<div class="gmail_quote"><br><b>The Hindustan Times : "Wikipedia plumbs for more Marathi articles"</b><div><a href="http://epaper.hindustantimes.com/PUBLICATIONS/HT/HM/2011/11/10/ArticleHtmls/Wikipedia-plumbs-for-more-Marathi-articles-10112011004008.shtml?Mode=1" target="_blank">http://epaper.hindustantimes.com/PUBLICATIONS/HT/HM/2011/11/10/ArticleHtmls/Wikipedia-plumbs-for-more-Marathi-articles-10112011004008.shtml?Mode=1</a></div>
<div><br></div><div><div><i>Lack of digital archiving, limited Indian references and difficulty in accessing the Devnagari script are the main reasons for the lack of contributions made to the Marathi Wikipedia page, said <b>Pranav Curumsey</b>, chairperson of WikiConference 2011, at a press conference on Wednesday.</i></div>
<div><i>“While the English Wikipedia page has more than four million articles, the Marathi page has barely 35,000 articles,“ said <b>Mandar Kulkarni</b>, editor of Marathi Wikipedia.</i></div><div><i><br></i></div><div><i>The WikiConference 2011, organised by the Mumbai Wikipedia community and the Wikimedia Chapter (India), will be held from November 18 to 20 at the Mumbai University Convocation Hall.</i></div>
<div><i><br></i></div><div><i>The conference will have a Marathi track, including paper presentations and a group discussion on encouraging Wikipedia users to contribute to the Marathi page of the webbased encyclopedia project. The three-day conference will have <b>Jimmy Wales</b>, founder and chairman of the Wikimedia Foundation, will address attendees during the three-day conference. “Out of the 700 seats, only 50 are vacant at the moment,“ said Hisham Mundol, consultant, Wikimedia Foundation, India.</i></div>
<div><i><br></i></div><div><i>The conference will have paper presentations on topics such as Wiki for the Blind, WikiBhasha: Our Experiences with Multilingual Content and Legal aspects of Wiki culture.</i></div><div><i><br>
</i></div><div><i>“We will also have a panel discussion on Wiki Women Web: Bridging the Gender Gap, which will encourage more women to write and edit articles on our page,“ said Curumsey. “Even at the conference, only 14 % of the total registrations include women. We need to change this mindset,“ he added.</i></div>
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