Hello there,
We are inviting you to participate in *Wikipedia Pages Wanting Photos 2021
<https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_Pages_Wanting_Photos_2021>*, a
global contest scheduled to run from July through August 2021.
Participants will choose among Wikipedia pages without photo images, then
add a suitable file from among the many thousands of photos in the
Wikimedia Commons, especially those uploaded from thematic contests (Wiki
Loves Africa, Wiki Loves Earth, Wiki Loves Folklore, etc.) over the years.
In its first year (2020), 36 Wikimedia communities in 27 countries joined
the campaign. Events relating to the campaign included training organized
by at least 18 Wikimedia communities in 14 countries.
The campaign resulted in the addition of media files (photos, audios and
videos) to more than 90,000 Wikipedia articles in 272 languages.
Wikipedia Pages Wanting Photos (WPWP) offers an ideal task for recruiting
and guiding new editors through the steps of adding content to existing
pages. Besides individual participation, the WPWP campaign can be used by
user groups and chapters to organize editing workshops and edit-a-thons.
The organizing team is looking for a contact person to coordinate WPWP
participation at the Wikimedia user group or chapter level (geographically
or thematically) or for a language WP. We’d be glad for you to reply to
this email, or sign up directly at WPWP Participating Communities
<https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_Pages_Wanting_Photos_2021/Partici…>
.
Please feel free to contact Organizing Team
<https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_Pages_Wanting_Photos_2021/Organiz…>
if
you have any query.
Kind regards,
Tulsi
Communication Manager
Wikipedia Pages Wanting Photos Campaign
Hi all,
Join the Research Team at the Wikimedia Foundation [1] for their monthly
Office hours on 2021-06-01 at 16:00-17:00 UTC (9am PT/6pm CEST).
To participate, join the video-call via this link [2]. There is no set
agenda - feel free to add your item to the list of topics in the etherpad
[3] (You can do this after you join the meeting, too.), otherwise you are
welcome to also just hang out. More detailed information (e.g. about how to
attend) can be found here [4].
Through these office hours, we aim to make ourselves more available to
answer some of the research related questions that you as Wikimedia
volunteer editors, organizers, affiliates, staff, and researchers face in
your projects and initiatives. Some example cases we hope to be able to
support you in:
-
You have a specific research related question that you suspect you
should be able to answer with the publicly available data and you don’t
know how to find an answer for it, or you just need some more help with it.
For example, how can I compute the ratio of anonymous to registered editors
in my wiki?
-
You run into repetitive or very manual work as part of your Wikimedia
contributions and you wish to find out if there are ways to use machines to
improve your workflows. These types of conversations can sometimes be
harder to find an answer for during an office hour, however, discussing
them can help us understand your challenges better and we may find ways to
work with each other to support you in addressing it in the future.
-
You want to learn what the Research team at the Wikimedia Foundation
does and how we can potentially support you. Specifically for affiliates:
if you are interested in building relationships with the academic
institutions in your country, we would love to talk with you and learn
more. We have a series of programs that aim to expand the network of
Wikimedia researchers globally and we would love to collaborate with those
of you interested more closely in this space.
-
You want to talk with us about one of our existing programs [5].
Hope to see many of you,
Martin on behalf of the WMF Research Team
[1] https://research.wikimedia.org/team.html
[2] https://meet.jit.si/WMF-Research-Office-Hours
[3] https://etherpad.wikimedia.org/p/Research-Analytics-Office-hours
[4] https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Research/Office_hours
[5] https://research.wikimedia.org/projects.html
--
Martin Gerlach
Research Scientist
Wikimedia Foundation
Dear Wikimedia Community Members,
We have been so hard at work that we are just now peeking our heads out of
our computer screens! However, we have some exciting news to share with you
around Wikimania 2021!
Here are some updates and important information:
1.
Session Submission forms are now live! If you’re looking to lead a
session at Wikimania 2021, please review the following links:
1.
Program Submissions
<https://wikimania.wikimedia.org/wiki/2021:Submissions>
1.
Session Submission Guidelines
<https://wikimania.wikimedia.org/wiki/2021:Submission_Guidelines>
2.
FAQ <https://wikimania.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimania:2021_FAQ>
2.
Wikimania 2021 Wiki Page <https://wikimania.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimania> is
now LIVE, you can now refer to this page for all information regarding
Wikimania 2021! However, it is a live and under construction page - any
suggestions on how to improve it? Message us!
We look forward to receiving your submissions and suggestions.
Have a great weekend and see you all soon.
Best Wishes,
Winnie Kabintie (User:Ms_Kabintie
<https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Ms_Kabintie>), on behalf of the
Wikimania 2021 Core Organizing Team.
Hi everyone,
It has now been one year since the Wikimedia 2030 recommendations have
been published. To mark that anniversary, I am delighted to present
“The Movement Strategy Playbook”[1], a comprehensive document that
contains insights into the key practices and lessons learned from this
global open strategy.
The Movement Strategy Playbook highlights experiences of Wikimedians
who participated in movement strategy between July 2018 and June 2020.
During this period, working groups developed the movement strategy
recommendations and principles, with input from community members,
from affiliates, and the Wikimedia Foundation. This process was
supported by a core team, which I led, featuring a mix of people who
worked for the Wikimedia Foundation or for Wikimedia Deutschland.
This level of global collaboration is a first for the Wikimedia
Movement. And this type of organisational open strategy process –
global, transparent, iterative, inclusive – is unique. My sincere hope
is that it will set a benchmark for collaboration in our movement,
both in terms of how this kind of collaboration can be done and also
what to be mindful of. I hope it is useful for others in the movement,
particularly as we move toward implementing the recommendations.
One fantastic thing about the Playbook: It is not ready, and probably
never will be! It is a living document with space for contributions
from everyone in the movement and beyond. On each lesson’s page, you
can add your suggestions for tools or ideas that could help make the
insights even more actionable. The playbook will continue to evolve
and grow, and will become even better with every participatory and
inclusive process that we as a movement complete.
If you want to learn more about exactly how all of this was done, I
encourage you to also read this outstanding overview[2], which was put
together by the movement strategy core team and chronologically
outlines each step that was taken to create the recommendations.
I’d like to say a huge heartfelt thank you to everyone who took part
in this process: all the working group members, the community members,
as well as affiliates and the Wikimedia Foundation who provided input
and helped shape the recommendations, and of course to my wonderful
colleagues in the movement strategy core team. It’s been such an
exciting, eventful, exhausting and overly rewarding experience for me
to navigate through this endeavour with you all.
And now: Happy reading!
Nicole
Note that we have also published a blog post with more context and key
findings on the global Diff blog[3] as well as on Wikimedia
Deutschland’s blog, in both English and German[4].
[1] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Strategy/Wikimedia_movement/2018-20/Reports…
[2] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Strategy/Wikimedia_movement/2018-20/Reports…
[3] https://diff.wikimedia.org/2021/05/25/movement-strategy-playbook-creating-a…
[4] https://blog.wikimedia.de/2021/05/25/ein-regelbuch-fuer-open-strategy-das-m…
--
Nicole Ebber
Director Movement Strategy and Global Relations
Wikimedia Deutschland e. V. | Tempelhofer Ufer 23-24 | 10963 Berlin
Phone: +49 30 219 158 26-0
https://wikimedia.de
Keep up to date! Current news and exciting stories about Wikimedia,
Wikipedia and Free Knowledge in our newsletter (in German):
https://www.wikimedia.de/newsletter/
Wikimedia Deutschland – Gesellschaft zur Förderung Freien Wissens e.
V. Eingetragen im Vereinsregister des Amtsgerichts
Berlin-Charlottenburg unter der Nummer 23855 B. Als gemeinnützig
anerkannt durch das Finanzamt für Körperschaften I Berlin,
Steuernummer 27/029/42207.
Dear Wikimedia Community Members,
It’s finally here! The session submission guidelines for the first ever
virtual Wikimania are live! You can view them here
<https://diff.wikimedia.org/tag/wikimania-2021/> on DIFF. The Wikimania
2021 Event Wiki will also go live next week, we’ll start to host all
further updates there!
Session submissions will open on Monday 24th of May! We will share where
you will be able to do this.
Reading all of this information could leave you with questions. We
therefore will be making ourselves available for office hours. More
information on when and how to engage with us will be provided next week.
In the meantime you can leave your questions for the Core Organizing Team
here:
https://wikimania.wikimedia.org/wiki/2021:Wikimania_Submission_help_desk
Best Wishes,
Winnie Kabintie (User:Ms_Kabintie
<https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Ms_Kabintie>), on behalf of the
Wikimania 2021 Core Organizing Team.
Dear All,
We are pleased to invite you to attend the first virtual office hours for
the Africa Wiki Challenge <http://awc.ofwafrica.org/> (AWC).
The virtual office hours are periods dedicated to attend to the needs of
anyone participating or interested to learn more about the AWC campaign.
The office hours will be hosted via Google Meet once every week on Fridays
as listed below.
Why is it important to attend?
The virtual office hours provide you the opportunity to connect with others
across different time zones to share ideas and have your questions
addressed. It also provides a unique opportunity for you to learn and
increase your knowledge about Wikipedia and its sister projects.
Who is eligible to attend?
Participants, organizers, partners, editors, as well as anyone who is
interested to learn more about the AWC campaign.
Virtual Office Hours via Google Meet
Kindly join any of the virtual office hours by clicking any of the meeting
link below:
- Friday 21st May, 2021 5pm-6pm UTC
<https://meet.google.com/gnv-zjau-eiy>
-
Friday 28th May, 2021 3pm - 4pm UTC
<https://meet.google.com/ntg-tdgh-znw>
-
Friday 3rd June, 2021 3pm - 4pm UTC
<https://meet.google.com/njh-vrrs-hup>
-
Friday 11th June, 2021 3pm - 4pm UTC
<https://meet.google.com/dbi-rzdv-piw>
-
Friday 18th June, 2021 3pm - 4pm UTC
<https://meet.google.com/zkh-qmwc-omu>
-
Friday 25th June, 2021 3pm - 4pm UTC
<https://meet.google.com/vwb-xdao-okf>
What the Africa Wiki Challenge (AWC) is about!
The Africa Wiki Challenge <http://awc.ofwafrica.org/> is an online writing
campaign that is aimed at generating African-related content on Wikipedia
by Africans, people of African descent and Africans in the diaspora. The
campaign invites content creation along different selected topics/themes
annually, this year focuses on “Landmarks in Africa'' and runs from 23rd
May to June 30th 2021.
The theme, Landmarks in Africa, solicits written content on the many
landmarks that cover historical, cultural, geographical and places of
national or continental significance. The campaign will also encourage
visualisation of these articles by adding/uploading photos, audios or
videos. Such items or landmarks of interest include:
-
Monuments - Statues, Memorials, Historic buildings, Archaeological
sites, etc.
-
National Demarcations - Districts, Municipalities, Metropolitan,
Regions, States, etc.
-
Geographical Endowments - Mountains, Valleys, Forests, Waterfalls,
Wildlife Reserves, Beaches, etc.
-
Infrastructural Developments - Roads, Hospitals, Churches, Mosques,
Schools, Rails, Water parks, Hotels, Theme parks, etc.
Africa is the second (2nd) largest continent on the planet, and very little
information about it means the lack of visibility for a substantive chunk
of human knowledge and history. We are convinced that Africa deserves to be
substantially covered and definitely has a lot to showcase to the world.
Visit the Africa Wiki Challenge <http://awc.ofwafrica.org/> website for
more information.
Thank you.
Regards,
Ruby
--
Ruby D-Brown
Administrative Executive
Open Foundation West Africa
ofwafrica.org
Hello all,
In this month’s showcase, we have two presentations on the importance and
value of Wikipedia outside of Wikipedia. In the first talk, Nick Vincent
will present results on the importance of Wikipedia for search engines in
which they looked how often and where Wikipedia links appeared in search
results of Google, Bing, DuckDuckGo, etc. In the second talk, Tiziano
Piccardi will present a recent study on the value of Wikipedia’s links to
external websites by quantifying the amount of traffic generated by those
links and analyzing for which types of articles Wikipedia acts as a
stepping stone to the intended destination.
Time/date: May 19, 16:30 UTC (9:30am PT/ 12:30pm ET/ 18:30pm CET)
Youtube-link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VoX5rFNzkXs
Talk 1
Speaker: Nick Vincent (Northwestern University, USA)
Title: The Importance of Wikipedia to Search Engines and Other Systems
Abstract: A growing body of work has highlighted the important role that
Wikipedia’s volunteer-created content plays in helping search engines
achieve their core goal of addressing the information needs of hundreds of
millions of people. In this talk, I will discuss a recent study looking at
how often, and where, Wikipedia links appear in search engine results. In
this study, we found that Wikipedia links appeared prominently and
frequently in Google, Bing, and DuckDuckGo results, though less often for
searches from a mobile device. I will connect this study to past work
looking at the value of Wikipedia links to other online platforms, and to
ongoing discussions around Wikipedia's value as a training source for
modern AI.
Related paper:
-
A Deeper Investigation of the Importance of Wikipedia Links to Search
Engine Results. To Appear in CSCW 2021.
https://nickmvincent.com/static/wikiserp_cscw.pdf (pdf)
Talk 2
Speaker: Tiziano Piccardi (EPFL, Switzerland)
Title: On the Value of Wikipedia as a Gateway to the Web
Abstract: By linking to external websites, Wikipedia can act as a gateway
to the Web. However, little is known about the amount of traffic generated
by Wikipedia's external links. We fill this gap in a detailed analysis of
usage logs gathered from Wikipedia users' client devices. We discovered
that in one month, English Wikipedia generated 43M clicks to external
websites, with the highest click-through rate on the official links listed
in the infoboxes. Our analysis highlights that the articles about
businesses, educational institutions, and websites show the highest
engagement, and for some content, Wikipedia act as a stepping stone to the
intended destination. We conclude our analysis by quantifying the
hypothetical economic value of the clicks received by external websites. We
estimate that the respective website owners would need to pay a total of
$7--13 million per month to obtain the same volume of traffic via sponsored
search. These findings shed light on Wikipedia's role not only as an
important source of information but also as a high-traffic gateway to the
broader Web ecosystem.
Related paper:
-
On the Value of Wikipedia as a Gateway to the Web. WWW 2021.
https://arxiv.org/pdf/2102.07385 (pdf)
--
Janna Layton (she/her)
Administrative Associate - Product & Technology
Wikimedia Foundation <https://wikimediafoundation.org/>