As you might be aware, it's Open Access Week! Now in its 8th year, this
annual event highlights the importance of free licensing in scholarly
research. It's a cause strongly aligned with what Wikimedians do.
There are at least two online events involving Wikimedia that you can
engage with regardless of where you live:
* A weeklong virtual edit-a-thon, for Wikipedia articles relating to OA:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/The_Wikipedia_Library/OA_week
* A panel discussion I will moderate next week, about the intersection of
Wikimedia and OA: http://wikistrategies.net/oa-wikipedia-panel/ (This will
be in the evening in the Americas, morning in Asia/Australia; recording
will be available too.)
There are several other, more local events involving Wikipedia and OA:
http://openaccessweek.org/main/search/search?q=Wikipedia+2015
What's happening in your community? Are you planning to participate in any
OA Week activities?
-Pete
[[User:Peteforsyth]]
Hi Ilario,
it is the will of the board to make it easy to start a recognised body to do work and it is totally acceptable if these bodies also die after having fulfilled their purpose - or grow and develop into other affiliation models. So the criterium for us is easy entry.
Anyway the user groups have limited liability and responsibilities, access to ressources is controlled on a case by case basis eg. through the Grant Avisory Committee and every year user groups must be renewed, for this we want so see a simple report. So every ug with the minimum of activity - a report written, having responded to our follow-up e-mail - is renewed.
/Manuel
--
sent from mobile phoneAm 18.10.2015 4:46 nachm. schrieb Ilario Valdelli <valdelli(a)gmail.com>:
>
> I personally think that the main concern, in this proliferation of
> groups, is an lack of the implementation of a "good governance".
>
> A user group is like a body, it can born, can develop and can die.
>
> At the moment there is an unclear guideline about the monitoring and the
> development of these groups: they can only born.
>
> https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_user_groups
>
> Basically the affiliation committee creates these entities, but don't
> monitor them and don't evaluate to retire (or the best would be to
> freeze) some old entities when they become essentially inactive or silent.
>
> In this case the balance would be compensated and the proliferation of
> these groups would have a sense.
>
> Kind regards
>
> On 18.10.2015 16:48, Gregory Varnum wrote:
> > The Affiliations Committee (AffCom) has been preparing for the increased momentum since the user group model was implemented, and it follows a pattern that we’ve been seeing over the past couple of years. In 2013, we approved 10 user groups, last year we approved 19, and so far this year we have approved around 20. That number will likely increase next year. This growing momentum is why we have continued to tweak the approval process to be faster and able to handle the growing momentum. So, from our perspective, this is something we have been preparing for from the start, and not a surprise.
> >
> > Personally, I think further complicating affiliate classifications is a bad idea. “Small” and “larger” are very culturally relative, varies across the models (there are user groups “larger” than chapters), changes over time, and implies that “large” affiliates do work “small” affiliates cannot, when we continue to see that is in fact not the case at all. The current criteria for WMCON is active and inactive, which seems far more appropriate. Additionally, dividing them will not save much money, if any, as there would still presumably be a gathering for the “small” affiliates.
> >
> > I agree with Leigh and others that affiliates should receive more support, but I do not think those efforts will be served well by further dividing them.
> >
> > -greg (User:Varnent)
> > Vice Chair, Wikimedia Affiliations Committee
> >
> >
>
> --
> Ilario Valdelli
> Wikimedia CH
> Verein zur Förderung Freien Wissens
> Association pour l’avancement des connaissances libre
> Associazione per il sostegno alla conoscenza libera
> Switzerland - 8008 Zürich
> Tel: +41764821371
> http://www.wikimedia.ch
>
> _______________________________________________
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It's nice to see the recent momentum in the formation of user groups. Can
Affcom shed some light on what may be causing the burst of announced
formations?
Relatedly, I'm wondering if the number of UGs is now so high that the
budget and/or programmatic capacity of WMCON will be a bit stretched to
accomodate all of the UGs in addition to the larger affiliates. I was
thinking that it would be good to have a track at WMCON devoted to small
affiliates, but now I'm starting to wonder if there are so many of us, with
interests and concerns hopefully now more visible on WMF's radar due to our
increased numbers, that it would make sense to have separate conferences
for the large and small affiliates so that undivided attention from WMF can
be given more evenly to both size classes of affiliates for the duration of
a conference. Any thoughts about those options, from Affcom, WMF, WMDE, or
others?
Pine
Hi all,
As part of ongoing attempts to improve the Wikimedia blog,[1] we're going
to trial a digest/roundup of stories from around the Wikimedia movement. As
I'm not omnipresent, this will require input from you.
Please send any timely and interesting story ideas you have to me via email
or on my talk pages (on meta or en.wp[2]) by this Wednesday, 21 October.
[1] https://blog.wikimedia.org/
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Ed_Erhart_(WMF) /
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Ed_Erhart_(WMF)
--
Ed Erhart
Editorial Associate
Wikimedia Foundation
All week, in celebration of #OAWeek, SPARC and Wikipedia Library are
hosting a global, virtual, week-long, open access editathon.
You can jump right in with a full guide and easy entry points for making
your first contribution to the event.
We're aiming for *1000* improvements and tracking the progress of everyone
involved.
Please check it out, spread the word, add your name as a participant, and
make one change to bring us closer to a world of Open Access!
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/The_Wikipedia_Library/OA_week
Best,
Jake Orlowitz
The Wikipedia Library
Dear all,
I am honoured to announce on behalf of the Affiliations Committee, the
recognition of Iraqi Wikimedians as a Wikimedia User Group [1]. Among
their goals are supporting the different Wikimedia projects in Iraq,
supporting Iraqi Wikimedians, and eventually becoming the recognized
chapter in Iraq. Recently, they have organized a series of workshops in
Erbil to teach people about Wikipedia and how to edit it, and are
currently working on flyers regarding Wikipedia and how important it is,
in both Arabic and Kurdish.
Please, let's welcome our iraqi colleagues :-)
Mabrouk!!!
1:https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Iraqi_Wikimedians
--
"*Jülüjain wane mmakat* ein kapülain tü alijunakalirua jee wayuukanairua
junain ekerolaa alümüin supüshuwayale etijaanaka. Ayatashi waya junain."
Carlos M. Colina
Socio, A.C. Wikimedia Venezuela | RIF J-40129321-2 |
www.wikimedia.org.ve <http://wikimedia.org.ve>
Chair, Wikimedia Foundation Affiliations Committee
Phone: +972-52-4869915
Twitter: @maor_x
I've been following the conference online and I congratulate the organisers
- some fascinating presentations and the videos are excellent. A link to
the videos:
http://wikiconferenceusa.org/wiki/2015/Schedule
I recommend Stuart Ray's insightful presentation at 4 hours 36 minutes on
day two (Saturday 10th), addressing Wikipedia's problematical relationship
with experts.
A couple of points.
1) I'd love to view or listen to a recording of the 45 minute
panel discussion held in the Jefferson Room at 12:15 on Saturday,
"Journalism and the Online Information Community: How Wikimedians Cover
Wikimedia." Was it recorded and will it eventually be put online?
2) Greg Kohs was banned from attending. I think that was a mistake. He is a
fierce critic of Jimmy Wales and Wikipedia. I am aware of the lines he has
crossed in the past (and the seemingly sincere apologies). Notwithstanding
those past crossed lines, and his propensity to walk very close to the edge
of propriety today, he has a valid critique and, along with those of more
temperate critics, his voice has a place in a truly comprehensive
conversation about this project.
--
Anthony Cole <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Anthonyhcole>
> Thanks Luis. added my notes next to yours.
>
> Hi, Michal-
> Very interesting, thanks for sharing! Some comments in-line:
>
> On Sun, Oct 11, 2015 at 2:59 AM, Michal Lester <mlester(a)wikimedia.org.il>
> wrote:
>
> > We are pleased to share with you the initial results of the HEWP editors
> > survey:
> >
> >
> > Wikimedia Israel conducted an editors’ survey in August among HEWP
> editors.
> > The questionnaire was based on the WMNL survey in order to to enable
> > international learning in the future.
> >
> > The survey had two target audiences: active editors (with voting rights
> > [1])
> > and contributors. The questionnaire was the same but distributed
> > differently. Active editors got an invitation to participate on their
> talk
> > page, while contributors were invited through a “Sitenotice”. Some 151
> > active editors and 171 contributors participated.
> >
> > *Gender*: Almost 20% of the respondents were women.
> >
> > Among the active editors, only 10% were women whereas 29% of the
> > contributors were women. The explanations (open answers) for limited
> > diversity among the editors ranged from a negative work atmosphere to a
> > conservative point of view about gender roles.
> >
> > Editors in general did not find the low participation of women negatively
> > affects the coverage of topics in Wikipedia.
>
>
> Did this vary by gender? i.e., do both men and women agree that low
> participation affects coverage?
>
We checked again the data and there is difference but not significant.
But most of the women (82%) think that
low participation of women has an impact on the working environment. While
men (44%) think that it has only some impact.
>
>
> > Answering a question about how
> > to increase the participation of women, respondents offered workshops,
> > encouraging high school students to participate, expanding the wiki-women
> > group and providing general support.
> >
> > *New editors*: A large majority of editors acknowledged that new editors
> > wanted to contribute to HEWP. They recognized the importance of a
> > continuous arrival of new editors and felt that new editors were welcome.
> >
>
> Did this vary by age of editors? i.e., did new editors agree that new
> editors were welcome? :)
>
Yes but.... 44% of the contributors agree that new editors were welcome.
23% do not agree with the saying. Only 31% of contributors are new editors
(less than a year) so it is
hard to say because we do not analyze the newbies' answers apart from the
contributors.
>
>
> > *Work Atmosphere*: 34% of the respondents reported that they were
> satisfied
> > with the work atmosphere on the Hebrew Wikipedia. Only 5.5% of the
> editors
> > were not satisfied with it at all. However, 46% noted that there was a
> > large number of conflicts. Active editors (66%) reported such conflicts
> > more than contributors (29%). Almost 46% of the active editors stated
> that
> > they felt like they were in a conflict in the past six months, while only
> > 29% of contributors expressed the same. 61% of the editors indicated that
> > conflicts were either mostly or sometimes resolved in a good way.
> >
>
> Interesting!
>
>
> > Ideology, worldviews and egos were considered to play a major role in the
> > development of conflicts. Contributors also mentioned lack of patience
> from
> > the active editors.
>
>
>
> > *Wikimedia Israel*: 60% of the respondents are familiar with Wikimedia
> > Israel. As expected active editors are more acquainted with WMIL than
> > contributors. Among them, 78% agree with the statement that WMIL provides
> > practical support to editors.
> >
>
> That's terrific.
>
>
> > The survey provides important information for the HEWP editors’ community
> > and for Wikimedia Israel.
> > Wikimedia Israel will learn the data and use it to develop better support
> > for editors, contributors and newbies.
> >
>
> Please do keep us up to date on this; it would be very interesting to see a
> model for transforming data into action. (My own department has been
> thinking about this in light of our recent hire of a survey specialist;
> hopefully something for us to keep improving on across the movement.)
>
> Luis
>
Michal