Dear Wikimedians,
We are happy to announce the maiden edition of the Africa Wiki Challenge, a writing contest that calls on all Africans, people of African descent, people that identify with the continent or any one with an interest in Africa to contribute content about the many things that make up the true and rich identity of the continent (its rich and colourful cultures, history, landmarks, education, cities, rivers, lakes, food, vegetation, etc.) from 23rd May to 30th June 2021.[1] The campaign seeks to project stories of Africa, project its identity and help reduce the content gap about the continent on the web.[2]
Each year, we will select a theme to guide users on what to contribute to as part of the campaign. This year, we have selected the theme “Landmarks in Africa”.[3] The aim is to document all landmarks that cover historical, cultural, geographical and places of key significance to a country or the continent. These include but not limited to;
-
Monuments - Statues, Memorials, Historic buildings, Archaeological sites -
National Demarcations - Districts, Municipalities, Metropolitan, Regions, States, etc. -
Geographical Endowments - Mountains, Valleys, Forests, Waterfalls, Wildlife, Beach, etc. -
Infrastructural Developments - Roads, Hospitals, Churches, Mosques, Schools, Rails, Water parks, Hotels, Theme parks, etc.
Individuals or affiliates are welcome to participate or support the project. You can participate in the competition by writing new articles or improving existing articles in the destubathon contest.[4] Visit our participate page for more information about how to join the competition.[5] Do you want to organise an activity in your group/country/region? Check out our organizers page or organizers guide for more information.[6][7]
There will be virtual office hours prior to the start and during the campaign.[8] These office hours are opportunities to learn more about the campaign, ask questions, or receive support.
Kindly send questions, suggestions, comments or concerns to info@ofwafrica.org or visit the campaign page on meta or on our website.[9]
Ruby Damenshie-Brown
Administrative Executive
Open Foundation West Africa
[1] - https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Africa_Wiki_Challenge
[2] - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NjD7DqepQdg
[3 ]- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a2LDKzenfc4
[4] - https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Africa_Wiki_Challenge/Destubathon
[5] - https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Africa_Wiki_Challenge/Participate
[6] - https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Africa_Wiki_Challenge/Organize
[7] - https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d2/Organisers_Guide_for_AWC...
[8] - https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Africa_Wiki_Challenge/Participate#Join_our_V...
[9] - http://awc.ofwafrica.org/
Ruby Damenshie-Brown
Administrative Executive
Open Foundation West Africa
www.ofwafrica.org
Hello Ruby,
Allow myself to use the occasion to emphasize how important the campaigns for WikiAfrica/Africa Wiki are in order to provide pictures to the wikis and to the world.
It is still difficult to find good pictures on Wikimedia Commons that illustrate life in many African countries. I am grateful for the pictures tourists upload, and sometimes the pictures from national or foreign governments are quite usable. But there is something missing.
For our children‘s encyclopedia in German, Klexikon, it was a challenge to find pictures with some diversity when we wrote the articles about non European and non North American countries. And it still is, or: maybe there are more suitable pictures on Commons but we don‘t always find them because Commons as a platform itself... could be improved in a number of ways.
But in recent years, we have seen pictures made within campaigns such as Wiki loves women or the thematic challenges about work or transport in Africa. Step by step, our Klexikon articles can be essentially improved; although, there is still a certain bias towards pittoresque churches, nice beaches and other more „tourism related objects“.
Also, we have recently added a number of videos made by WikiTongues, another great initiative.
https://klexikon.zum.de/wiki/Algerien https://klexikon.zum.de/wiki/%C3%84quatorialguinea https://klexikon.zum.de/wiki/Liberia https://klexikon.zum.de/wiki/Mosambik
By the way, when I am looking for good pictures on Wikipedia (German, English, Dutch), I see that a lot of Wikipedia articles could need an update too - with regard to the pictures that have been made in the, say, last 10 years or even only 5 years.
(I noticed that Commons received a lot of good pictures about e.g. Barbados and Angola within the last 5 years only.)
So I am looking forward to the new pictures from this campaign, and to see how they will be used for display on the wikis.
Kind regards Ziko
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Klexikon
Ruby D-Brown rbrown@ofwafrica.org schrieb am So. 2. Mai 2021 um 10:38:
Dear Wikimedians,
We are happy to announce the maiden edition of the Africa Wiki Challenge, a writing contest that calls on all Africans, people of African descent, people that identify with the continent or any one with an interest in Africa to contribute content about the many things that make up the true and rich identity of the continent (its rich and colourful cultures, history, landmarks, education, cities, rivers, lakes, food, vegetation, etc.) from 23rd May to 30th June 2021.[1] The campaign seeks to project stories of Africa, project its identity and help reduce the content gap about the continent on the web.[2]
Each year, we will select a theme to guide users on what to contribute to as part of the campaign. This year, we have selected the theme “Landmarks in Africa”.[3] The aim is to document all landmarks that cover historical, cultural, geographical and places of key significance to a country or the continent. These include but not limited to;
Monuments - Statues, Memorials, Historic buildings, Archaeological sites
National Demarcations - Districts, Municipalities, Metropolitan, Regions, States, etc.
Geographical Endowments - Mountains, Valleys, Forests, Waterfalls, Wildlife, Beach, etc.
Infrastructural Developments - Roads, Hospitals, Churches, Mosques, Schools, Rails, Water parks, Hotels, Theme parks, etc.
Individuals or affiliates are welcome to participate or support the project. You can participate in the competition by writing new articles or improving existing articles in the destubathon contest.[4] Visit our participate page for more information about how to join the competition.[5] Do you want to organise an activity in your group/country/region? Check out our organizers page or organizers guide for more information.[6][7]
There will be virtual office hours prior to the start and during the campaign.[8] These office hours are opportunities to learn more about the campaign, ask questions, or receive support.
Kindly send questions, suggestions, comments or concerns to info@ofwafrica.org or visit the campaign page on meta or on our website.[9]
Ruby Damenshie-Brown
Administrative Executive
Open Foundation West Africa
[1] - https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Africa_Wiki_Challenge
[2] - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NjD7DqepQdg
[3 ]- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a2LDKzenfc4
[4] - https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Africa_Wiki_Challenge/Destubathon
[5] - https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Africa_Wiki_Challenge/Participate
[6] - https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Africa_Wiki_Challenge/Organize
[7] - https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d2/Organisers_Guide_for_AWC...
[8] - https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Africa_Wiki_Challenge/Participate#Join_our_V...
[9] - http://awc.ofwafrica.org/
Ruby Damenshie-Brown
Administrative Executive
Open Foundation West Africa
www.ofwafrica.org _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia-l New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
We are slowly getting there Ziko.
Since the launch of Wiki Loves Africa in 2014, we have collected 70k images of the African continent. Not Historical Monuments or Landmarks, but mostly everyday life pictures. Last year, we published an infographic to summarize the outcome of the photo campaign : https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b4/Wiki_Loves_Africa_2020_A... Still a LOT to do, but already way better than a couple of years back.
The point I find the most satisfaction with is the reuse of those pictures into Wikipedia articles. Check out for example reuse percentage of WLA 2019 : https://tools.wmflabs.org/glamtools/glamorous.php?doit=1&category=Images...] ("Images from Wiki Loves Africa 2019") This is 10% and as you may see, with a HUGE margin of improvement since most of the reuse are in French and English. I hope to see the other languages pick up sometimes...
But it takes time and energy to go through all the images collected to identify the best fit; so dedicated initiatives dedicated to that are precious. WPWP initiative [2] is very important in that regards to improve use of all those images in Wikipedia articles.
Since you mention Klexikon, let me note that we just closed the WikiChallenge Ecoles d'Afrique [1] last week :) And some countries teams are really putting a LOT of effort to illustrate the articles written by the children, either with locally taken pictures, or reusing Commons material (often published by well-known wikimedians). See for example * Tunisia : https://fr.vikidia.org/wiki/Projet:WikiChallenge_%C3%89coles_d%27Afrique_202... * Cameroun : https://fr.vikidia.org/wiki/Projet:WikiChallenge_%C3%89coles_d%27Afrique_202... * Guinea : https://fr.vikidia.org/wiki/Projet:WikiChallenge_%C3%89coles_d%E2%80%99Afriq...
There are some pretty cool pages with LOTS of illustrations.
Remaining challenges are to better categorize and describe images, which we can do for example using the ISA tool [3] LOT's of work to do in that direction....
And finally... identification of best pictures (featured, good etc.) so that random visitors have more chance to stumble on them and reuse them (except for North of Africa really doing this sorting well, most african teams do not do it frequently, so this is another direction where we could help)
I welcome Ghana's new initiative to give a push into a new rather poorly explored direction yet.
Flo
[1] : https://fr.vikidia.org/wiki/Projet:WikiChallenge_%C3%89coles_d%27Afrique_202... [2] : https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_Pages_Wanting_Photos_2021 [3] : https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:ISA_Tool/Wiki_Loves_Africa_MetaDa...
Le 02/05/2021 à 12:22, Ziko van Dijk a écrit :
Hello Ruby,
Allow myself to use the occasion to emphasize how important the campaigns for WikiAfrica/Africa Wiki are in order to provide pictures to the wikis and to the world.
It is still difficult to find good pictures on Wikimedia Commons that illustrate life in many African countries. I am grateful for the pictures tourists upload, and sometimes the pictures from national or foreign governments are quite usable. But there is something missing.
For our children‘s encyclopedia in German, Klexikon, it was a challenge to find pictures with some diversity when we wrote the articles about non European and non North American countries. And it still is, or: maybe there are more suitable pictures on Commons but we don‘t always find them because Commons as a platform itself... could be improved in a number of ways.
But in recent years, we have seen pictures made within campaigns such as Wiki loves women or the thematic challenges about work or transport in Africa. Step by step, our Klexikon articles can be essentially improved; although, there is still a certain bias towards pittoresque churches, nice beaches and other more „tourism related objects“.
Also, we have recently added a number of videos made by WikiTongues, another great initiative.
https://klexikon.zum.de/wiki/Algerien https://klexikon.zum.de/wiki/Algerien https://klexikon.zum.de/wiki/%C3%84quatorialguinea https://klexikon.zum.de/wiki/%C3%84quatorialguinea https://klexikon.zum.de/wiki/Liberia https://klexikon.zum.de/wiki/Liberia https://klexikon.zum.de/wiki/Mosambik https://klexikon.zum.de/wiki/Mosambik
By the way, when I am looking for good pictures on Wikipedia (German, English, Dutch), I see that a lot of Wikipedia articles could need an update too - with regard to the pictures that have been made in the, say, last 10 years or even only 5 years.
(I noticed that Commons received a lot of good pictures about e.g. Barbados and Angola within the last 5 years only.)
So I am looking forward to the new pictures from this campaign, and to see how they will be used for display on the wikis.
Kind regards Ziko
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Klexikon https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Klexikon
Ruby D-Brown <rbrown@ofwafrica.org mailto:rbrown@ofwafrica.org> schrieb am So. 2. Mai 2021 um 10:38:
Dear Wikimedians, We are happy to announce the maiden edition of the Africa Wiki Challenge, a writing contest that calls on all Africans, people of African descent, people that identify with the continent or any one with an interest in Africa to contribute content about the many things that make up the true and rich identity of the continent (its rich and colourful cultures, history, landmarks, education, cities, rivers, lakes, food, vegetation, etc.) from 23rd May to 30th June 2021.[1] The campaign seeks to project stories of Africa, project its identity and help reduce the content gap about the continent on the web.[2] Each year, we will select a theme to guide users on what to contribute to as part of the campaign. This year, we have selected the theme “Landmarks in Africa”.[3] The aim is to document all landmarks that cover historical, cultural, geographical and places of key significance to a country or the continent. These include but not limited to; * Monuments- Statues, Memorials, Historic buildings, Archaeological sites * National Demarcations- Districts, Municipalities, Metropolitan, Regions, States, etc. * Geographical Endowments- Mountains, Valleys, Forests, Waterfalls, Wildlife, Beach, etc. * Infrastructural Developments- Roads, Hospitals, Churches, Mosques, Schools, Rails, Water parks, Hotels, Theme parks, etc. Individuals or affiliates are welcome to participate or support the project. You can participate in the competition by writing new articles or improving existing articles in the destubathon contest.[4] Visit our participate page for more information about how to join the competition.[5] Do you want to organise an activity in your group/country/region? Check out our organizers page or organizers guide for more information.[6][7] There will be virtual office hours prior to the start and during the campaign.[8] These office hours are opportunities to learn more about the campaign, ask questions, or receive support. Kindly send questions, suggestions, comments or concerns toinfo@ofwafrica.org <mailto:info@ofwafrica.org>or visit the campaign page on meta or on our website.[9] Ruby Damenshie-Brown Administrative Executive Open Foundation West Africa [1] - https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Africa_Wiki_Challenge <https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Africa_Wiki_Challenge> [2] - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NjD7DqepQdg <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NjD7DqepQdg> [3 ]- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a2LDKzenfc4 <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a2LDKzenfc4> [4] - https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Africa_Wiki_Challenge/Destubathon <https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Africa_Wiki_Challenge/Destubathon> [5] - https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Africa_Wiki_Challenge/Participate <https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Africa_Wiki_Challenge/Participate> [6] - https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Africa_Wiki_Challenge/Organize <https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Africa_Wiki_Challenge/Organize> [7] - https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d2/Organisers_Guide_for_AWC.pdf <https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d2/Organisers_Guide_for_AWC.pdf> [8] - https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Africa_Wiki_Challenge/Participate#Join_our_Virtual_Office_Hours <https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Africa_Wiki_Challenge/Participate#Join_our_Virtual_Office_Hours> [9] - http://awc.ofwafrica.org/ <http://awc.ofwafrica.org/> Ruby Damenshie-Brown Administrative Executive Open Foundation West Africa www.ofwafrica.org <http://www.ofwafrica.org> _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines <https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines> and https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia-l <https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia-l> New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org <mailto:Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org> Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l <https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l>, <mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org <mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org>?subject=unsubscribe>
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Hello Ziko,
Thank you for sharing interest in our project and the work you are doing within Wikimedia.
The Africa Wiki Challenge (AWC) is a writing contest organised by Open Foundation West Africa to create African content (content about Africa) along selected topics annually, of which this year focuses on “Landmarks in Africa''.[1]
Even though the campaign mainly focuses on writing articles, it hopes to encourage participants to upload photos and use them on their articles to provide a holistic experience for readers of those articles.[2] It also has a destubathon component to encourage improvement of existing articles around the theme.[3]
Everyone with the passion for Africa is welcome to participate in this campaign, feel free to visit the AWC meta page for more information.[4]
Cheers,
Ruby D-Brown
[1] - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a2LDKzenfc4
[2] - https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Africa_Wiki_Challenge/Participate
[3] - https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Africa_Wiki_Challenge/Destubathon
[4] - https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Africa_Wiki_Challenge
On Sun, May 2, 2021 at 10:23 AM Ziko van Dijk zvandijk@gmail.com wrote:
Hello Ruby,
Allow myself to use the occasion to emphasize how important the campaigns for WikiAfrica/Africa Wiki are in order to provide pictures to the wikis and to the world.
It is still difficult to find good pictures on Wikimedia Commons that illustrate life in many African countries. I am grateful for the pictures tourists upload, and sometimes the pictures from national or foreign governments are quite usable. But there is something missing.
For our children‘s encyclopedia in German, Klexikon, it was a challenge to find pictures with some diversity when we wrote the articles about non European and non North American countries. And it still is, or: maybe there are more suitable pictures on Commons but we don‘t always find them because Commons as a platform itself... could be improved in a number of ways.
But in recent years, we have seen pictures made within campaigns such as Wiki loves women or the thematic challenges about work or transport in Africa. Step by step, our Klexikon articles can be essentially improved; although, there is still a certain bias towards pittoresque churches, nice beaches and other more „tourism related objects“.
Also, we have recently added a number of videos made by WikiTongues, another great initiative.
https://klexikon.zum.de/wiki/Algerien https://klexikon.zum.de/wiki/%C3%84quatorialguinea https://klexikon.zum.de/wiki/Liberia https://klexikon.zum.de/wiki/Mosambik
By the way, when I am looking for good pictures on Wikipedia (German, English, Dutch), I see that a lot of Wikipedia articles could need an update too - with regard to the pictures that have been made in the, say, last 10 years or even only 5 years.
(I noticed that Commons received a lot of good pictures about e.g. Barbados and Angola within the last 5 years only.)
So I am looking forward to the new pictures from this campaign, and to see how they will be used for display on the wikis.
Kind regards Ziko
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Klexikon
Ruby D-Brown rbrown@ofwafrica.org schrieb am So. 2. Mai 2021 um 10:38:
Dear Wikimedians,
We are happy to announce the maiden edition of the Africa Wiki Challenge, a writing contest that calls on all Africans, people of African descent, people that identify with the continent or any one with an interest in Africa to contribute content about the many things that make up the true and rich identity of the continent (its rich and colourful cultures, history, landmarks, education, cities, rivers, lakes, food, vegetation, etc.) from 23rd May to 30th June 2021.[1] The campaign seeks to project stories of Africa, project its identity and help reduce the content gap about the continent on the web.[2]
Each year, we will select a theme to guide users on what to contribute to as part of the campaign. This year, we have selected the theme “Landmarks in Africa”.[3] The aim is to document all landmarks that cover historical, cultural, geographical and places of key significance to a country or the continent. These include but not limited to;
Monuments - Statues, Memorials, Historic buildings, Archaeological sites
National Demarcations - Districts, Municipalities, Metropolitan, Regions, States, etc.
Geographical Endowments - Mountains, Valleys, Forests, Waterfalls, Wildlife, Beach, etc.
Infrastructural Developments - Roads, Hospitals, Churches, Mosques, Schools, Rails, Water parks, Hotels, Theme parks, etc.
Individuals or affiliates are welcome to participate or support the project. You can participate in the competition by writing new articles or improving existing articles in the destubathon contest.[4] Visit our participate page for more information about how to join the competition.[5] Do you want to organise an activity in your group/country/region? Check out our organizers page or organizers guide for more information.[6][7]
There will be virtual office hours prior to the start and during the campaign.[8] These office hours are opportunities to learn more about the campaign, ask questions, or receive support.
Kindly send questions, suggestions, comments or concerns to info@ofwafrica.org or visit the campaign page on meta or on our website.[9]
Ruby Damenshie-Brown
Administrative Executive
Open Foundation West Africa
[1] - https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Africa_Wiki_Challenge
[2] - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NjD7DqepQdg
[3 ]- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a2LDKzenfc4
[4] - https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Africa_Wiki_Challenge/Destubathon
[5] - https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Africa_Wiki_Challenge/Participate
[6] - https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Africa_Wiki_Challenge/Organize
[7] - https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d2/Organisers_Guide_for_AWC...
[8] - https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Africa_Wiki_Challenge/Participate#Join_our_V...
[9] - http://awc.ofwafrica.org/
Ruby Damenshie-Brown
Administrative Executive
Open Foundation West Africa
www.ofwafrica.org _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia-l New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
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