companies. One thing is clear, this huge figure can not be from just government budgets and if everything goes as planned then there will be a huge inflow of private capital, the likes of which has not been seen before.
As the Glasgow meetings run into overtime there is a keen desire from many nations to accelerate the phase-out of coal and fossil fuels, which faces some resistance from fossil fuel rich countries such as Saudi Arabia and Russia. There is a desperate push from the UK to bring about a good resolution among the 200 nations which are involved in these talks before the final agreements can be fully published. The main concern is that with the current commitments, emissions will still rise by 14% in 2030, which is why many countries want an acceleration for the phasing out of fossil fuels.
Afghanistan
Ever since the government of Afghanistan fell into the hands of the Taliban, there have been many questions asked as to how it happened. One of the main reasons could be due to “ghost soldiers”, more than 300,000 who simply didn’t exist but were mentioned in the government books. It is now apparent that these workers may have been invented so that more senior officials could take what would have been their wages. It was only in August that the Taliban quickly gained control of the country and with winter fast approaching many in the country will have to face severe anguish with a genuine threat of hunger for many.
Additionally, several areas have reported drought and many gather in certain areas such as Maidan Wardak to get goods provided by the World Food Programme (WFP). It is the Taliban soldiers who control the areas and keep the crowd relatively quiet with many in the crowd looking angry and scared. There is an estimated 22 million people who the WFP needs to supply food to, and with the weather taking a turn for the worse, there will be a greater need of food supplies, with large numbers being threatened with acute hunger.
The WFP, which is run by the United Nations, has urged many global communities to provide humanitarian support for the people of Afghanistan. There are many desperate parents who have been reported to sell the children to obtain food, and millions veer on edge of starvation. The humanitarian services that used to be there previously are being squeezed further by international sanctions. It is estimated that around half the population, which includes 23 million people could face severe starvation withing just months.
With the winter months approaching, this will only make things much worse, especially for the many families with little children on the brink of starvation. In addition to this, there have been some reports that hospitals have been under the strain of many malnourished children, most very close to death. The severe drought has pushed the price of wheat crops very high, and the economy is badly damaged. There has been an alliance of 17 aid organisations which has called on world leaders to “stop playing politics with people’s lives.”
Sources: Churchtimes, bignewsnetwork, BBC
The history of Bumble and the drop
The popular dating app Bumble saw its users fall by around 2%, and this was enough to drop the shares by 20%. Bumble was founded in 2014 by Whitney Wolfe Herd, who is the CEO of Bumble. The intention was to create a more female-focused dating space for women and since then it has grown to be worth billions of dollars after it went public. Wolfe Herd was a cofounder at Tinder, where she came up with the name of the app.
Through her experience at Tinder, and with the help of another colleague, she was persuaded to work on another dating app, so along with cofounder Chris Gulzcynski and former vice president of design Sarah Mick, Bumble was launched. It is important to note that Bumble was like Tinder in that it was location based, however with this app the idea was that women should make the first move. The basic mechanics of Bumble were very similar to Tinder’s, where the users swipe right on someone they are interested in and left on someone they dislike.
However, Wolfe Herd was passionate to empower more women with the app, and this means that only the woman has the ability to make the first contact. Furthermore, the strategy used to initially market Tinder was also used to market Bumble, and this meant taking the app to college campuses. By the end of 2017, the app had grown to 22 million users and would later go on to expand onto other apps such as Bumble BFF, which is for just platonic friendships.
Nevertheless, more recently the company’s shares have lost about 32% since its market debut. This is largely due to the pandemic restrictions which have hindered growth and thus caused the drop in the share price. The total number of paying users was reduced by 2% and this was mainly due to the Delta variant surge which called for another lockdown. Badoo which is Bumble’s other dating app also saw a decrease in growth over this period.
Sources: NYPost, Barrons, Businessinsider