http://opensource.com/life/13/4/increasing-foss-participation
Marina Zhurakhinskaya has a very factual roundup of the recent outreach
programs that help in increasing FLOSS participation by women.
"Targeted outreach programs have proven to be very effective in bringing
in women who are interested in technology, but who have stayed out of
particularly male-dominated areas....These efforts address the reasons
women are staying out by reassuring women there is a supportive
environment and providing a focused opportunity to gain experience...."
Wikimedia Foundation participated in the last round of the internship
program she mentions, and also will participate in the next round.
--
Sumana Harihareswara
Engineering Community Manager
Wikimedia Foundation
Hi everyone,
I'm the former Wikipedian in Residence at the Smithsonian, and it was an
opportunity that changed my career path and allowed me to make
connections in the GLAM industry - and a chance to improve the world's
largest encyclopedia and its' sister projects. If you, or someone you
know, is a student with experience in editing Wikipedia and would like
to live in Washington DC (or does live there) for the summer and get
paid a stipend - please apply!!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:GLAM/SI/WIR
I'd love to see more WIR women - right now I think there are only
two-four of us internationally and about 20 men! :)
I'm happy to provide any off list input about working there, if you'd like.
-Sarah
--
*Sarah Stierch*
*/Museumist and open culture advocate/*
>>Visit sarahstierch.com <http://sarahstierch.com><<
Hi all,
We will be celebrating a workshop and editathon on Wikipedia and gendergap topics in Madrid, Spain, next week, on the 15th and 16th of April. More info is available here:
http://medialab-prado.es/article/taller_edicion_wikipedia
If you can make it, we would love to see you there. If not, we will let you know how it goes!
Kind regards,
María
Enviado desde mi dispositivo móvil
Hi all -
Today I helped run an editathon at an all-women's cooperative in Berkeley.
We attracted maybe fifteen or twenty people over the course of the day, and
focused most of our editing on prominent historical women active in the
cooperative movement. I think we created a number of neat articles,
although they all have a lot of room for improvement (which hopefully will
be coming in part from our new editors - engagement was much higher than I
am used to for an event like this!) We also improved a number of existing
articles.
These are the articles we created:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alice_Aclandhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tanzania_Federation_of_Co-operativeshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Margaret_Llewelyn_Davieshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catherine_Webb_(Co-operative_Activist)
There's little information about most of these women online, but there's an
awful lot available in books. The sources we had today would've allowed us
to expand the articles a lot further than we did, but we were operating
under some time constraints (plus the whole teaching people wikicode part.)
If anyone is further interested in expanding these articles (especially
those about Alice, Margaret, or Catherine,) there's a huge amount of
information available about them in these books:
*The woman with the basket; the history of the Women's Co-operative Guild,
1883-1927. By Catherine Webb
*The matriarchs of England's cooperative movement : a study in gender
politics and female leadership, 1883-1921 / Barbara J. Blaszak
*Feminism and the politics of working women : the Women's Co-operative
Guild, 1880s to the Second War Main
*Caring & Sharing, the Centenary History of the Co-operative Women's Guild
As well as information in a decent number of other books, though not
much available online. If anyone feels like improving these articles
further, it'd be awesome, and we'll get to improving them ourselves
eventually otherwise :)
Just figured I'd share some happiness,
Kevin Gorman
Please see below. I really don't know what to say right now except <3
you Sue. (And let's hope another woman leads WMF ;) )
-Sarah
-------- Original Message --------
Subject: [Wikimedia-l] Announcement *please read*
Date: Wed, 27 Mar 2013 15:04:49 -0700
From: Sue Gardner <sgardner(a)wikimedia.org>
Reply-To: Wikimedia Mailing List <wikimedia-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org>
To: Wikimedia Mailing List <wikimedia-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org>
Hello Wikimedia community members,
This is not an easy e-mail to write, and it’s been a very hard
decision to make. But I’m writing to tell you that I’m planning to
leave my position as the Executive Director of the Wikimedia
Foundation.
My departure isn’t imminent -- the Board and I anticipate it’ll take
at least six months to recruit my successor, and I’ll be fully engaged
as Executive Director all through the recruitment process and until we
have a new person in place. We’re expecting that’ll take about six
months or so, and so this note is not goodbye -- not yet.
Making the decision to leave hasn’t been easy, but it comes down to two things.
First, the movement and the Wikimedia Foundation are in a strong place
now. When I joined, the Foundation was tiny and not yet able to
reliably support the projects. Today it's healthy, thriving, and a
competent partner to the global network of Wikimedia volunteers. If
that wasn’t the case, I wouldn’t feel okay to leave. In that sense, my
leaving is a vote of confidence in our Board and executive team and
staff --- I know they will ably steer the Foundation through the years
ahead, and I’m confident the Board will appoint a strong successor to
me.
And I feel that although we’re in good shape, with a promising future,
the same isn’t true for the internet itself. (This is thing number
two.) Increasingly, I’m finding myself uncomfortable about how the
internet’s developing, who’s influencing its development, and who is
not. Last year we at Wikimedia raised an alarm about SOPA/PIPA, and
now CISPA is back. Wikipedia has experienced censorship at the hands
of industry groups and governments, and we’re --increasingly, I
think-- seeing important decisions made by unaccountable
non-transparent corporate players, a shift from the open web to mobile
walled gardens, and a shift from the production-based internet to one
that’s consumption-based. There are many organizations and individuals
advocating for the public interest online -- what’s good for ordinary
people -- but other interests are more numerous and powerful than they
are. I want that to change. And that’s what I want to do next.
I’ve always aimed to make the biggest contribution I can to the
general public good. Today, this is pulling me towards a new and
different role, one very much aligned with Wikimedia values and
informed by my experiences here, and with the purpose of amplifying
the voices of people advocating for the free and open internet. I
don’t know exactly what this will look like -- I might write a book,
or start a non-profit, or work in partnership with something that
already exists. Either way, I feel strongly that this is what I need
to do.
I feel an increasing sense of urgency around this. That said, I also
feel a strong sense of responsibility (and love!) for the Wikimedia
movement, and so I’ve agreed with the Board that I’ll stay on as
Executive Director until we have my successor in place. That’ll take
some time -- likely, at least six months.
Until then, nothing changes. The Wikimedia Foundation has lots of work
to do, and you can expect me to focus fully on it until we have a new
Executive Director in place.
I have many people to thank, but I’m not going to do it now --
there’ll be time for that later. For now, I’ll just say I love working
with you all, I’m proud of everything the Wikimedia movement is
accomplishing, and I’m looking forward to our next six months
together.
Jan-Bart’s going to write a note in a couple of minutes with
information about the transition process. We’ll be hosting office
hours this weekend as well, so anybody with questions can ask them
here or turn up to talk with us on IRC.
Thanks,
Sue
_______________________________________________
Wikimedia-l mailing list
Wikimedia-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org
Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l
Mako has just blogged this about the conference (which i've been helping
to organize!):
On the weekend of April 20-21, Students for Free Culture is
going to be holding its annual conference, FCX2013, at New York
Law School in New York City. As a long-time SFC supporter and
member, I am enormously proud to be giving the opening keynote
address.
Although the program for Sunday is still shaping up, the
published Saturday schedule looks great. If previous years are
any indication, the conference can serve as an incredible
introduction to free culture, free software, wikis, remixing,
copyright, patent and trademark reform, and participatory
culture. For folks that are already deeply involved, FCX is
among the best places I know to connect with other passionate,
creative, people working on free culture issues.
I’ve been closely following and involved with SFC for years and
I am particularly excited about the group that is driving the
organization forward this year. If you will be in or near New
York that weekend — or if you can make the trip — you should
definitely try to attend.
FCX2013 is pay what you can with a $15 suggested donation. You
can register online now. Travel assistance — especially for
members of active SFC chapters — may still be available. I hope
to see you there!
via:
http://mako.cc/copyrighteous/students-for-free-culture-conference-fcx2013
It's coming up pretty soon, but I wanted to ping everyone about it again
to see if anyone is able to go.
Also, if you have a blog, or some social media profile (reddit, twitter,
statusnet, tumblr) would you be willing to help spread the word about
the conference? I submitted Mako's post on a few sites already:
http://www.reddit.com/r/linux/duplicates/1br044/if_youre_near_ny_dont_miss_…https://twitter.com/freeculture/status/320292374062448640https://identi.ca/notice/100500818
Best,
Kyra
--
Board of Directors, Students for Free Culture: www.freeculture.org
Blog: http://thesilentnumber.me - StatusNet Microblog:
http://identi.ca/kxra
Email: kxra(a)freeculture.org - SMS: +1.617.340.3661
Jabber/XMPP: kxra(a)riseup.net - IRC: kxra @freenode @oftc @indymedia
Did anyone see this? A popular blogger on Science (with more than 4
million followers) is a woman. The woman herself, Elise Andrew, had no
idea it was a secret, and she was "outed" when she announced her
twitter account featuring a picture of herself. Apparently the bias
occurred because of the swear word on her facebook page which made
readers assume she was a man. Interesting conclusion! This is a
facebook hype that deserves a WP page, no?
article is here:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/us-news-blog/2013/mar/20/i-love-science-w…
facebook page here:
http://www.facebook.com/IFeakingLoveScience
The TV interview with Dr. Michio Kaku on CBS morning show is here:
http://cbsn.ws/109mAEL