1. Bringing Konkani Encyclopedia in Public Domain
A meeting was scheduled with the Vice Chancellor Dr. Satish R Shetye to discuss the
possibility of bringing Konkani Encyclopedia in public domain. As for now the four volume
Konkani Encyclopedia is under copyright of University of Goa. Dr. Shetye has gifted one
whole set of Konkani Encyclopedia to CIS and is interested to relinquish the copyright to
release it under creative common license and digitize it on Wikipedia. In the coming weeks
we'll be working closely with Dr. Shetye and his team to digitize this free
encyclopedia on Wikipedia.
Special thanks to Goa State Library, Goa University, Dr. Shetye, Prof. Alito Siqueira,
Prof. Gopakumar for such a wonderful gift. And a big thanks to Harriet Vidyasagar and
Debanjan and all those who helped to pull this through.
Picture:
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:With_Vice-Chancellor_Dr._Shetye_2.JPG
2&3. Two Days Wikipedia workshop at Goa University
A two day Wikipedia session was organized for MA, research and PhD students at Goa
University on the 12th and 13th Dec 2012.
A special thanks to Prof. Alito Siqueira from Department of Sociology Goa University,
Harriet Vidyasagar from OLPC, Prof. Gopakumar from Goa University, Debanjan and Frederick
from Wikipedia community and CIS team for making this workshop a huge success. All efforts
invested in discussions and planning the workshop over multiple mail trails, conference
calls, one-on-one calls paid off extremely well. Over 35 participants attended the two day
workshop and throughly enjoyed the sessions.
Most of the participants had already created their usernames before the 1st session, as it
was instructed to them earlier, though there were some participants who created their user
accounts during the session. Despite creating a ticket for releasing the IP from 7
accounts creation limit we ran into an IP block. This was the second time we encountered
such a problem and we'll be looking closely into this matter for smooth operations
going forward.
It was pre-decided by the organisers that the 1st session will be theoretical while the
2nd session will be a complete hands-on-traning session. Hence the 1st session started
with general introduction about Wikipedia, 5 pillars, how Wikipedia works, brief about
Wikipedia community, state of Wikipedia in India etc. The following day participants
pre-selected articles that they wanted to edit during the course of the 2nd session. They
were taught how to do minor edits, add edit summary, add references, understand view
history and page statistics, importance of article and user talk pages.
The 2 day long workshop came to an end with a meeting organised by all the participants to
decide what should be their next steps. The workshop created a lot of enthusiasm in the
participants and they were already thinking how individual students, researchers and
professors will be building up pages on Wikipedia, one page at a time. They also showed
keen interest to understand how monthly meet ups are organised in other cities so that
they could also organise meet ups in Goa starting 2013 (the proposed date as for now is
16th Jan 2013 - also to celebrate Wikipedia's anniversary).
The feedback received from the participants was extremely positive. In the meanwhile there
have been some discussion about forthcoming workshops - we have already received inquires
from 5 more institutes to organise similar events in Goa. It seems like the initial seeds
have been sown for a flourishing Wikipedia community in Goa.
4. Konkani in Wikipedia incubator - Taking it to the next level
An introductory session was organised in the Konkani Department at Goa University on the
12th Dec 2012. The Konkani staff and students were exhilarated to learn about Konkani in
Wikipedia incubation. They have shown keen interest to kick start this project and get the
translations done in any or all scripts - Devanagari, Roman, Kannada, Malayalam and
Perso-Arabic for Konkani Wikipedia.
We've been in touch with the Director of Konkani Department, Madhavi Sardesai and we
are currently discussing the possibility of organising a follow up meeting in Jan/Feb
2013. In the meanwhile, User:Fredericknoronha, one of the Wikimedia Incubator members
contributing to Konkani Wikipedia, has been helping us get in touch with more Konkani
writers and organising a common meeting sometime in early 2013 to take this project to the
next level. To begin with, if we can just get the translations done a lot of things will
fall in place and will also help build confidence too.
Some useful links
Konkani in Wikipedia incubator
http://incubator.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wp/gom
Some pages contributed already - much work needs to be done to improve quality
http://incubator.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:PrefixIndex/Wp/gom/
List of tasks as viewed by volunteers
http://incubator.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wp/gom/tasks
An example of a well-translated article, on the "Pinto's Revolt" by Isidore
Dantas
http://incubator.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wp/gom/Pintonchem_Karosthan
Picture 1:
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Nitika,_Harriot_and_myself_at_Goa_Un…
Picture 2:
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Nitika,_Harriot_and_myself_at_Goa_Un…
5. Promoting GLAM in Goa
We organised an introductory GLAM session at Goa State Central Library on the 13th Dec
2012. It was well attended by about 45 interested people coming from over 10 different
GLAM institutes in Goa. Nitika from CIS and Debanjan from Pune community led the session
about Wikipedia and GLAM activities that have been undertaken by our global community
since 2010. The talk instilled a lot of enthusiasm in librarians and curators in Goa to
start similar programs in their associated institutes.
Some of the institutes attending the session were - Museum of Christian Art, Goa Chitra,
Bookworm Library, K.S. Goa State Library, GTL Bicholini, DFLG District Library.
Participants had lot of interesting questions about starting GLAM projects in
English/Marathi/Konkani, starting point of the project, logistical/financial support
required to run a GLAM project etc.
To begin with we'll be meeting Victor Hugos Gomes from Goa Chitra who has shown keen
interest to start a GLAM project. Goa Chitra showcases the rich tradition of implements,
tools, arts and crafts. Goa Chitra has archived Goa's cultural heritage through
documents, books, photographs, handcrafts, electronic recordings, costumes, musical
instruments, artifacts. In the coming weeks we'll be following up with Goa Chitra and
more institutions to figure out the possibility of starting new projects in 2013.
Here's an audio recording of the entire event:
http://archive.org/details/GlamInGoa
Picture 1:
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Lecture_Central_Library_Goa_15.JPG
Picture 2:
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Lecture_Central_Library_Goa_14.JPG
6. Wikipedia event at St. Xavier's College, Goa
A three hour workshop was organised in the morning of 14th Dec 2012 at St. Xavier's
College, Goa. Over 30 participants attended the session. The workshop started with a short
introductory presentation followed by learning how to edit Wikipedia. Since there were
lesser number of computers participants were divided in groups of 2 or 3 maximum. Each
group made at least 3 edits with the help of volunteers present in the room. A follow up
session will be organised in Jan/Feb 2013 to organise an edit-a-thon for all the
interested and enthusiastic participants.
A special thanks to everyone who helped organising this event - Harriet Vidyasagar,
Frederick, Debanjan - all from Wikipedia family and Nitin Volvoikar, Head of Journalism
from St. Xavier's.
Picture 1:
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Editing_at_Xavier%27s_Mapusa_2.JPG
Picture 2:
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Editing_at_Xavier%27s_Mapusa_3.JPG