Hello friends,
This is a link I recommend you to bookmark.
http://wiki.wikimedia.in/Geographical_distribution_of_Indian_Wikipedians
This list is useful for outreach & also whenever someone needs Wiki-Help in
a particular city. It would be great if Wikipedians could update this
list.:)
We have the following completely unrepresented states/UTs:
* Andaman & Nicobar Islands
* Arunachal Pradesh
* Assam
* Chandigarh
* Chhattisgarh
* Dadra, Nagar & Haveli
* Daman & Diu
* Goa
* Himachal Pradesh
* Jammu & Kashmir
* Jharkhand (AngPradesh is in Mumbai)
* Lakshadweep
* Manipur
* Meghalaya
* Mizoram
* Puducherry
* Punjab (oye, ye ki hoya!)
* Nagaland
* Uttar Pradesh
* Uttarakhand
Okay, all you admins, please update your status (Mikey my boy, that means
you too)!
Abroad, we dont have Indic Wikipedians listed for:
* Africa
* Australia
* Asia (other than India)
* Middle East
* North America
* South America
Unless you would like to stay off list, of course that's acceptable too.
May I also request Tinu / list admins to please forward it all the Indic
language & city Wikimedia lists. We need this resource to be as
comprehensible as possible.
Warm regards,
Ashwin Baindur
------------------------------------------------------
Hi all,
Needless to repeat the <India-Indic-Mobile-Growth> story. But I was
surprised even with that, many Indic wikipedias do not have a mobile
site(or some have gone dead since they failed to update for
MobileFrontend[1] changes), even the ones that had weren't very much
usable. Lets not cite, mobile phones do not have fonts, no one uses Indic
on mobile, we all know lot of people do use Opera-mini with complex script
rendering support.
* Please visit <yourlanguage>.m.wikpedia.org and see if there is a page. If
it has nothing but 'search, license, and action control' links, here[2] are
the steps that an admin need to do to get a mobile site running with
content. If you have problem in doing those, come and ask at
#wikimedia-tech (or #mediawiki {?}).
* When I visited Tamil wikipedia mobile site, I was restricted to content
that was put on mainpage, the links in it. Since my Symbian phone doesnt
have Indic input system, I cant search anything. The solution to this is to
have a list of articles in alphabetical order *and* display it in mobile
front page, like Assamese wikipedians have done[3]. Many Indic wikis have
this template, but few show it on main page. This might be incredibly
useful on mobile versions.
More thoughts on improving Mobile sites welcome :)
Mobile sites are important since,
1. Lot of people will be using this.
2. The Wikipedia app uses this(?) [Correct me if am wrong]
[1] http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Extension:MobileFrontend
[2]
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mobile_Projects/Mobile_Gateway#Mobile_homepa…
[3] http://as.m.wikipedia.org/
--
Regards
Srikanth.L
Dear friends,
This is to inform you all about the creation of the first MediaWiki group in India. For the past several days, I’ve been speaking to Quim Gil, Sumana and Yuvi Panda. I was informed about the setting up of local groups in different countries for technical contributors. With encouragement from all of them and with help from Noopur I submitted a proposal for the formation of MediaWiki Group Ahmedabad. This proposal has been endorsed by 7 people so far.
For those who might be interested in setting up similar groups, I think a Wikitech mailing list for India is being set up and personally, I would be happy to help you write a proposal for your community. I think it’s a great idea because with the help of this technical group we intend to make good technical infrastructure and editing environment for Gujarati Wikipedia easier to contribute to.
I have already ported HotCat and Popups(on the way) on Gujarati Wikipedia. Please have a look at the areas we want to collaborate on:
Areas of collaboration:
Localize Gadgets for Gujarati Wikipedia and Wikisource
Create New Gadgets and extensions
Bug solving for Gujarati Wikipedia and WikiSource and also other MediaWiki related Bug solving for all Indian languages
Translate into Gujarati Language, i.e http://translatewiki.net/
Wikidata
You can read the proposal here: https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Groups/Proposals/Ahmedabad
Your endorsements, improvements and feedback are welcome at the wiki
page. Thank you!
Harsh Kothari
PS: see also http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Groups/Proposals
---
Harsh Kothari
Research Fellow,
Physical Research Laboratory(PRL).
Ahmedabad.
Let me begin with, what I consider to be, one of the most powerful
statements of the Digital Era and the 21st century.
* *
*Imagine a world in which every single person on the planet is given free
access to the sum of all human knowledge – Jimmy Wales 2004*
Every time I read this statement, it stirs up all the excitement and
enthusiasm I have for Wikipedia. It not just presents a potential vision
but also a) opens up un-ending possibilities across multiple realms; b)
enunciates the largest ever human collaboration across all kinds of
boundaries; c) presents an opportunity that was never possible in the human
history; and d) shows the conception of one of the best democratic
platforms of collective-knowledge-building and free-knowledge-sharing. More
importantly Jimmy Wales’ statement succinctly instructs what needs to be
done as PDA2K. Further, the A2K programme work-plan (
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/India_Access_To_Knowledge/Programme_Plan)
has clearly quantified this into measurable milestones.
So I felt it is more productive to not delve too much into the ‘what’
question, but focus more on *how can we achieve this*? Thus the below plan
is more of an *Operational Plan* than a vision statement. Further, it is
not a work-plan as it lacks micro details. What I set out to do below is to
present an outline of the key tasks and strategies that we could adopt to
achieve our collective vision in year 1. It should be noted that I have
deliberately not touched upon some of the activities that are currenly
being deployed.
*Focus Areas:** *There are a number of Wikimedia projects in Indian
languages and about 20 Indian language wikipedias. Given the current size
of the A2K team and the support available it is prudent to identify focus
areas/projects where deeper impact can be achieved. After a careful
examination of the various Indian languages wikipedias it will be useful to
have the following as the primary focus languages. These would be 1) Hindi;
2) Malayalam; 3) Tamil; 4) Kannada & 5) Telugu. Have worked with few
parameters (like current activity, operational convenience, infrastructure,
etc) in making this suggestion and community members are welcome to
question this or offer suggestions. Further, as a secondary focus, 5 more
languages could be identified in consultation with the Wikimedia India
Chapter (WIC) and other community members. Basically the A2K team will have
to focus 70% of its energies on these 5 languages in order to achieve
long-term tangible impact of creating large user and editor base. This will
allow for speedier implementation of pilots/strategies, provide quick
learning and enable cross-pollination of the success strategies in the
secondary focus areas. In the first two months a game plan will be drawn up
for each of the 5 primary languages in consultation with the WIC and the
community.
*Three Nodes:* I perceive three important nodes for the growth of Indian
Wikimedias and Wikimedia in India. First, the one which we all know is the
Community. The second is what I call Knowledge Collaborators (more about it
below) and the third is the A2K team itself. These should not be seen as
watertight divisions as they often complement each other and work in
collaborative manner
*Node 1 – Community: *Community is our greatest strength. It is important
to start with the learnings and challenges the Wikimedia communities have
faced in each of the 5 primary language areas. Initially a framework will
be developed to capture the community experience of growing their
respective language Wikimedia projects. Following this A2K team will
collate the collective knowledge of the community members and come up with
a SWOT (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SWOT_analysis) analysis, which
will be shared with community. Based on this SWOT analysis the A2K team
will work with the respective community to set Goals (focussing on
community expansion and retention) for the next one year. Following this a
detailed work planning exercise will be undertaken. This work-plan will be
reviewed and reworked on a quarterly basis by the community.
*Deliverable in the first 60 days:* 1) Framework/Process for each of the 5
language communities; 2) Collation of collective learning and challenges;
3) SWOT analysis; 4) Goal setting; 5) Commence work-planning exercise
In addition to the regular activities of the Community the following
catalytic community building tools will also be developed and deployed
through the Community in order to amplify the reach and growth of that
respective language Wikimedia project.
*i) Wiki-Community Leadership Programme*
Rationale: Outreach to communities in small cities and towns need a
continuous and consistence engagement.
Objective: Primary role will be community sensitization, mobilization and
expansion and mentoring Grass-root wiki leaders (GWL).
Each of the language community will either nominate or recruit at least 5
Wiki-Community Leaders (WCL), who will be able to physically cover at least
3-4 districts. A2K in collaboration with the WIC will invest on these
Leaders in building their capacities by offering them a) leadership
curriculum; b) public-speaking skills; c) curriculum on community
mobilization and effective volunteerism; and e) necessary technological and
content support.
Outputs: 1) 5 WCL to mentor at least 5 GWLs = A base of 150 leaders (i.e.
150 potential editors); 2) Each WCL to organize 1 Perspective Building
Programme (PBP) every week (avg 15 new members per event) = 750 PBPs; 3)
Each WCL to organize 1 Wiki-Outreach and Orientation event every month (avg
10 new members per event) = 300 Wiki-Orientations to reach 3000 members
(may result in 150 editors).
*Deliverable in the first 60 days:* 1) Identification of WCL; 2) Curating a
training module for WCL;
*ii) Perspective Building Programmes (PBP)*
Rationale: Don’t start talking shop if you want build community. Build
perspective and focus on enrolment. A group becomes a community only when
it is enrolled into the idea.
Objective: Create an enabling communal context where the Indian Wikimedia
projects find an immediate identification and association.
The majority of educated individuals in non-metro contexts are unaware or
not exposed to discourses about knowledge production, consumption and
availability of knowledge, open source, technology and knowledge, knowledge
industries, etc. In such a context the success rate of a Wikimedia
orientation workshop comes down drastically. Also, there is a need to
generate a larger debate about the above mentioned topics, which will
create conducive atmosphere for the growth of Indian Wikimedia projects and
could break the vicious circle we are stuck in.
Outputs: 1) 15-20 model PBPs each in 5 languages; 2) Possible replication
across other Indian language Wikimedia projects; 3) Public awareness about
Indian Wikimedia (Direct about 20,000 people; Indirect about 60,000 people
and may result in 8000 new users); 4) If successful, possible availability
of a strong Pilot for the Global wiki-community
*Deliverable in the first 60 days:* 1) Creating a blue-print for PBP; 2)
Model PBP creation; 3) Testing in 2 locations each across of 5 language
areas; 4) Review
*iii) Wiki-Panchayat*
Rationale: Keep four crabs in a box and each one will ensure that no one
will escape. Where there is a community there is bound to be a dispute.
Objective: Instituting a community based conflict resolution body,
especially to avoid edit wars. To be modelled on our good old Panchayt
system.
*Deliverable in the first 60 days:* Discuss the modalities of
Wiki-Panchayat with the respective communities and work towards developing
a model. Develop a work-plan to design and roll-out the idea.
*iv) Quarterly Jam Sessions (QJS)*
Rationale: It is important to review and reflect and revise to successfully
meet the goals.
Objective: These mandatory sessions will push the community to physically
and virtually come together and take a stock of how they are progressing
against their own plans. This community based review mechanism will further
foster collaborations; build larger community ownership; enable
peer-to-peer learning; and catalytically contribute to the strengthening of
the community, while celebrating the collective spirit.
Outputs: 1) 4 QJS in each of the 5 language areas; 2) Increased public
visibility to Wikimedia and Indian Wikimedia projects; 3) Possible
replication across other Indian language Wikimedia projects;
*Deliverable in the first 60 days:* Discuss the modalities of QJS with the
respective communities and work towards developing a model. Develop a
work-plan to design and roll-out the idea.
*v) Wiki-Caravans*
Rationale: People are always happy to join-in the celebrations.
Objective: A yearly event that will celebrate and publicly show-case the
growth of Wikimedia projects in 5 Indian languages. Will facilitate greater
visibility, help in building institutional partnerships and raise funding
for WIC.
Outputs: At least 1 Wiki-Caravan organized across 5 language areas; 2)
Increased public visibility to Wikimedia and Indian Wikimedia projects; 3)
%age increase in fund raising of WIC
*Deliverable in the first 60 days:* In collaboration with WIC and community
members work towards curating a model Wiki-Caravan. Assess fund
requirement. Develop a work-plan to design and roll-out the idea.
*Node 2 – Institutional Knowledge Collaborators: *As we all know these are
typical domains of Knowledge-Holes and Knowledge-Habitats, where a large
packet of population is formally into knowledge production, consumption and
dissemination. These can be classified as below.
i) Galleries
ii) Libraries
iii) Archives
iv) Museums
v) Universities and Research Institutions
vi) KINSHIP Groups
vii) NGOs
viii) Foundations
*i to iv) GLAM* I think WIC and some members from the Community are already
engaging with GLAM institutions. It would be useful to review our current
mode of engagement with GLAM institutions and the results that have been
achieved. A lot of digitization and preservation work is underway across
various GLAM institution and we need to plug into this network and explore
possibilities of collaborations.
*Deliverable in the first 60 days:* Review the current strategy. Develop a
list of GLAM institutions in the five language areas and map existing
networks, digitization activities and projects.
*v) Universities and Research Institutions*
Rationale: With the impending advent of foreign universities and
privatization of higher education there is a lot of out of box thinking
amongst the Universities and Research Institutions to make itself socially
relevant and societally connected. Increasingly these institutions are
looking at technological interface for learning, cutting-edge courses and
developing qualitative regional language resources for higher education.
Objective: There is a huge potential En-Wikimedia and Indian Wikimedia
projects can offer to Universities and Research Institutions in
re-inventing their pedagogic practices. These institutions need to be made
aware that Wikipedia can be the potential open learning and knowledge
dissemination tool.
Possibilities: Students to put up their assignments and project reports on
the Wikimedia platform. Wikipedia as a potential young researcher’s tool;
Indian language Wikipedias can be leveraged as a potential regional
language resource for advanced learning.
Approach: 1) MOUs with Universities/Research Institutions; 2) Institute 5
Fellowships (quarterly) for Young Researcher in Residency Programme (YRRP)
in each focussed language area with 15 new articles and 100 edits in
respective language Wikipedia and 100 new key words as deliverables. 3)
Faculty Engagement Programme (FEP), 2 in each language for six-month
duration, whereby a faculty is provided support to mentor and manage at
least 5 Young Researchers on an Indian topic; 4) Wiki-Young Researchers
Workshop
Outputs: 1) MOUs with at least 2 Universities/Research Institutions in each
of the 5 language areas to potentially garner 5,000 users and 250 editors.
2) YRRP directly to add 100 active editors with 1500 new articles, 10,000
edits and 10,000 key words. 3) Indirectly YRRP can have a much larger (3x)
foot-print if executed strategically. 4) FEP to yield at least 100 active
editors and will have the same direct output as YRRP.
*Deliverable in the first 60 days:* 1) Devise a draft blue-print for
engagement with University and Research Institutions; 2) Create a long list
of potential partner institutions; 3) Few ice-breaker meetings with faculty
in Universities.
* *
*vi) KINSHIP Groups – These are what I would like to call Groups with
Knowledge on Issues, Niche Subjects, Hobbies and Independent Projects.*
Rationale: There is a huge potential here for knowledge pooling and very
few institutions like Sarai have managed to successfully tap into knowledge
groups.
Objective: The biggest advantage is that these groups have tons of passion
for their respective subject and will be more than willing to become
Wikimedians. It is only that we need to identify and reach them. The ideal
strategy would be to initially follow a YRRP model.
Output: 1) Institute 5 YRRP Fellowships (quarterly) in each focussed
language area with 15 new articles and 100 edits in respective language
Wikipedia and 100 new key words as deliverables. 2) Actively link them with
Community.
*Deliverable in the first 60 days:* 1) Devise a draft blue-print for
engagement with KINSHIP Groups; 2) Create a long list of potential groups;
3) Few ice-breaker meetings.
* *
*vii & viii)NGOs and Foundations – There is huge potential for Indian
Wikimedia to collaborate with NGOs and Grant making Foundations.*
Right now I can only suggest one example of collaborating with Community
Radio Stations across India for content sharing, which they anyhow produce
and submit to Ministry of I&B. They can also be potential grass-root
networks (with technology) to create and cultivate new users and editors.
Similarly sector specific NGOs offer a really big opportunity for the
growth of Wikimedia in India. But it is important to know how to engage the
NGOs and Foundations.
*Deliverable in the first 60 days:* An engagement plan will be developed.
* *
*Node 3 – A2K Team: The A2K team will be an important caveat in this
Operational Plan. Have briefly outlined the activities and could elaborate
if there are any specific questions.*
a. A review of work done so far; Learnings and Challenges (Month 1)
b. Revisiting the Role and Objectives of Team Members (Month 1)
c. SMART Goal Exercise - Personal and Professional Goal setting (Month
2)
d. Work Planning Exercise & Goal Setting (Month 2)
e. Monthly Review (From Month 3 onwards)
f. Budget Planning in sync with Programme Planning (Month 2)
g. Creating Key Result Areas for each member of the team (Month 2)
h. Periodic Public Disclosure and Open assessment of Team performance
(From Month 3 onwards)
Hello Everyone,
This is Sucheta. I am an OPW intern at MediaWiki, based in Kolkata. The
newly formed Mozilla Community of Kolkata is organizing a 2 day ( Jan 5 -
Jan 6 ) event dedicated to Free and Open Source Software and various
Mozilla initiatives, where participants will get chance to interact with
professional developers and renowned FOSS activists as well as some Mozilla
Representatives from the Mozilla India Community. And they want to have a
MediaWiki part as well and had approached me for the same. I had approached
few people from MediaWiki and checked if they could come over. But
Santhosh, Yuvi Panda, and Harsh Kothari seem to be occupied at that
specific period of time, although they are ready to help remotely. So, I am
planning to do one small workshop on MediaWiki there, with 10-15 students
maybe. It would be great to have your support, and suggestions are welcome
too.
Here is the event’s official website: http://moztiatbesu.co.nr/
I have been planning this workshop with Yuvi Panda and Harsh Kothari and
here’s basically what we had in mind for the workshop:
- Userscripts and Gadgets:
'Lesson Plan':
1. Environment (JS, Dev Toolbar, Common.js, importScript, mw.loader.load)
2. Data (API, API Sandbox, actions)
3. Accessing Data from the Environment (AJAX concepts, mw.API,
mw.loader.using)
- Introduction to IRC: People should get the idea of the amazing
community out there! So, I thought IRC environment should get them that
feel, and would also help them for future work. I am thinking of
introducing them to the channel #mediawiki on freenode.
So, if you know people in Kolkata who would be interested in getting a
technical introduction to Mediawiki, please ask them to attend! Do forward
it to the relevant lists too!
Thanks for the support!
Cheers,
Sucheta
[Sorry, the subject part was missing on the last e-mail.]
Hello Everyone,
This is Sucheta. I am an OPW intern at MediaWiki, based in Kolkata. The
newly formed Mozilla Community of Kolkata is organizing a 2 day ( Jan 5 -
Jan 6 ) event dedicated to Free and Open Source Software and various
Mozilla initiatives, where participants will get chance to interact with
professional developers and renowned FOSS activists as well as some Mozilla
Representatives from the Mozilla India Community. And they want to have a
MediaWiki part as well and had approached me for the same. I had approached
few people from MediaWiki and checked if they could come over. But
Santhosh, Yuvi Panda, and Harsh Kothari seem to be occupied at that
specific period of time, although they are ready to help remotely. So, I am
planning to do one small workshop on MediaWiki there, with 10-15 students
maybe. It would be great to have your support, and suggestions are welcome
too.
Here is the event’s official website: http://moztiatbesu.co.nr/
I have been planning this workshop with Yuvi Panda and Harsh Kothari and
here’s basically what we had in mind for the workshop:
- Userscripts and Gadgets:
'Lesson Plan':
1. Environment (JS, Dev Toolbar, Common.js, importScript, mw.loader.load)
2. Data (API, API Sandbox, actions)
3. Accessing Data from the Environment (AJAX concepts, mw.API,
mw.loader.using)
- Introduction to IRC: People should get the idea of the amazing
community out there! So, I thought IRC environment should get them that
feel, and would also help them for future work. I am thinking of
introducing them to the channel #mediawiki on freenode.
So, if you know people in Kolkata who would be interested in getting a
technical introduction to Mediawiki, please ask them to attend! Do forward
it to the relevant lists too!
Thanks for the support!
Cheers,
Sucheta
