Jump to content

Wikipedia:Top 25 Report/April 21 to 27, 2013

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Top 25 Report: Most Popular Wikipedia Articles of the Week (April 21 – April 27 2013)

[edit]

Last week's reportNext week's Report

Summary: A slow week, dominated by pop culture, previous entries, Google Doodles and Reddit threads. The popularity of Iron Man 3 and The Great Gatsby augur well for future reports, when their movies are finally, fully released.

For the week of April 21 to 27, the 25 most popular articles on Wikipedia, as determined from the report of the 5,000 most trafficked pages* were:

Rank Last Wks Article Views Notes
1 Ella Fitzgerald 1,902,708
The First Lady of Song, the Queen of Jazz; she of the 3-octave range and 13 Grammy wins, received a Google Doodle in honour of what would have been her 96th birthday on April 25.
2 Iron Man 3 652,309 As per usual in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, the third installment in the Iron Man series was released internationally a week early, triggering interest before its release in its home country on May 3.
3 9 8 Game of Thrones 543,047 This epic fantasy TV series launched its third season on March 31, and has seen its ratings almost double on its premiere episode.
4 - - Munich massacre 503,257 An attack during the 1972 Summer Olympics in Munich, West Germany on the Israeli Olympic team by the Palestinian group Black September. Underwent a massive spike in views on April 25, after a 4-0 victory by Bayern Munich over Barcelona FC was referred to in the press as a "Munich massacre".
5 10 16 Facebook 488,397 A perennially popular article.
6 - - Hemlock Grove (TV series) 474,142 Produced by schlockmeister Eli Roth, who also directed the pilot, this predictably gory werewolf series, based on a novel, was released in its entirety via Netflix on April 19.
7 7 2 Oblivion (2013 film) 466,461 Despite narrowly losing the weekend top spot to Michael Bay's sociopathon Pain & Gain, this Tom Cruise star vehicle still handlily beat it in the Wikipedia stakes, garnering more than twice its views.
8 11 26 Deaths in 2013 426,855 The lists of deaths in the current year is always a quite popular article.
9 - - Socotra 407,165
This biodiversity hotspot in the Arabian Sea off the coast of Yemen received a massive amount of attention thanks to a TIL (Today I Learned) thread on Reddit.
10 - - George Jones 404,786
Country music singer and onetime Mr. Tammy Wynette who died on April 26
11 - - The Great Gatsby 401,638
This perennial contender for the Great American Novel and eternal junior high school assignment got a lot of attention this week, most likely from users looking for the upcoming Baz Luhrmann film.
12 17 8 Google 401,002 A perennially popular article
13 20 28 World War II 380,743
Another perennially popular article. (The 16th most popular article from 2010–12, in fact, see Table 2 here.)
14 19 2 Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act 376,926 Otherwise known as CISPA, this hugely controversial act passed the US Congress with little comment from the media, despite its potentially dramatic impact on personal privacy. Thankfully beaten in the Senate.
15 Arsenal F.C. 371,419 The world's fourth-richest football club came to notice with a 1-0 victory against Fulham, and an impending match against Manchester United (which they held to a 1-1 draw).
16 - - Earth Day 365,612
Despite a Google Doodle, this ecologically-minded April 22 celebration scored little over half the views of last week's similar 4/20 Day. I guess smoking pot is easier to countenance than saving the world.
17 1 2 Chechnya 361,449
This ruined Russian republic became destination #1 for Wikipedia users when it was revealed to be Boston bombings suspects' ethnic homeland, and remains a popular topic a week after.
18 16 2 Daft Punk 357,847
This robot-helmet-wearing, cyberpunk-infused electronic music duo released their long-awaited new single "Get Lucky."
19 21 3 Game of Thrones (season 3) 351,362 see #3 above
20 - 28 YouTube 351,135 Another perennially popular article
21 3 2 Boston Marathon bombings 348,429
Unsurprisingly still popular a week after the fact.
22 - 2 List of Game of Thrones episodes 337,118 see #3 above
23 5 2 420 (cannabis culture) 323,110
4/20 Day still hanging in the air the following week.
24 - Aashiqui 2 320,848 Bollywood blockbusters like this occasionally score highly enough with Indian diaspora to register on English Wikipedia
25 - - Edith Macefield 318,947
Another Reddit TIL, this woman who fought a housing development for the right to continue to live in her house received sympathy from Wikipedia users.
  • This list is derived from the WP:5000 report. It excludes the Wikipedia main page (and "wiki"), non-article pages, and anomalous entries (such as DDoS attacks or likely automated views). Please feel free to discuss any removal on the talk page if you wish. Standard removals this week include:
    • G-force; this has been in the Top 25 since the list was started at the beginning of the year. The continuing popularity of this article, which jumped in June 2012, has been without explanation. Articles on popular scientific concepts get nowhere this level of viewing based on our analysis to date, e.g., Gravitation (49,516 views from March 3–9), and therefore we have decided to remove it from the list as most likely caused by non-human views.
    • Cat anatomy; explanation still unknown for its continuing high view counts

Specific removals this week (those articles for which no reason for any sudden popularity could be located):