Dear colleagues,
This is a request for your input and possible ideas (if any) regarding my management of
the fallout from Jimmy's announcing myself as a 2018 Wikimedian of the Year.
Emails below are a copy of my ongoing consultations with Wikimedia Foundation staff and
other Wikimedians I personally know, as well as a report on what's already brewing in
my region of Russia after this unexpected outcome.
I would be grateful, if you can advise me on how to properly steer the enthusiasm of
behalf of regional government, mass-media, NGOs, etc. which have just discovered about the
possibility of participation in Wikimedia movement (think anything from U.S. is not
getting much in-depth coverage in Russian by sources that regional public figures, NGOs,
teachers or general regional journalists read) & are now placing great hopes on
teaching whole of Tatarstan about how to Wiki & also engaging all Tatars globally (3/4
outside of Tatarstan, 1/5 outside of Russia).
regards,
farhad
Updates:
* Selet WikiSchool got presented to wider public @ the press-conference for Tatar-speaking
journalists (July 31), at the poster session in the framework of the World Congress of
Tatars Youth Forum (Aug.3), and later at a Tatar projects fair in the Downtown park of
Kazan (Aug.5)
* Contribution of those writing into Wikipedia in Tatar was recognized by choosing myself
as one of the current year's "For the great service to Tatar nation" medal
recipients. (Aug.3)
* We recorded a 40 min interview in Turkish (Aug.4, see
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HK3tFBWMWcs )
* We didn't yet meet the President of the Republic (his schedule changed once again),
but I got another firm request to meet with the Minister for Youth Affairs (another good
acquaintance of mine, ex-member of local Comedy Club type activity), as well as with the
Head of World Congress of Tatars' Executive Bureau, and more TV & written press
interviews are lining up.
* I am trying to manage these guys' optimism & desire to move quickly, keeping in
mind they are not really familiar with the Wiki-way or our communities' policies &
practices
* Bashkir (ba) & Sakha (sah) communities have shared advice about how to assure that
local Wikimedia community stays clearly independent in a cultural environment where
neither Education, nor GLAM programs will attract local partners unless those have a
strong support of the regional or federal government entities.
* Looking forward to meet with my Wikimania-2017 roommate from the Philippines in
Singapore on Aug.16 to collect some more input from Asia
-------- Пересылаемое сообщение--------
03.08.2018, 19:35, "Фархад Фаткуллин / Farkhad Fatkullin"
<frhd(a)yandex.com>om>:
Thursday, 2 August 2018
Republic of Tatarstan Ministry for Informatization & Communication @ IT-park, Kazan
18:00-20:50
Meeting with Tatarstan Deputy Prime Minister - Minister for Informatization &
Communications Roman Shaykhutdinov
http://mic.tatarstan.ru/eng/minister.htm
on opportunities Wikimedia projects & popularization thereof among the population of
the Republic can bring for Tatarstan
In attendance:
* Almaz A. Valiullin, Director General of Tatarstan Center for Information Technologies
http://mic.tatarstan.ru/eng/valiullin.htm
* Tatyana S. Kamaletdinova, CEO of Tatarstan Center for Information Technologies
http://mic.tatarstan.ru/eng/kamaletdinova.htm
* Anna V. Yakovleva, Head of Ministry's Press-Service
http://mic.tatarstan.ru/rus/about/structure_new?department_id=80576
* Farkhad N. Fatkullin, 2018 Wikimedian of the Year, Wikimedia Russia member
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Frhdkazan
Agenda:
1. Content creation contests
2. Education projects
3. How can these be organized in a systemic way, engaging students throughout all
municipal districts of Tatarstan & Tatar diaspora globally, and assessing
effectiveness of measures
4. Larger Tatar language internet development, promoting content creation in the language
5. .tatar domain
6. ContentTranslation
7. Generating lists for content creation
8. Free licenses
9. Wikidata
10. Regional educational Wiki-seminar for beginners, introduction & orientation
11. Smartphone oriented educational projects around Tatar & Tatar Wikipedia (beginning
with Tatar version of
www.kakprav.com & on to WOK Master type )
12. OSM in Tatar
13. The way forward: visiting WMF to discover other opportunities, MoU with WMF?
Decided:
1. Almaz Valiullin to head the Working Group on behalf of the Ministry
2. Next meeting set for / around 20th of August
3. Minister requested his staff to draft documents regarding moving all Regional &
Municipal budget funded websites to CC-BY type free licenses
4. Minister proposed every organization website place a link to a Wikipedia article about
it (in Tatar, Russian or English, depending on the language used)
5. Help is requested about developing simple samples or article creation guidelines for
various institutions of Tatarstan & diaspora organizations to learn what is considered
appropriate by Wiki-community & how should representatives of respective entities
6. Annual Tatar Internet Awards Ceremony to include awards to leading editors of Wikimedia
projects in Tatar
7. Help is requested to develop a framework of Wikipedia Article Contests for Secondary
School Children of Tatastan, with article quality assessment schemes (prizes &
organization to be funded by Tatarstan goverment, promotion in local mass-media, schools
& etc.)
8. Help is requested to develop a framework for a sustainable functioning of a Tatarstan
& Tatar language oriented Wikimedia thematic organization to be responsible for
systemic work around developing & promoting Wikimedia projects in Tatar, as well as
Tatarstan-oriented content creation for various Wikis
9. Readiness to consider awarding *.tatar domain names to those, who develop attractive
projects in Tatar that can't be hosted on Wikimedia platform or otherwise need a Tatar
digital identity
10. Help is requested regarding drafting a program proposal, necessary budget &
expected results for a Tatarstan oriented introductory Wiki-seminar, open for a wide
public
11. Help is requested to provide links to Wikidata educational materials, Practical Use
Cases & expert responses to the Deputy Minister (in English)
12. Help is requested in organizing a learning visit to WMF Headquarters during Tatarstan
Delegation annual fall visit to Silicon Valley & other places in U.S. to discover
other opportunities
--
Farkhad Fatkullin - Фархад Фаткуллин
http://sikzn.ru/ Тел.+79274158066 / skype:frhdkazan /
Wikipedia:frhdkazan
03.08.2018, 11:42, "Фархад Фаткуллин / Farkhad Fatkullin"
<frhd(a)yandex.com>om>:
Hi Nochole & Kui,
Thank you for your responses & readiness to help.
Events on the ground are developing following predictable course - we had a very
constructive 3 hour long discussion last night with Tatarstan's Deputy Prime Minister
(IT minister) & his team, whilst earlier Thursday I got an invite to meet with another
Deputy Prime Minister (President of the National Council of Trustees for the World
Congress of Tatars Association).
More TV & magazine interviews are expected, some in detail articles in Russian
promoting Wikimedia projects are in the pipelines (expecting to see the texts for
necessary corrections & adding links to respective WMRU, Meta, WMF & related
independent media articles (thanks to ComCom).
I hope to find time to prepare & email both you (in English) & IT ministry's
Working Group (in Russian) my summary of yesterday late evening meeting, with attendees,
topics discussed, request & proposals, etc. They want to move as fast as possible,
because this will help them to meet promoting Tatar language use online task they are
charged with by the region's President.
Just a few to begin with:
* Ready to move all regional and municipal government websites into CC-BY, add links to
respective WP articles from all these
* Willing to have Tatarstan & Tatar language oriented thematic organization in place
to work with secondary schools & Universities, GLAMS, diaspora
* Ready to sponsor prizes for article writing contests (either through WMRU or this new
entity)
* Requesting guidance from myself & Wikimedia community on what's the best way to
make this all successful
* Interested in supporting WMRU organized general public educational Wiki-Seminar in
Tatarstan Academy of Sciences or other respected facility with a large conference hall
open to all public (September-October?)
* Willing to visit WMF headquarters in November to meet, learn more about what's
there (I admit I don't read all mailing lists or Meta discussions, don't have time
to see all wonderful YouTube videos available, haven't yet have time to visit a single
Wikimedia Conference) & possibly sign MoUs or whatever that would help speed up
Wikimedia acceptance & popularity growth among the population of the region.
I am in touch with Wikimedia RU & Wikimedia Languages of Russia Community's
regarding ongoing developments, benefiting from collective wisdom of Wikimedians I know.
Should you be ready to bring any ideas to the table, please shoot them my way.
regards,
farhad
--
Farkhad Fatkullin - Фархад Фаткуллин
http://sikzn.ru/ Тел.+79274158066 / skype:frhdkazan
/ Wikipedia:frhdkazan
02.08.2018, 16:35, "Nichole Saad" <nsaad(a)wikimedia.org>rg>:
> Hi Farhad,
>
> First, congratulations on being named "Wikimedian of the Year!" We have
received your letter, and are looking forward to engage with your ideas. Realistically,
I'll be able to provide a more in depth response early next week.
>
> best regards,
>
> Nichole
>
> On Wed, Aug 1, 2018 at 2:45 PM Фархад Фаткуллин / Farkhad Fatkullin
<frhd(a)yandex.com> wrote:
>> Dear Sirs,
>>
>> This is from Farhad, User:frhdkazan (ComCom member, now a.k.a. 2018 Wikimedian of
the Year) with some proposals about how to leverage a fleeting opportunity I got. Please
read the text below this letter ASAP & think how you can help seize the moment.
I'm looking forward to first ideas within 24 hours from now.
>>
>> Any support of yours would be greatly appreciated.
>> Thanks a million.
>> regards,
>> farhad
>>
>> P.S. More on where I'm coming from can later be discovered @
http://frhd.narod.ru/resume-en.htm (dated, stopped my retainer contract with the Office of
Tatarstan President in September 2013) & more up-to-date but in Russian @
http://sikzn.narod.ru/index/0-4 . I have previously translated & provided digital
media with the link to Russian text of Wikimedia Blog post about Jess Wade
https://ru.wikinews.org/wiki/?curid=176108 , & now contacted Asian colleagues to get
similar content about Nahid Sultan & Wikimedia Bangladesh. Also on my agenda is to
record a video-interview in Turkish for Wikimedia Turkey's communication campaign - I
speak the language & we are in touch with Turkish community. I also need to get back
to interpreting into Russian videos of Wikimania-2018 available on YouTube - maybe later
this week, before I join my family for a few days off & then a week-long
interpretation assignment in Singapore.
>>
>> --
>> Farkhad Fatkullin - Фархад Фаткуллин
http://sikzn.ru/ Тел.+79274158066 /
skype:frhdkazan / Wikipedia:frhdkazan
>>
>> TRIGGER
>> Following Jimmy's unexpected pass during Wikimania-2018 Closing Ceremony, I
became an instant celebrity of sort - myself alone I've seen over 40 articles with
positive PR about Wikipedia & wider body of Wikimedia projects,
>> * one by RT in Russian collecting over 1.1 million Facebook likes in under 8
hours from publication
>> * short positive ones from Russian Federation government's Official gazette
& Russkiy Mir Foundation
>> * first ever mention that people can donate to Wikimedia Russia volunteers
organization for us to be able to fund local Wiki-seminars, conferences & contests
(WMF is not funding Wikimedia Russia & can't allow us to use donate link from
Russian Wikipedia or place a link to "Thank you, but we don't accept donations
from Russia" page where users from Russia are being routed
>> * about to get one with links published to various WMF & Wikimedia Russia
projects, including promoting free licenses, Education & GLAM programs, etc.
>> I'm periodically collecting these @
https://tt.wikipedia.org/wiki/Википедия:Безнең_турында_матбугатта#Ел_викиме… when
time permits, but there's more in my Facebook Messenger.
>>
>> CONTEXT
>> This is also generating very positive attention on behalf of the Republic of
Tatarstan government, as well as our regional NGO partner, Selet Youth Education
Foundation, with whom yet unrecognized Tatar Wikimedians are jointly running Selet
WikiSchool project.
https://outreach.wikimedia.org/wiki/Education/News/May_2018/Selet_WikiSchool The latter
want to introduce this joint initiative, as well as Wikimedia Russia executive director
Stanislav Kozlovsky (Ph.D. in Psychology, Researcher & a Senior lecturer at Moscow
State University) and myself to the President of Tatarstan during his visit to their
Annual International Forum of Tatar-speaking High-School Age Youth on August 6th.
Unrelated to that I was yesterday called up by a good acquaintance of mine (Tatarstan Vice
Prime-Minister, Minister for IT
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_Shaykhutdinov ), who
invited me to have a talk with him tomorrow about how promoting Wikimedia projects in
wider Tatar-speaking world (only about 25% of Tatars live in Tatarstan) can help him get
whatever current President wants him to do to develop Tatar language use online. There are
some other Tatarstan Prime-Minister Office level things in the pipeline, & I am also
waiting for a call from Russian Federation ex-IT Minister
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nikolay_Nikiforov , whom I know from his years in Tatarstan
government as well (until 2012). FYI: Wikimedia movement is still unknown in Russia, with
local mass media outlets are predominantly speaking about Wikipedia in Russian when there
is some lapse that can be exploited to show one's Russian patriotism & thus score
some points (basically same political circus, as what we are seeing in U.S. with
Russia-collusion story in the overdrive, just opposite direction), and here we get
something to reverse the situation big time, explaining to the wide public that it's
not only Ok, but even desirable they engage with Wikimedia projects.
>>
>> IDEA
>> Keeping in mind that Tatarstan President is the head of both Russia-Islamic World
Strategic Vision Group & Association of Innovative Regions of Russia, Jimmy gave me
a-hell-of-an-opportunity for an elevator pitch for Wikimedia movement in Russia and some
adjacent counties (think Turkey & Central Asia), and I would really hate seeing it go
unused. I will do my part here (about CC-BY for regional government controlled websites,
Wikipedia Education Program as an extracurricular activity in all secondary school &
universities, GLAM, as well as some locally funded carrots for participants), but I also
want your help in driving this to a home-run. Every fall Tatarstan President & the
delegation is visiting Silicon Valley & other places of interest in U.S. & it
would be great if we could set-up a physical visit to Wikimedia Foundation, with a first
hand presentation of best international practices the movement if proud of & have some
MoU on cooperation signed (as a bureaucratic basis for continuing the conversation) with
either some department in Tatarstan government, just like the one you signed with the
Mexican Ministry of Culture
www.eluniversal.com.mx/cultura/secretaria-de-cultura-y-wikimedia-firman-con….
To set the context, Tatarstan has such formal documents with a number of American
companies & institutions, with our private English-speaking IT Univesity @
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Innopolis having been developed jointly with Carnegie Mellon
University (with consultancy fees paid by Tatastan), we have Russia's first publicly
funded hospital certified to be meeting
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joint_Commission
requirements & plenty of U.S. investors @ our
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alabuga_Special_Economic_Zone . On top of this, we could
benefit from having Selet Youth Educational movement
http://selet.biz/en/ to embrace Wiki
even further, so maybe a similar MoU on collaboration between them and
Wikiedu.org signed
simultaneously would be great (I met LiAnna and Jami in Montreal last year & was
really impressed with what these guys are doing).
>>
>> REQUEST
>> Please shoot something my way before the same time tomorrow, for me to handle the
meeting with Tatarstan Deputy Prime Minister more effectively to progressively open other
opportunities I've touched on. On top of what I described above & my last
year's ideas @
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Frhdkazan/Wiki4RegionalDevt (in
Russian), I'll be bringing to the table topics of:
>> * Wikidata
>> * OSM, as well as a
>> * WOK-like project for all things in Tatar (I was contacted by a local 9th grader
who, on his own initiative with a help of a teacher, did something similar for students
who want to train for Russian-language SAT/ACT type exam
www.kakprav.com & now offered
to develop such or bigger thing for Tatar). For more on WOK, see
https://www.vanguardngr.com/2018/01/wikipedia-wok-seek-nigerian-content-onl…
>> * whatever else you or anybody else can help me think of until then & or
later opportunities
>
> --
> Nichole Saad
> Wikimedia Foundation | Senior Program Manager, Education
> nsaad(a)wikimedia.org
> user: NSaad (WMF)
-------- Конец пересылаемого сообщения --------
--
Farkhad Fatkullin - Фархад Фаткуллин
http://sikzn.ru/ Тел.+79274158066 / skype:frhdkazan /
Wikipedia:frhdkazan