47 Country Report: Wikipedia
Joseph Kimble
Egypt uses Wikipedia in Arabic and Egyptian Arabic to considerable extent. In March, Egyptian users viewed Arabic Wikipedia pages forty-four million times. Out of all countries using Arabic Wikipedia, Egypt is recorded as one of the top two user locations globally. In the beginning of its use in 2004, Arabic Wikipedia was considered one of the worst kept Wikipedia projects amongst other languages. However, by 2014, thanks to the efforts of the Wikimedia Foundation and the nonprofit group Taghreedat pages created in Arabic Wikipedia tripled. By 2016, Arabic Wikipedia scored the fifth highest depth score for its articles. Arabic Wikipedia sees most of its engagement from Egypt, specifically in number of users from a specific country and pages created. By mid 2020, Arabic Wikipedia came under scrutiny as it saw criticism for its bias against the LBGTQ community and the rejection of articles about women and minorities
In Arabic Wikipedia, Egypt has a very similar breakdown of information as English Wikipedia. Some of the information is switched around in its place and Arabic Wikipedia includes the translation and meaning behind the Arabic name of Egypt first. The other main point of difference is the information included about current politics and criticisms of Egypt as a government, as the Arabic Wikipedia does not have any information on human rights or freedom of speech like English Wikipedia. Most editing comes from sources outside of Egypt in areas either more west in Northern Africa like Morocco, Algeria, and Tunisia or from countries like Germany, America, France, and Australia.