Wikimedia-in-chn May 2011

wikimedia-in-chn@lists.wikimedia.org

5 participants
7 discussions

WikifyIndia
by Sohel Bohra 21 Jun '11

21 Jun '11

[[This is a lengthy mail and is cross-posted on all mailing lists. Kindly bear]] Dear Wikimedians, We interact with the government on multiple occasions. The problems are all too familiar - complex systems, official apathy, corruption - just to name a few. Some trivia and stats to qualify these claims: * Entrepreneurs identified increasing the speed and ease of issuing permits; lowering taxes; and reducing the time it takes to start a business as key issues. (Note - All issues relate to government interactions; Source - Legatum Institute) * In Mumbai, there are 37 procedural hoops to jump through to gain approval to build a warehouse. (Source : World Bank) * On the Corruption Perception Index (2010), India ranks 87th of 178 countries * Indians are highest ranked in volume of search for terms such as government rules, passport and registration (Source - Google Trends) Here's where WikifyIndia - a wiki of government procedures - kicks in. If Wikipedia is the Thinkers Encyclopedia, WikifyIndia is the Doer's Encyclopedia We (the founders) are ardent believers of the Wikipedia model and want to apply it to government procedures. Our belief is that ordinary citizens suffer for two reasons – the process is complex and accurate information is unavailable. WikifyIndia addresses the latter. Agents distort information to suit themselves. Officials are rarely friendly. The best solution has always been to ask someone who has ‘been through the grind’. WikifyIndia does it on a national level. The scope of the Project is wide ranging. From getting into the armed forces to filing a Right To Information request, from complaining about a broken traffic signal to opening a restaurant, from changing your name to adopting a child, from applying for euthanasia to marrying in court, from getting a gun permit to filing your taxes, from getting a permit to climb peaks to getting a gas connection, it will all be there. www.wikifyindia.com Every article is expected to have a short intro, requirements/eligibility, procedure, list of documents, timings, fees, application form, sample certificate among other details. Unlike Wikipedia, WikifyIndia is also a forum. There is merit in aggregating experiences (for ex. visa experiences can be quite varied). Current approaches on the internet are inadequate. Information is retrieved from Q&A forums, blog posts, agent or government sites. It is incomplete and outdated. Wikipedia has proved that a bottom approach is far more suitable in some areas than any top down approach (where a group is formally trying to organise information). Even if someone did a good job, they wouldn't be able to distribute it for free. WikifyIndia complements Wikipedia. The article on Civil Marriage in Wikipedia is written differently from the same article on WikifyIndia. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_marriage http://www.wikifyindia.com/wiki/Civil_Marriage When WikifyIndia has adequate accurate content, it will reduce what economists call 'transaction costs'. Any tool to improve productivity of citizens, entrepreneurs and organisations will be directly contributing to the Indian economy. To the best of our knowledge, there is no other site with a similar approach in any other country. We urge you to jump in and make a difference. WikifyIndia is a non-profit initiative free of advertising and is being run by a small fund created by the Founders. We (the founders) have cribbed about a @#$% and rotten system for far too long. WikifyIndia is our way of doing something about it. We ask for your complete support in adding content, sharing experiences, creating templates and technical support. The goal is for every government procedure to be available in every Indian language with complete and accurate guidelines. If a farmer's wife in Manipur wants to get employed under Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme, she should have all the information and forms on the site in her language. Thank you for your time and patience, Anish and Sohel [User:Sbohra]

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Fwd: Request for a Team to guide college students for open source projects
by Shrinivasan T 31 May '11

31 May '11

---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Shrinivasan T <tshrinivasan(a)gmail.com> Date: Wed, Jun 1, 2011 at 1:54 AM Subject: Request for a Team to guide college students for open source projects To: ILUG-C <ilugc(a)ae.iitm.ac.in> Friends. Today morning, I had a discussion with HOD MCA Dept, Panimalar Engg College, Chennai. They are willing to encourage their 180 final year students to do projects in open source technologies. They need our support in the following areas. 1. Training on various FOSS languages and technologies 2. Helping the students to select open source projects to contribute 3. Mentoring the students during the development period I showed the following pages. http://wiki.ilugc.in/index.php?title=Projects_List http://wiki.ilugc.in/index.php?title=Projects_Mentors They are highly interested to see these pages. The staff will be their internal guide and we have to be as external guides. We have 2 semesters. We can use 1 semester for training and the next for project development. Students will be available from 3.30 - 5.30 pm daily. This is a great opportunity for us to bring more open source contributors. When the staff and students from are willing to contribute, industry should help them to make it into reality. I ensured them as to give a proposal within this week. We have to plan for the following things. 1. Trainers who can goto college in person to train the students 2. List of open source projects to contribute 3. Mentors for the students We need a huge list of project as all the students have to do individual projects. We need more persons to participate in the huge project of turning students into contributors. Please share your thoughts here, on how to proceed further. Note: All the efforts will be rewarded by the college management. -- Regards, T.Shrinivasan My Life with GNU/Linux : http://goinggnu.wordpress.com Free/Open Source Jobs : http://fossjobs.in Get CollabNet Subversion Edge : http://www.collab.net/svnedge -- Regards, T.Shrinivasan My Life with GNU/Linux : http://goinggnu.wordpress.com Free/Open Source Jobs : http://fossjobs.in Get CollabNet Subversion Edge : http://www.collab.net/svnedge

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Wikipedia for World Heritage Online Petition
by naveenkumar palaniswamy 29 May '11

29 May '11

Hello all, I have signed the petition of the "WIKIPEDIA for WORLD Heritage". This petition is useful for the protection of wikipedia and protection of free knowledge. And also please do translations in Indian languages. Thank you, p.naveenkumar For details: http://wikipedia.de/ http://wikipedia.de/wke/Petition

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Spoken Tutorial - How can you contribute? - A Discussion with Prof . Kannan
by Shrinivasan T 21 May '11

21 May '11

Spoken Tutorial [ http://spoken-tutorial.org ] is a great movement which brings the FOSS technologies in all Indian languages as video tutorials. A video created in one language is being translated to all the indian languages. Thus the FOSS technologies reach all the corners of the India. This national level project is started by IITBombay and Ministry of Human Resources Development. This project needs more contributors to create videos and to translate the existing videos into our languages. Every contribution is credited well by the IITB. Yes, we can get 3,500 INR for a 10 min video. Are you interested in contributing to a national level revolution with FOSS? Find your place here on how to contribute. How can you contribute? Create original video Translate the existing video Verify / QA for the translation Verify / QA for the video creation Spread the news Create a Team in your college etc Prof. Kannan, the head of this project, visits Chennai this weekend. We arrange a meet with him to have a direct interaction on how can we contribute to the project Spoken-Tutorial. Date : May 20, 2011 Sunday [ Tomorrow ] Time : 4.00 - 6.00 pm Place : MS - 241, Seminar Hall, Department of Chemical Engg, Mechanical Science Block, IIT Madras, Chennai Landmark : Next to Humanities Science Block, The same road from the Gajendra Circle that we goto the aero space engg. All are invited. Spread the news and bring the interested people. Let us contribute to the national revolution through FOSS. -- Regards, T.Shrinivasan My Life with GNU/Linux : http://goinggnu.wordpress.com Free/Open Source Jobs : http://fossjobs.in Get CollabNet Subversion Edge : http://www.collab.net/svnedge

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Re: [Wikimedia-in-chn] India Programs: Team Selection: Call for Talent!
by Hisham Mundol 05 May '11

05 May '11

Hi All (cross-posting pan-india; apologies if you get this more than once.) A few of you have reached out and suggested modifications / corrections in the postings. I've made these. Thank you for your inputs. Please see the revised ones : Wiki http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/RFP/Consultant,_Participation_-_India_P… http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/RFP/Consultant,_Indic_Initiatives_-_Ind… LinkedIn http://www.linkedin.com/jobs?viewJob=&jobId=1592308 http://www.linkedin.com/jobs?viewJob=&jobId=1592351 Many thanks Hisham Mundol Wikimedia Foundation India Programs skype: hisham.wikimedia gtalk: hmundol(a)wikimedia.org twitter: @mundol On May 4, 2011, at 10:06 AM, Hisham Mundol wrote: > Hi All > > I'm writing to inform you that the selection process for 2 of the 4 potential new team members of the India Programs team has started. These have been posted on Office as well as LinkedIn. They can be seen at the at the following locations: > > Wiki > http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/RFP/Consultant,_Participation_-_India_P… > http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/RFP/Consultant,_Indic_Initiatives_-_Ind… > > LinkedIn > http://www.linkedin.com/jobs?viewJob=&jobId=1592308 > http://www.linkedin.com/jobs?viewJob=&jobId=1592351 > > Can I request a few things. > > a) India Programs is extremely keen on having existing Wikimedians on board in the team. I therefore invite and urge anyone from the existing community to respond to either / both of these. As you will make out from the wordings, there is a clear preference for those who are already involved in the community. > b) Please do forward this mail to anyone you know who you think might be interested. While they may not be from the existing community, you are best placed to know your who would fit into the movement and who might be interested. > c) Please do broadcast these links on any other mailing lists, bulletin boards, various social networks (twitter, facebook, etc.), etc. so that we can reach more potential candidates / remind potential candidates. > > Please do not hesitate to contact me for any clarifications. > > Many thanks. > > Hisham Mundol > Wikimedia Foundation India Programs > skype: hisham.wikimedia > > gtalk: hmundol(a)wikimedia.org > twitter: @mundol >

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India Programs IRC : Thursday May5th 2011 @ 8pm IST (GMT + 5:30) : #wikimedia-office
by Hisham Mundol 05 May '11

05 May '11

Hi Folks (cross-posting to reach all-India; apologies if you get multiple messages.) Our regular monthly IRC on India Programs is on the 1st Thursday of every month. Please do join in this evening (details are in the subject of this mail.) The agenda is to share an update on India Programs (such as the India Campus Program, the Campus Ambassadors initiative and building the team for India Programs.) Needless to say, we will also discuss any other areas that you wish to cover. I look forward to as many of you as can make it. Many thanks. Warm Regards, Hisham Mundol Wikimedia Foundation India Programs skype: hisham.wikimedia gtalk: hmundol(a)wikimedia.org twitter: @mundol

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Fwd: India Programs: Team Selection: Call for Talent!
by Hisham Mundol 04 May '11

04 May '11

cross posting to local India lists Hisham Mundol Wikimedia Foundation India Programs skype: hisham.wikimedia gtalk: hmundol(a)wikimedia.org twitter: @mundol Begin forwarded message: > From: Hisham Mundol <hmundol(a)wikimedia.org> > Date: May 4, 2011 10:06:31 AM GMT+05:30 > To: Wikimedia India Community list <wikimediaindia-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org> > Subject: India Programs: Team Selection: Call for Talent! > > Hi All > > I'm writing to inform you that the selection process for 2 of the 4 potential new team members of the India Programs team has started. These have been posted on Office as well as LinkedIn. They can be seen at the at the following locations: > > Wiki > http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/RFP/Consultant,_Participation_-_India_P… > http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/RFP/Consultant,_Indic_Initiatives_-_Ind… > > LinkedIn > http://www.linkedin.com/jobs?viewJob=&jobId=1592308 > http://www.linkedin.com/jobs?viewJob=&jobId=1592351 > > Can I request a few things. > > a) India Programs is extremely keen on having existing Wikimedians on board in the team. I therefore invite and urge anyone from the existing community to respond to either / both of these. As you will make out from the wordings, there is a clear preference for those who are already involved in the community. > b) Please do forward this mail to anyone you know who you think might be interested. While they may not be from the existing community, you are best placed to know your who would fit into the movement and who might be interested. > c) Please do broadcast these links on any other mailing lists, bulletin boards, various social networks (twitter, facebook, etc.), etc. so that we can reach more potential candidates / remind potential candidates. > > Please do not hesitate to contact me for any clarifications. > > Many thanks. > > Hisham Mundol > Wikimedia Foundation India Programs > skype: hisham.wikimedia > > gtalk: hmundol(a)wikimedia.org > twitter: @mundol >

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Wikimedia-in-chn May 2011