Dear all,
We from the Centre for Internet and Society (CIS-A2K) thank you all for your support and collaboration and wish you a very Happy New Year. We bring you the details of our work for the month of January 2014:
CIS-A2K, KIIT University and Kalinga Institute of Social Sciences sign MoUs
KIIT University, Kalinga Institute of Social Sciences and the Centre for Internet and Society's Access to Knowledge team (CIS-A2K) have entered into a memorandum of understanding (MoUs) for furthering Odia Wikipedia. Dr.Achyuta Samanta, Founder-Chairman of KIIT and KISS inaugurated both the collaborations formally. Dr. Sasmitarani Samanta, Registrar, KIIT and Surjya Kanta Mohanty, Chief Operating Officer, KISS signed the MoUs of KIIT and KISS respectively whereas T. Vishnuvardhan, Programme Director, CIS-A2K was there to sign in both the MoUs on behalf of CIS along with Subhashish Panigrahi, Programme Officer, CIS-A2K: http://bit.ly/1j1qtFv.
Article
Odia Wikipedia: Three Years of Active Contributions Gives Life to a Ten Year Old Project (by Subhashish Panigrahi, HASTAC, January 31, 2014): http://bit.ly/1jvxD8r.
WikiSangamotsavam 2013 brings Indian Wikimedians together (by Netha Hussain and Subhashish Panigrahi, DNA, January 14, 2014). The article was edited by Rohini Lakshane: http://bit.ly/1jvynKP.
Blog Entries
Wikipedia Editing as Assessment Tool in the Indian Higher Education Classroom (by Dr. Tejaswini Niranjana, Ashwin Kumar A.P. and T. Vishnu Vardhan, January 30, 2014): http://bit.ly/1m5QHMD.
Wikipedia at Forefront in Christ University (by Syed Muzamiluddin, January 29, 2014): http://bit.ly/LTFA8E.
Events Organised
Odia WikiMeetup (Bhubaneswar, January 11, 2014): http://bit.ly/NBkFJi.
Introductory talk about "Wikipedia in Academics" (KIIT School of Technology, Bhubaneswar, January 12, 2014): http://bit.ly/1j1yv1f.
Wikipedia Editing Demonstration at NIE (Nirmala Institue of Education, Goa, January 15, 2014): http://bit.ly/1fmYkKK
Odia Wikipedia's 10th anniversary @ KISS (Kalinga Institute of Social Sciences, Bhubaneswar, January 28, 2014): http://bit.ly/1gsqkJC.
Odia Wikipedia 10th anniversary (Indian Institute of Mass Communication, Dhenkanal, January 29, 2014): http://bit.ly/1dGRBoy.
Event Participated In
The Dynamics of Education to Employment Journey: Opportunities and Challenges (organized by KIIT School of Management, KIIT University, Bhubaneswar, February 21-22, 2014). T. Vishnu Vardhan gave a talk: http://bit.ly/1ePwqHc.
Media Coverage
CIS gave its inputs for the following media coverage:
Digitising contest to preserve rare books in Malayalam (The Hindu, January 4, 2014): http://bit.ly/NBtVgz.
‘With Internet in every pocket, power to the people’ (by Shubhadeep Chaudhury, The Tribune, January 12, 2014): http://bit.ly/1ojb1IZ. Shubhadeep interviews T. Vishnu Vardhan on internet and social media.
ଆଦିବାସୀ ଭାଷାର ଉନ୍ନତିକଳ୍ପେ ଉଇକିପିଡ଼ିଆ (Odishan.com, January 12, 2014): http://bit.ly/1kAWJmG.
KIIT University to lead building free knowledge repository initiative (India Education Diary.com, January 20, 2014): http://bit.ly/1j1Rzwk.
Odisha: KISS to create tribal languages and heritage repository (Odisha Diary Bureau, January 20, 2014): http://bit.ly/1bLBhmB.
FDC recognition for the Centre for the Internet and Society (Wikimedia Foundation, January 30, 2014): http://bit.ly/1fYdxOz. Wikimedia Foundation published a resolution declaring CIS eligible for funding through the Annual Plan Grants program.
Tech-savvy students given tips to enter IT field (The Times of India, January 31, 2014): http://bit.ly/1j1QvIX.
Odia Wikipedia (Sanchar, January 31, 2014): http://bit.ly/1ePwAON.
Wikimedia Foundation has funded A2K to anchor the growth of Wikimedia movement in India. The A2K team consists of six members, four based in Bangalore: T. Vishnu Vardhan, Dr. U.B. Pavanaja, Subhashish Panigrahi and Muzammiluddin Syed, one member Nitika Tandon in Delhi and one Advisor Dr. Tejaswini Niranjana. Archives of our newsletters can be accessed here (http://cis-india.org/about/newsletters). Wikipedians from various communities can request for outreach programs, technical bugs, logistics-merchandize and media, public relations and communications at http://bit.ly/TOcXId.
About CIS
The Centre for Internet and Society is a non-profit research organization that works on policy issues relating to freedom of expression, privacy, accessibility for persons with disabilities, access to knowledge and IPR reform, and openness (including open government, FOSS, open standards, etc.), and engages in academic research on digital natives and digital humanities.
Follow us elsewhere
Twitter: https://twitter.com/CISA2K
CIS group on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/groups/cis.india
Visit us at: https://cis-india.org
Support Us
Please help us defend consumer / citizen rights on the Internet! Write a cheque in favour of ‘The Centre for Internet and Society’ and mail it to us at No. 194, 2nd ‘C’ Cross, Domlur, 2nd Stage, Bengaluru – 5600 71.
Request for Collaboration:
We invite researchers, practitioners, and theoreticians, both organisationally and as individuals, to collaboratively engage with Internet and society and improve our understanding of this new field. To discuss the research collaborations, write to Sunil Abraham, Executive Director, at sunil(a)cis-india.org or Nishant Shah, Director – Research, at nishant(a)cis-india.org. To discuss collaborations on Indic language wikipedia, write to T. Vishnu Vardhan, Programme Director, A2K, at vishnu(a)cis-india.org
CIS is grateful to its donors, Wikimedia Foundation, Ford Foundation, Privacy International, UK, Hans Foundation and the Kusuma Trust which was founded by Anurag Dikshit and Soma Pujari, philanthropists of Indian origin, for its core funding and support for most of its projects.
Thanks
Nitika Tandon
The project page for coordinating online and offline events for
International Women's Day (March 8) and Women's History Month has been
published on Meta at:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Women%27s_History_Month,_India-2014
I urge Indian language editors to add lists of articles to create and
expand as a part of the edit-a-thon:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Women%27s_History_Month,_India-2014/To_do_l…
The theme of the edit-a-thon this year on the English Wikipedia is Women
Parliamentarians. The articles listed for creation, expansion and
improvement as a part of the Lilavati's Daughters edit-a-thon on women
scientists could be taken up again during Women's History Month.
Rohini Lakshané
--
Chairperson (Special Interest Group), Gender gap,
Wikimedia Chapter (India)
Blog: WikipeDNA <http://www.dnaindia.com/blogs/wikipeDNA>
Facebook: WikiWomen's Collaborative
India<https://www.facebook.com/groups/gendergapindia/>
Dear Bangalore Wikimedians,
please see the notice below, about the Wikimedia Foundation visit to
Bangalore next week. Specifically, we would like to meet as many of you as
possible at a meetup, and need your help picking the best time.
Thanks,
Asaf
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Asaf Bartov <abartov(a)wikimedia.org>
Date: Thu, Feb 6, 2014 at 5:02 PM
Subject: WMF visit to Bangalore next week
To: Wikimedia India Community list <wikimediaindia-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org>
Cc: Anasuya Sengupta <asengupta(a)wikimedia.org>, Garfield Byrd <
gbyrd(a)wikimedia.org>, Bishakha Datta <bdatta(a)wikimedia.org>, Sydney Poore <
sydney.poore(a)gmail.com>
Dear Indian Wikimedians,
I pleased to announce a group from the Wikimedia Foundation will be
visiting India next week, staying in Bangalore from Feb 10th through Feb
16th.
The group includes:
1. Garfield Byrd (WMF's Chief of Finance and Administration)
2. Anasuya Sengupta (WMF's Senior Director of Grantmaking)
3. Sydney Poore (volunteer member of the Funds Dissemination Committee
[FDC])
and will be joined in India by WMF Trustee Bishakha Datta.
(I had also been intending to come, but am prevented this time around due
to unexpected issues securing a travelling visa to India.)
WMF staff have been visiting partner organizations and communities over the
past few months, to learn more about their context, achievements and
challenges. More recently, FDC members have been joining them in this
effort. Currently, WMF staff and FDC members are visiting Germany.
One purpose of this visit is to conduct working meetings with the
Foundation's two major partners and grantees in India: the Wikimedia India
(WMIN) chapter and the Centre for Internet and Society (CIS), operating the
Access To Knowledge (A2K) programme.
Additionally, we would like to meet as many Wikimedians as we can, via a
community meetup in Bangalore, and to make ourselves available over digital
channels (at least taking advantage of being in the same timezone) to
community members across India, via open group discussions over IRC. We
are also open to discussion with any interested smaller groups or
individuals, over Skype, Hangout, or telephone, time permitting.
We have put up a rough agenda page up on Meta:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/WMF_India_Visit_Feb_2014
Please feel free to sign up for the meetup or the conversations, and to
raise topics you would like to see addressed, on the talk page.
We greatly regret that logistical issues are preventing us from visiting
other communities in person this time around, and from attending the Telugu
community's 10th anniversary celebrations in Vijayawada.
Cheers,
Asaf Bartov
--
Asaf Bartov
Wikimedia Foundation <http://www.wikimediafoundation.org>
Imagine a world in which every single human being can freely share in the
sum of all knowledge. Help us make it a reality!
https://donate.wikimedia.org
--
Asaf Bartov
Wikimedia Foundation <http://www.wikimediafoundation.org>
Imagine a world in which every single human being can freely share in the
sum of all knowledge. Help us make it a reality!
https://donate.wikimedia.org