Thanks Ryan for your thoughts, I was waiting to hear more opinions but it
might just be that folks don't feel strongly one way or the other.
I'd like to weight in on a couple of "pros". You make a good point on the
scale of the project, (and this could be more than I can chew by myself),
but this portal might not need to be a gigantic meta project (and difficult
doesn't mean impossible :) , maybe we should look at this as a simpler
'dashboard", a space to help navigate the content and aggregate effort? (i
was editing/adding to a list on the French portal within 2 minutes of being
on it - the information was right there, easy to navigate, I saw something
was missing, done.)
I am not sure we should fear cannibalizing female contributors, I'd think
that the women already contributing are familiar with the wikipedia
environment, need no/less training, and already found their sweet spot, ie.
specific topics to work on based on their expertise or interest. The portal
idea is intended to attract and onboard new users to Wikipedia's not
shifting internal contributors, and even if we were to generate interest
from within it would likely be in addition and complementary to what they
are already doing. The loss of females is in part due to the general
attrition of the Wiki contributor-based, I think there is an opportunity
for small adjustments weather it's in how we display information or in
outreach efforts, that can help reverse the trend and attract a much needed
new user-base (female or male or minority...).
Is this the right group to be discussing this? I'd love to hear what the
folks here think, and if this worth discussing?
Sylvia
Hi everyone,
Just a reminder that #askawikiwoman is taking place on Twitter right
now. I know many of us are wiki-know-it-all's, but, this is an
experimental event that we're trying out as part of my fellowship :)
It'd be great to have you ask Dr. Adrianne Wadewitz (User:Wadewitz)
anything and everything about Wikipedia!
Simply use the hashtag #askawikiwoman on Twitter and Adrianne will
answer your question via the @WikiWomen Twitter.
https://twitter.com/WikiWomen
Adrianne will be online from 10-5 answering questions about everything
ranging from:
* Editing and mark up questions
* The gender gap
* Using Wikipedia in her classroom
* How she got into editing
* What it's like being a woman editing Wikipedia
* Whatever else wiki related!
Please forward to any groups or individuals you think might want to
participate. Thanks everyone.
Sarah
--
*Sarah Stierch*
*/Wikimedia Foundation Community Fellow/*
>>Mind the gap! Support Wikipedia women's outreach: donate today
<https://donate.wikimedia.org/><<
Thought that some people on this list might find this interesting (given that some women on Wikipedia have sadly suffered harassment because of their gender).
Mozilla have just passed a new set of guidelines, the Mozilla Community Participation Guidelines.
https://www.mozilla.org/about/policies/participation.html
"The Mozilla Project welcomes and encourages participation by everyone. It doesn't matter how you identify yourself or how others perceive you: we welcome you. We welcome contributions from everyone as long as they interact constructively with our community, including, but not limited to people of varied age, culture, ethnicity, gender, gender-identity, language, race, sexual orientation, geographical location and religious views."
--
Tom Morris
<http://tommorris.org/>
Hi all - see below! Siko headed the fellowship program and has provided
great guidance and insight in regards to my gender gap related projects.
I encourage you to apply for an Individual Engagement Grant for projects
related to helping encourage more women editors in your projects!! (Or
whatever else floats your boat :) )
-Sarah
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: *Siko Bouterse* <sbouterse(a)wikimedia.org
<mailto:sbouterse@wikimedia.org>>
Date: Tue, Jan 15, 2013 at 7:56 PM
Subject: New grants program for individuals
To: wikimedia-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org <mailto:wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org>
*Hi all,
I?m pleased to announce the launch of a new grantmaking program at the
Wikimedia Foundation: Individual Engagement Grants. These grants will
support Wikimedians as individuals or small teams to complete projects
that benefit the Wikimedia movement, lead to online impact, and serve
the mission, community, and strategic priorities. This new program is
intended to complement WMF?s other grantmaking programs as well as the
grants that chapters and affiliate organizations provide.
The first round of proposals will be accepted from now until 15 February
2013. We?re also seeking committee members to help select the first
round of grantees. Please help spread the word to other lists!
To get involved, share your thoughts, submit a proposal, or join the
committee:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IEG
For more information on all of WMF?s grantmaking programs:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:Start
Best wishes,*
Siko
--
Siko Bouterse
Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.
sbouterse(a)wikimedia.org <mailto:sbouterse@wikimedia.org>
/Imagine a world in which every single human being can freely share in
the sum of all knowledge. /
/Donate <https://donate.wikimedia.org> or click the "edit" button today,
and help us make it a reality!/
--
Siko Bouterse
Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.
sbouterse(a)wikimedia.org <mailto:sbouterse@wikimedia.org>
/Imagine a world in which every single human being can freely share in
the sum of all knowledge. /
/Donate <https://donate.wikimedia.org> or click the "edit" button today,
and help us make it a reality!/
Hello fellow Wikipedians,
Disclaimer: I'm a newbie (please be gentle)
I'll be brief. I've made my first (minor) edit on Wikipedia in December and
have since then try to learn as much as possible about the movement and the
various projects. I'm still a long way to go.
I'm particularly interested in the work done around Women's Participation
(contributors) and Women's Voices (the actual content covering women
topics/work). I believe the teaHouse and WikiWomen Collaborative are a huge
step in helping onboard women contributors. While perusing other language
Wikis to see how the "Women participation/content" is handled, I found
the French
Portal Femmes <https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portail:Femmes> and the
Portuguese Portal Mulheres
<https://pt.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portal:Mulheres>to be well designed and
a useful gateway for content, it clearly catalogues
and consolidates women related knowledge in one space. I didn't find an
equivalent portal in the English version, is there a reason not to have
something like this on the english Wikipedia?
I see a couple of valid reasons to having a Women Portal in English
(particularly while the topic is being built and major gaps are being
identified/filled). One is to offer a quick inventory of content, where one
can see what's already covered and what's missing (without having to
actively search for it). The other is that 'forcing' some level of content
structure will help rally the community around specific topics to focus on
(gaps), and possibly identify new ones. A successful example is Sarah
Stierch WikiProject Women
Scientists<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WikiProject_Women_scientists>,
it's a great project and it should sit in a larger portal with other master
headers to Women in History, Women in Art, Women in Politics, Women in
Academia, Women in Technology.... all of which features the names, photos,
bios, subgroups, and links to their work. This structure applies to any
group/topic that is underrepresented - it makes it easier for newcomers
(intimidated) and experts (busy) to identify areas they can contribute to
right the way. How do I go about doing this?
So much for being brief :)
Sylvia
Joseph Reagle released his new paper - "Free as in sexist?" Free culture
and the gender gap.
Abstract:
Despite the values of freedom and openness, the free culture movement's
gender balance is as skewed (or more so) as that of the computing
culture from which it arose. Based on the collection and analysis of
discourse on gender and sexism within this movement over a six--year
period. I suggest three possible causes: (a) some geek identities can be
narrow and unappealing; (b) open communities are especially susceptible
to difficult people; and, (c) the ideas of freedom and openness can be
used to dismiss concerns and rationalize the gender gap as a matter of
preference and choice.
Find it here:
http://www.uic.edu/htbin/cgiwrap/bin/ojs/index.php/fm/article/view/4291/3381
Lots of talk about Wikipedia, and a few familiar names cited in it (Kat
Walsh, Sue, SlimVirgin, among others).
-Sarah
--
*Sarah Stierch*
*/Museumist and open culture advocate/*
>>Visit sarahstierch.com <http://sarahstierch.com><<
Hello fellow Wikipedians,
I'll be brief. I've made my first (minor) edit on Wikipedia in December and
have since then try to learn as much as possible about the movement and the
various projects. I'm still a long way to go. Disclaimer: I'm a newbie
(please be gentle)
I'm particularly interested in the work done around Women's Participation
(contributors) and Women's Voices (the actual content covering women
topics/work). I believe the teaHouse and WikiWomen Collaborative are a huge
step in helping onboard women contributors. While perusing other language
Wikis to see how the "Women participation/content" is handled, I found
the French
Portal Femmes <https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portail:Femmes> and the
Portuguese Portal Mulheres <https://pt.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portal:Mulheres> to
be well designed and a useful gateway for content, it clearly catalogues
and consolidates women related knowledge in one space. I didn't find an
equivalent portal in the English version, is there a reason not to have
something like this on the english Wikipedia?
I see a couple of valid reasons to having a Women Portal in English
(particularly while the topic is being built and major gaps are being
identified/filled). One is to offer a quick inventory of content, where one
can see what's already covered and what's missing (without having to
actively search for it). The other is that 'forcing' some level of content
structure will help rally the community around specific topics to focus on
(gaps), and possibly identify new ones. A successful example is Sarah
Stierch WikiProject Women
Scientists<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WikiProject_Women_scientists>,
it's a great project and it should sit in a larger portal with other master
headers to Women in History, Women in Art, Women in Politics, Women in
Academia, Women in Technology.... all of which features the names, photos,
bios, subgroups, and links to their work. This structure applies to any
group/topic that is underrepresented - it makes it easier for newcomers
(intimidated) and experts (busy) to identify areas they can contribute to
right the way. How do I go about doing this?
So much for being brief :)
Sylvia
A number of folks involved here are mentioned - Joseph Reagle, Sue
Gardner, Denise Paolucci (Dreamwidth!) and a project I worked on, the
Teahouse.
http://news.yahoo.com/study-shows-gender-bias-wikipedia-linux-180400641.html
ByJared Spurbeck
<http://contributor.yahoo.com/user/261857/jared_spurbeck.html>|Yahoo!
Contributor Network -- 6 hrs ago
* Email <http://news.yahoo.com/_xhr/mtf/panel/>
* Share
<http://www.facebook.com/sharer.php?u=http%3A%2F%2Fnews.yahoo.com%2Fstudy-sh…>
*
* 5
* Print <javascript:window.print();>
Today inthe age of the "brogrammer,"
<http://www.cnn.com/2012/05/07/tech/web/brogrammers/index.html>whose
frat boy tendencies are glorified and sought after by cutting-edge
online startups, women in tech often find themselves objectified and
excluded -- especially in communities likeWikipediaandopen-source
software, where women make up even less of the population (around 13
percent and 1 percent, respectively) than in more mainstream technical
fields.
That was one of the factsJoseph Reagle, an assistant professor
atNortheastern University, drew on for his study about"Free culture and
the gender gap."
<http://geekfeminism.org/2009/09/23/open-letter-to-mark-shuttleworth/>He
discovered that just because a community (like Wikipedia)/says/that it's
open doesn't mean that it isn't hostile to women.
*Free for all?*
The "Free Encyclopedia" Wikipedia's claim to fame is that anyone can
edit and contribute to it. To keep errors from cropping up, it has
policies that let anyone flag part of an article for review, and allow
trusted editors to decide how to present something.
The process by which those editors decide, however, is often highly
combative and alienating to women, who "are socialized to not be
competitive and avoid conflict" according to Reagle. Sue Gardner, the
Executive Director of theWikimedia Foundation(the project behind
Wikipedia), wrote a list of"Nine Reasons Women Don't Edit Wikipedia,"
<http://suegardner.org/2011/02/19/nine-reasons-why-women-dont-edit-wikipedia…>in
which she noted Wikipedia's "fighty" and "contentious" culture, where
loud and assertive people drive others out regardless of their competence.
*"Otherwise commendable features"*
Reagle found that Wikipedia's values of radical freedom and openness
actually led to a culture that is more closed off to women. He noted
that "implicit" power structures existed, even in the absence of formal
ones; and that imposing few restrictions on how people treat each other
can lead to "a chaotic culture of undisciplined vandals," which
disenfranchises women from participation just as surely as if there were
rules against women participating.
Similar dynamics exist in popular open-source software projects like the
Linux kernel. Open-source luminaries like Eric Raymond are legendarily
combative andhostile to "idiots," <http://www.catb.org/esr/aim/>even
while they theytolerate abusive personalities
<http://esr.ibiblio.org/?p=1310>whodrive female contributors away.
<http://geekfeminism.org/2009/10/08/psa-mikeeusas-hate-speech-and-harassment/>Reagle's
study quoted numerous female writers with experience working in Linux
and open-source software, who called its community "cliquish and
exclusionary" as well as "more competitive and fierce than most areas of
programming."
*How to achieve equality*
Wikipedia's new Teahouse page
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Teahouse>is "a friendly place to
help new editors," which is designed especially toencourage women to
participate.
<https://blog.wikimedia.org/2012/03/05/wikipedia-teahouse-a-warm-welcome-for…>Meanwhile,
women like Denise Paolucci are creating their own startups
likeDreamwidth, <http://dreamwidth.org/>which are based on existing
open-source programming code. Unlike most "proprietary" code, it's still
free for women to do what they want with it -- if they can overcome the
obstacles in their way.
/Jared Spurbeck is an open-source software enthusiast, who uses an
Android phone and an Ubuntu laptop PC. He has been writing about
technology and electronics since 2008./
Study Shows Gender Bias in Wikipedia, Linux
--
*Sarah Stierch*
*/Museumist and open culture advocate/*
>>Visit sarahstierch.com <http://sarahstierch.com><<
Hi everyone,
Thursday, Dr. Adrianne Wadewitz (User:Wadewitz) will be participating in
our first #askawikiwoman event on Twitter. This event encourages people
to ask short questions about Wikipedia (about editing it, policies, what
it's like to be a Wikipedian, gender gap, whatever) and Adrianne will
respond!
It'll be an all day affair, and will take place via our @WikiWoman
twitter. All you have to do is type the hash tag #askawikiwoman and ask
your question and Adrianne will respond.
If this is successful, we'll do them more frequently and focus on
multilingual engagement.
Please read the blog here:
http://blog.wikimedia.org/2013/01/14/have-a-question-about-wikipedia-ask-a-…
And spread the word!! See you on Twitter :)
-Sarah
--
*Sarah Stierch*
*/Museumist and open culture advocate/*
>>Visit sarahstierch.com <http://sarahstierch.com><<