Hello all,
Every year, the month of October is dedicated to celebrating Wikidata’s birthday, as our favorite Wikimedia project went live on October 29th, 2012. Since then, we’ve been celebrating together the achievements of the community, bringing together active editors and newcomers, and taking this opportunity to do outreach and bring more people onboard.
This year, for Wikidata’s 12th birthday, we would love to see many decentralized community events taking place all around the world in October and November.
Whether you are involved in a local chapter or user group, or in touch with another organization that could organize an event, or simply interested in connecting with other Wikidata editors, we invite you to start thinking about organizing a Wikidata birthday event in the upcoming months!
On the Twelfth Birthday page, you will find more information about the birthday and how to organize an event.
Wikidata birthday decentralized events are organized by local groups within the Wikidata community, onsite as well as online. They can take many forms and can be adapted to the wishes, languages, favorite topics and interests of the local group. It can be for example:
A meetup / get together with your local/regional community to share a piece of birthday cake ;
An online editing campaign to improve Wikidata together on a specific topic ;
A moment dedicated to celebrating Wikidata’s birthday during a Wikimedia conference ;
A “translathon” to improve the labels of Wikidata in your language ;
A workshop in a library or university to get more people aware of Wikidata ;
A livestream presentation to showcase interesting tools ;
…and many other things!
On the How to run an event page, you will find many other examples of events, and you can take inspiration from the past years and what other people have been organizing.
You will also find a communication kit with visuals that you can use to communicate about your event, and instructions on how to add your event to the global schedule.
If you are planning an event for Wikidata’s birthday, you may need some financial support in order to run the event smoothly. On the Funding page, you will find some useful information about how to get funding, to help your participants join or to provide equipment or refreshments.
What is new this year: Wikimedia Deutschland will run an experiment on providing microgrants to fund projects related to the Wikidata birthday. These grants, of a maximum amount of 1,000€, will be provided to the selected projects after an application process that is running until September 1st. You also have the option to ask for WMF’s Rapid Fund if the amount or eligibility criteria work better for you. You will find all the information about how to apply and what to prepare on the Funding page.
If you are interested in organizing an event, we strongly encourage you to do it together with other people. We suggest that you reach out to your local affiliate to get logistical and communication support, or to other Wikidata editors who share similar interests, for example your favorite WikiProject.
You are also very welcome to join the Wikidata Events Telegram group, in which you will find other community organizers who have been running events in the past and can answer your questions or provide inspiration. On top of that, we are running organizers office hours from July to October: you can join these online meetings to connect with other organizers and ask questions to the coordination team.
I’m looking forward to hearing about your Wikidata birthday events, and I’m available at lea.lacroix_ext@wikimedia.de if you have any questions.
Best,
--Léa LacroixCommunity Engagement & Events ConsultantContractor for Wikimedia Deutschland e.V.