Thats great news Hisham!! congrats! The 5key factors mentioned are really
important... So much is happening in India program, facebook guidance is
also working smoothly & now the assamese community..
Congrats again..:-)
Best,
Deepon
On May 30, 2012 9:49 AM, "Hisham" <hisham(a)wikimedia.org> wrote:
Dear All
I wanted to share with you an update on the work that
Shiju<http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Shiju>[1] is
doing on Indic
languages<http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/India_Program/Indic_Languages&g…
as part of India Program <http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/India_Program>.[3]
A guiding principle for the thinking and efforts of our team is that
community building should be the most essential aspect of all the work that
we do. In the context of small Indic communities, Shiju has been working
to try and identify the various elements that need to come together to
foster community building. This update is about the Community Building
pilot<http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/India_Program/Pilot_Designs/Basic_C…
that
was run for the Assamese community. For context, community building means
different things to different people and in fact there was a very
interesting
post<http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimediaindia-l/2011-December…
that Shiju put out that articulated his thinking on this and, hence, our
priorities.
The results of these efforts have been outstanding
- number of editors on Assamese Wikipedia has increased to 31 in April
2012 (from 18 in December 2011 and just 10 in November 2011.)
- number of Wikiprojects increased to 6 (from a situation where there
were no reasonably active ones in December 2011- and including 5
Wikiprojects independently conceptualised and managed by the community)
- average monthly edits on Assamese Wikipedia increased to about 5000
in April 2012 from around 3000 in November 2011
There are 5 key factors that are responsible for this remarkable growth
1. *Strong communication*. This started with Shiju building personal
connections with Assamese editors and then encouraging them to communicate
with each other on-wiki, online and in meet--ups and outreach sessions.
2. *Initial push*. Shiju visited Assam in January where he spent time
in 2 towns with 7 of the most active community members, who also conducted
2 outreach sessions. This visit has proved to be really useful because it
helped to energise the community and also helped to establish a personal
relationship between Shiju and these editors (and also, amongst the editors
themselves.)
3. *Encouraging collaboration*. Wikiprojects and outreach are really
useful to galvanise a community and helped build personal equations. It's
wonderful to see the increase in Wikiprojects and
4. *Building capacity & confidence*. In all the work that has been
done for the Assamese community, the endeavour has been to build capacity.
For instance, support was given to get basic outreach material including
FAQs prepared and outreach sessions were guided by Shiju. It's inspiring
to see the Assamese community now take things to a whole new level and plan
out an ambitious 10th
anniversary<http://blog.wikimedia.in/2012/05/16/ten-glorious-years-of-assamese-wikipedia-celebrate-with-clicks-and-words/>
.[6]
5. *Healthy environment*. This is the last - but probably the most
essential point - and it is something I want to call out because it is what
will help or severely hinder the abilities of individual communities
realise their dreams and potential. The reason why the Assamese community
is making such wonderful steps forward is because there is
- a set of editors with the right level of initiative and motivation
- a strong sense of co-operation and good spirit amongst the editors
- an extremely welcoming approach to new editors
None of this would have been possible without the efforts of every single
Assamese community members. In the early days when Shiju started off, he
was interacting with Bishnu, Dipankar, Gitartha, Jyoti & Prabhakar - who
helped organise the first meet-ups and outreach sessions. Thanks to their
efforts, a list of thank-yous would now be 31 strong! Thank you and
congratulations to all of you!
To the Assamese community, I wish you the very best for your 10th
anniversary<http://blog.wikimedia.in/2012/05/16/ten-glorious-years-of-assamese-wikipedia-celebrate-with-clicks-and-words/>.[6]
There are exciting plans including your photo contest and your article
contest and the meet-up and the outreach session. I know that you are
doing most of the event largely independently (with
Noopur<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Noopur28>[7] providing
media assistance for the 10th anniversary and an India
Chapter<http://wikimedia.in/>
[8]
grant<http://wiki.wikimedia.in/Grants/Photo_and_Article_Competition_and_Wiki_Workshop_on_10-th_Anniversary_of_Assamese_Wikipedia>[9]
supporting
you.) This is the true signs of a community that is coming of age. There
are tremendous opportunities in outreach to get new editors, initiatives
like your article & photo contests to improve content and in proposed
projects like offline to make transformational changes in the community.
With regard to the way forward for India Program, the pilot design
page<http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/India_Program/Pilot_Designs/Basic_Co…
[4] on meta <http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/India_Program>[3] has now
been updated. The next steps are going to be to see how we can adapt or
build on these experiences with other communities, and as we move to other
communities, do them in a more scaleable manner.
To all community members - across languages across India - if you did want
any help in any aspect of community building, please feel free to reach out
to Shiju <http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Shiju>[1] at
shiju(a)wikimedia.org. Please also do add comments or ideas or suggestions
you might have to the Community Building Pilot's talk
page<http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:India_Program/Pilot_Designs/Bas…
.[10]
*hisham <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Hisham>[11]
*
Notes
[1]
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Shiju
[2]
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/India_Program/Indic_Languages
[3]
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/India_Program
[4]
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/India_Program/Pilot_Designs/Basic_Community_…
[5]
http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimediaindia-l/2011-December/005813.…
[6]
http://blog.wikimedia.in/2012/05/16/ten-glorious-years-of-assamese-wikipedi…
[7]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Noopur28
[8]
http://wikimedia.in/
[9]
http://wiki.wikimedia.in/Grants/Photo_and_Article_Competition_and_Wiki_Work…
[10]
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:India_Program/Pilot_Designs/Basic_Commu…
[11]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Hisham
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