Wikipedia adds page previews to web version

Mockup by Nirzar Pangarkar/Wikimedia Foundation, CC BY-SA 3.0

Ever found yourself going down a Wikipedia rabbit hole? Well, Wikipedia hopes to make those sessions a bit more productive with its latest feature for the web. The site now shows page previews via a popup window to give you additional context for a link. When you hover your mouse over the link, it’ll show you an image and a few sentences from the link to inform you what you might be clicking on. When you click on it, it’ll take you to the page in question. If not, it just disappears.

Wikipedia claims that testing done for the feature had users interacting with content more on the page and most users didn’t disable this feature. And while the site’s page views have gone down, this apparently means that people are finding the information they get on the fewer pages they visit as sufficient sources of information.

Source: The Verge

Wikipedia updates iOS app to bring ‘Black’ mode to the iPhone X

Here’s one more developer taking advantage of the iPhone X’s immersive display. Wikipedia just updated its app for iOS to introduce a new Black mode that works great for an OLED screen like that on this device. On top of this, version 5.7.3 of Wikipedia also introduces faster article loading and less data use and will have images downloaded only when they’re about to be displayed or saved. The appearance option to have info boxes will also be open by default. Aside from these, Wikipedia also did some spring cleaning within the app.

Source: 9to5Mac

Wikipedia co-founder gets his Twitter account hacked

OurMine, a hacking group, adds another high-profile social media breach to its list. This time they take over the Twitter account of Wikipedia co-founder Jimmy Wales. On Saturday, a tweet on Wales’ account showed up saying “RIP Jimmy Wales, 1966 – 2016,” which caused people to speculate if something did happen to him. Minutes later though, another tweet shows up saying “I confirm that Wikipedia is all lies, OurMine is the true.” The tweet included a link showing the group’s logo as well as an ad for social media security services. Wales’ bio has also even been changed to read “hacked by OurMine.”

Some of the other prominent figures OurMine has hacked include some of the heads of the biggest internet/tech companies including Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg, Twitter co-founders Evan Williams and Jack Dorsey, and Google CEO Sundar Pichai. It seems Wales has gotten back access to his account and tweets about three hours ago: “I'm (obviously) OK, and tweeting back to normal.”

Source: Mashable

Wikipedia now supports 3D Touch on iOS app

Wikipedia's latest update for its iOS app brings with it a bunch of new features. One of these include 3D Touch support for the iPhone 6s and iPhone 6s Plus. Version 5.0 also brings with it a redesigned app. The daily feed will show a lot of new content, including recommended articles, random articles, as well as top-read articles. The picture of the day will also be shown there. The app also now supports emoji search and Spotlight search for saved articles. If you're a Wikipedia fan on an Apple device, this new update might be just what you're looking for.

Source: Engadget | Download: Apple App Store (Free)