Hello Wikimedians!
We are excited to finally start coordinating among #1lib1ref organizers this month.
If you haven’t yet, we invite you to read the lessons that we learned from last year’s great campaign:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/The_Wikipedia_Library/1Lib1Ref/Lessons
As with last year, we hope to launch #1lib1ref on Wikipedia’s 16th birthday in January, asking librarians to “Give a birthday present to Wikipedia, by adding a reference”.
What’s new?
Last year we got a lot of feedback from librarians that they would have planned more activities if “they just had a bit more warning and time” so we are extending the campaign from eight days to 19 days, from January 15 through February 3.
We hope this does two things: a) it allows for several waves of communications and people adopting the campaign for local events and b) fits better with the start of the Spring Term at many universities in the Northern Hemisphere, where librarians are in demand for various activities.
We also noticed last year a lot of social media about informal gatherings: librarians wanted to learn about Wikipedia socially at physical events. We think this is a great opportunity, so the Wikipedia Library team is developing a coffee hour kit that provides enough material to help librarians coordinate a small gathering, where they can talk about Wikipedia with their peers and add their one reference.
The kit is going to include: a) recommendations for planning, b) a series of discussion questions, c) easy suggested activities, and d) a flyer template for promoting the event locally. If you would like to help build the kit, or a new 1lib1ref logo, let us know.
How you can help
We hope the campaign offers a platform for engaging librarians in your region and context to learn more about Wikimedia projects. We know librarians use Wikipedia for a variety of purposes, but the campaign’s story--specifically how our references work--becomes a shared foundation for understanding and entering our community. If you would like to coordinate #1lib1ref in your area, here are the main steps:
Join the Wikipedia + Libraries Facebook group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/wikilibrary
Fill out this survey: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSflWCp9QkNbIZWXCWU02bp_FGCAua4Z6UaBj7P6Gcn1csT-6g/viewform
Review Citation Hunt -- a volunteer-developed tool that allows for randomly being offered a citation. Check if your language is supported in the top right.
Report Bugs or request features or language support: https://github.com/eggpi/citationhunt/issues
Review Hashtag Tracking -- a way to track edits made through the edit summary field.
Report bugs or request features or language support: https://github.com/hatnote/hashtags/issues/new
Translate the campaign page to your local language. We want to have it ready for translation no later than November 10th and will notify you with an email that it’s ready.
Begin reaching out to partners that you think will want to participate during the campaign through a) communications or b) activities.
We look forward to collaborating with you! Thanks so much for your help--it should be a lot of fun.
Best,
Alex Stinson