Hi all,
because of the 5th edition and 1 millionth submission to WLM past year, it
seemed a nice idea to write a short article for Heritage in motion about
Wiki Loves Monuments.
Unfortunately, the deadline is rather short. Please find a draft below. If
you have comments, edits, suggestions, they are still very welcome in the
coming 23 hours. I would especially appreciate suggestions to make it read
more like 'fun' and less like 'numbers'.
Best,
Lodewijk
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Text available under: CC BY SA, authors: Lodewijk Gelauff & Cristian
Consonni
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While celebrating its fifth edition, the international photography
competition Wiki Loves Monuments welcomed its millionth image submission. A
good occasion to take a look at the past editions of the competition that
has been supported by Europa Nostra as a partner since 2011, and take a
look where it is headed.
In 2010, the competition was initiated by Wikimedia Netherlands as a
challenge to appreciate, photograph and share monumental buildings in their
environment with the rest of the world through Wikipedia. Over twelve
thousand photos were submitted through the competition, and consequently
shared through Wikimedia Commons, the media repository behind Wikipedia. In
the years that followed, the competition was organized by Wikimedia
volunteers in dozens of other countries: first in Europe (2011), later in
the whole world (since 2012). Wiki Loves Monuments was recognized as the
worlds largest photography competition by the Guinness Book of World
Records with over 300.000 submissions each year since 2012. Over the past
five editions, a total of 1,2 million photos was submitted to the
competition from 65 countries.
More than just a competition
Alongside the competition, data describing the officially recognized
cultural heritage monuments has been collected by Wikipedia volunteers: a
database was composed with more than 1,3 million buildings in 53 countries,
of which more than 450.000 now have an image linked to them. All submitted
images are, together with more uploaded images of cultural heritage
monuments, available through Wikimedia Commons[1]. All images can be used
freely, as long as the author and license are credited.
Images can be used by anyone, but are also actively added to articles on
Wikipedia, one of the world's most popular sources of information. As a
heritage ambassador, you can contribute in many different ways to this
wealth of material: you can release and upload your own photographic
material, as long as you use a free license, or contribute articles to
Wikipedia about the heritage sites. That way, we can share the beautiful
heritage sites that Europe has to offer with every single person. If you
are interested, please get in touch with a local chapter of Wikimedians in
your country for more information[2], or just start editing Wikipedia.
We hope to welcome you as participant in the 2015 competition!
<did you know box>
Did you know...
- that most of the photo submissions in the past years came from Ukraine,
Poland and Germany?
- that even Antarctica participated in 2013, with 22 submitted photos?
- that in Italy, Greece and Egypt, publishing photos of monuments may
require government permission?
Photos: the winning photos of 2010-2014
[1]:
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Cultural_heritage_monuments_by_…
[2]:
http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Local_chapters