This meetup will take place in the Microsoft Research Lab near Cambridge station:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Meetup/Cambridge/43
Please note the fine print about getting past the front door: this seems to be industry-standard, judging by our previous event hosted by Amazon.
This time we are being hosted by Andy Gordon of Microsoft Research. He has a couple of ideas related to Wikidata, including a use of Excel, so we'll be having some presentations at the beginning of the meetup.
Hope to see you there.
Charles
We've got about 150 photos from the place but would probably worth
having another crack at if someone is in the area:
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Victoria_and_Albert_Museum_of_C…
The good news is that Lowewood Museum which was due to close now
isn't. That bad news is we don't appear to have any photos from it at
all (although I have plans).
--
geni
Good afternoon everyone,
The American Centre of Oriental Research <http://acorjordan.org/> in Amman
has hired two part-time Wikimedians in Residence to work on the Open
Jordanian Heritage <https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Open_Jordanian_Heritage>
initiative. I'm working closely with them and was wondering if there's a
chance to connect them with experienced WiRs in the UK.
Warm wishes to all,
Raya
Dear all
As many of you will be aware, over the past three years volunteers, staff,
partners and other stakeholders from across the global Wikimedia community
have been involved in a process to identify what the future of our movement
should look like, and how we should get there. After what I know has felt
like a bit of a long haul, this process has now reached a crucial stage,
with the publication of 13 recommendations
<https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Strategy/Wikimedia_movement/2018-20/Recomme…>
which
will form the basis for the implementation of the strategic direction.
Implementation is likely to include changing the way the movement is
structured and funded (including looking at chapters like Wikimedia UK),
implementing behaviour and safety standards off and online, and looking at
content on Wikipedia (e.g. potential priorities for topics, or changing
notability criteria). This stage moves from what has been an abstract
discussion, into what will actually change in the movement.
There is now a *limited window for all of us to give feedback on these
recommendations*, and I invite you to do so in one of the following ways:
1. Email me with your feedback (preferably in a summarised, bullet pointed
format!) and I will add this to the feedback I will be giving on behalf of
the UK chapter, including responses from staff and trustees. Please email me
by reply or on lucy.crompton-reid(a)wikimedia.org.uk by *Thursday 27th
February *otherwise I will not be able to include your response.
2. Add your feedback to the relevant discussion page on meta. There is a
discussion page for general comments on the recommendations (and, more
broadly, the strategy process) or you can contribute to the discussion
pages for specific recommendations. Ideally you should do this by *21st
February* for your input to be taken into account by the team reviewing
feedback.
Chris Keating very kindly emailed the Affiliates mailing list highlighting
the aspects of the recommendations which are likely to have an impact on
affiliates. I've reproduced this below in case this is helpful - although
of course, people on this mailing list may well be looking through a
slightly different lens.
*Changing nature of affiliate-WMF relationships*
*The recommendations call for significant changes to the relationship
between the WMF and affiliates.*
*In particular, it calls for:*
** a Movement Charter, which sets out a common set of expectations around
behaviour and accountability of all movement entities (including both the
WMF and all affiliates)*
** a new "global governance body" that would provide input into future
development of future strategy; would set the framework for funds
dissemination; and hold all movement entities accountable. (including
affiliates and the WMF)*
*To be clear, it's very likely that many existing WMF/Affiliate structures
(AffCom, FDC, etc) would end up being folded into the global governance
body. *
*These recommendations are there in part because of feedback from
affiliates and communities that there is no way to structured way of
holding conversations within the movement. The expectations of behaviour
from movement entities (WMF and affiliates) can be unclear, and methods of
communication and conflict resolution are lacking. These proposals are
there to address that.*
*Going beyond these proposals, the recommendations also include
decentralisation as a principle - pushing power and control away from the
centre to the people who are most directly running projects. If taken
seriously, this would be a very big change in the relationship between WMF
and affiliates (particularly around grantmaking, where there has been
feedback around bureaucracy and inflexibility in the current system).*
*Supporting development of affiliates*
*There is a strong emphasis in the recommendations on building skills and
supporting individuals and organisations. Training, mentorship, and
learning are all mentioned a great deal.*
*This is a direct response to feedback from affiliates that there is not
enough support on offer from the movement at the moment. Many affiliates
have been saying "Ok, we got recognised by Affcom, what comes next?" and
finding there is no real support on offer. These recommendations are aimed
at solving that problem.*
*There is also the concept of 'regional hubs' which would exist to bring
affiliates (or affiliates-in-formation) together to better support them.
Again, this is directly in response to the fact that many of our existing
regional partnerships have a lot of value for affiliates and communities,
and affiliates are asking for support in languages other than English and
geographically close to them.*
*Impact and funds dissemination*
*It's recommended to clarify the movement's definition of 'impact'. This
means that there would be a clearer set of criteria around funds
distribution based on what impact projects are expected to have on people
and on knowledge equity. *
*It's also recommended that more of the decision-making power for funds
dissemination will sit closer to the communites using the funds. So less
focus on global committees like the FDC or global grants programmes, more
focus on groups of affiliates and community members in regional hubs
working out what to spend their money on (within an overall framework
established at a global level).*
As the strategy liaison for the UK I'm happy to be the conduit for any
questions you have on the strategy process - although of course you are
also welcome to add questions/comments to meta.
Best wishes
Lucy
--
Lucy Crompton-Reid
Chief Executive
Wikimedia UK
+44 (0) 203 372 0762
*Wikimedia UK* is the national chapter for the global Wikimedia open
knowledge movement, and a registered charity. We rely on donations from
individuals to support our work to make knowledge open for all. Have you
considered supporting Wikimedia? https://donate.wikimedia.org.uk
Company Limited by Guarantee registered in England and Wales, Registered
No. 6741827
Registered Charity No.1144513
Registered Office Ground Floor, Europoint, 5 - 11 Lavington Street, London
SE1 0NZ
The Wikimedia projects are run by the Wikimedia Foundation (who operate
Wikipedia, amongst other projects). Wikimedia UK is an independent
non-profit charity with no legal control over Wikipedia nor responsibility
for its contents.
Good afternoon all,
As part of our reporting & evaluation process, Wikimedia UK send out an
annual survey to our volunteers (such as event managers, speakers etc) and
representatives of partnership organisations.
This survey has just been sent out. If you do not receive an email, but
believe that you should have, please contact me (also please do reply just
to me rather than to all, to save everyone's inboxes...) and I'll send you
the link directly.
Many thanks, and have a good evening.
Best,
Sara
--
Dr Sara Thomas
Scotland Programme Coordinator, Wikimedia UK
https://wikimedia.org.uk/wiki/Wikimedia_in_Scotland
*I work part time and am not in the office on Mondays. *
*Wikimedia UK* is the national chapter for the global Wikimedia open
knowledge movement. We rely on donations from individuals to support our
work to make knowledge open for all. Have you considered supporting
Wikimedia? https://donate.wikimedia.org.uk
Wikimedia UK is a Company Limited by Guarantee registered in England and
Wales, Registered No. 6741827. Registered Charity No.1144513. (England &
Wales), SC048644 (Scotland). Registered Office Ground Floor, Europoint, 5 -
11 Lavington Street, London SE1 0NZ
<https://maps.google.com/?q=5+-+11+Lavington+Street,+London+SE1+0NZ&entry=gm…>
.
Wikimedia UK is the UK chapter of a global Wikimedia movement. The
Wikimedia projects are run by the Wikimedia Foundation (who operate
Wikipedia, amongst other projects).
*Wikimedia UK is an independent non-profit charity with no legal control
over Wikipedia nor responsibility for its contents.*
Hi all,
In lack of proper knowledge on where these issues currently live, the blog
emails seem to be lacking any kind of SPF or DKIM (and obviously, no DMARC
either) headers and Google seems to be sending all of these to spam.
Can whoever is responsible for the chapter's tech these days add this to
their (I'm sure, quite long) ToDo list?
(Happy to help where I can!)
-- Lewis Cawte
Hello everyone,
The Digital Humanities Awards is an international competition recognising
work in the field of (unsurprisingly) digital humanities.
This year a project involving our Wikimedian in Residence at the University
of Edinburgh has been nominated in the category of 'Best DH Data
Visualization'. Voting is open now
<http://dhawards.org/dhawards2019/voting/>.
Based on Wikidata, the work breathed new life into a database of Scottish
witch trials. If you haven't seen it already, here's the explorable map
<https://witches.is.ed.ac.uk/>.
Please do have a look and vote!
Richard Nevell
--
Dr Richard Nevell
Project Coordinator, Wikimedia UK
*Wikimedia UK* is the national chapter for the global Wikimedia open
knowledge movement, and a registered charity. We rely on donations from
individuals to support our work to make knowledge open for all. Have you
considered supporting Wikimedia? https://donate.wikimedia.org.uk
Company Limited by Guarantee registered in England and Wales, Registered
No. 6741827
Registered Charity No.1144513
Registered Office Ground Floor, Europoint, 5–11 Lavington Street, London
SE1 0NZ
The Wikimedia projects are run by the Wikimedia Foundation (who operate
Wikipedia, amongst other projects). Wikimedia UK is an independent
non-profit charity with no legal control over Wikipedia nor responsibility
for its contents.
Dear all
Following a review of our communications function, Katie Crampton's role
within Wikimedia UK has changed to Communications and Governance Assistant,
and she has taken on some new responsibilities relating to Wikimedia UK's
communications. In particular, she is currently managing our social media
output and the blog, and will be working on our next newsletter.
Unfortunately we didn't receive a good response to our recent recruitment
drive for a Head of External Relations, so will be readvertising this new
post at some point soon. In the meantime, if you have comments about our
communications or you would like to contribute a blog post about something
you're working on related to Wikimedia or open knowledge, please contact me
or Katie.
Thanks and all best wishes
Lucy
--
Lucy Crompton-Reid
Chief Executive
Wikimedia UK
+44 (0) 203 372 0762
*Wikimedia UK* is the national chapter for the global Wikimedia open
knowledge movement, and a registered charity. We rely on donations from
individuals to support our work to make knowledge open for all. Have you
considered supporting Wikimedia? https://donate.wikimedia.org.uk
Company Limited by Guarantee registered in England and Wales, Registered
No. 6741827
Registered Charity No.1144513
Registered Office Ground Floor, Europoint, 5 - 11 Lavington Street, London
SE1 0NZ
The Wikimedia projects are run by the Wikimedia Foundation (who operate
Wikipedia, amongst other projects). Wikimedia UK is an independent
non-profit charity with no legal control over Wikipedia nor responsibility
for its contents.
It turns out that UK Parliamentary constituencies are not well
represented in Wikidata; for example many lack details of adjoining
constituencies, coordinates, and shape files.
A query highlighting the missing data, and a tool for finding
neighbouring constituencies, can be found at:
https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Wikidata:WikiProject_British_Politicians/Cons…
with discussion on its talk page.
If you can help with improving these items, please do!
--
Andy Mabbett
@pigsonthewing
http://pigsonthewing.org.uk