Dear all,
This year the Community Day and Annual General Meeting will be separate
events, with the Community Day aligning closer to Wikimania 2022 timings.
To help design the community activity we want to hear what event activities
you value, whether you are in the mood for in person or virtual and what
timings suit your August plans.
The survey is very short and can be found here
<https://www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/BV2V3FT>.
If you can offer some time or creativity to help in planning please do let
me know.
Many thanks and best wishes
Natasha
--
Natasha Iles MCIOF (Dip)
Head of Development & Communications
Wikimedia UK
<https://donate.wikimedia.org.uk/>
*Wikimedia UK* <https://wikimedia.org.uk/> is the national chapter for the
global Wikimedia open knowledge movement.
Follow us on Twitter <https://twitter.com/wikimediauk>, Facebook
<https://www.facebook.com/WikimediaUK>, LinkedIn
<https://www.linkedin.com/company/496119>, and Instagram
<https://www.instagram.com/wikimediauk/>.
Wikimedia UK is a registered charity in England and Wales No.1144513.
and Scotland
No. SC048644. Company Limited by Guarantee, Registration No. 6741827.
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…>
.
Dear fellow Wikimedians of the UK,
I am writing to you to bring to your attention the case of my friend and
fellow free knowledge activist, the British-Egyptian Alaa Abd El-Fattah,
currently wrongfully imprisoned in Egypt under trumped up charges. Alaa is
on his second month of hunger strike and *urgently needs UK consular
support.*
Alaa is a writer, an award-winning human rights blogger, a software
developer, anda proponent of open knowledge. He is being targeted by the
Egyptian regime for speaking up for democracy and freedom. He is father to
a ten-year-old sona and an Amnesty Prisoner of Conscience
<https://www.amnesty.org/en/documents/mde12/2393/2020/en/>. He was
sentenced in December 2021 to 5 years in prison for resharing a Facebook
post about the deteriorating conditions in Egypt’s prisons.
Alaa has been subjected to torture and arbitrarily detained since September
2019. For two and a half years, he has been kept in a cell with no access
to books, newspapers or sunlight. He is not allowed a wristwatch to tell
the time of day, or exercise time outside his cell. His visits are limited
to one family member per month, for twenty minutes, through a glass
barrier, without a moment of privacy or physical contact.
Alaa is demanding his right to a visit from the British consulate, which is
yet to be secured since it was first requested in December 2021.
He began an open-ended hunger strike on April 2nd and his family fear for
his life.
The FCDO is fully aware of Alaa’s case, and his family have been liaising
directly with the British embassy in Cairo. However, I am extremely
concerned that things are not moving fast enough considering how
life-threatening
his situation is
<https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/british-egypt-jail-hun…>
and
the lack of progress in improving the conditions of his detention.
*I urge you to contact your MPs* *asking them to urgently write to Foreign
Secretary Liz Truss and ask what steps are being taken to address Alaa’s
wellbeing, ensure an immediate consular visit, and secure his release. *
*His family are also looking for MPs to table questions, submit EDMs and
host events in Westminster to raise Alaa's case. Please
contact freedomforalaa(a)gmail.com <freedomforalaa(a)gmail.com> if you are able
to help.*
For more information on Alaa, I recommend the recent Washington Post
Editorial Board’s piece: “A voice of the Arab Spring is being wrongfully
detained. Let him go free.”
<https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/04/08/dreams-prison-haunt-voic…>
The
website freealaa.net contains more background on Alaa's situation.
Following is an appeal by Alaa's sister:
https://www.facebook.com/Monasosh/posts/10159787151649454
Best regards,
Farah Mustaklem
Hi folks, apologies for x-posting...
Just wanted to let you know about an editathon taking place this Saturday
(23rd April, 13:00-16:00), by long-term Wikimedia UK partners *Protests &
Suffragettes
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:GLAM/Protests_and_Suffragettes>* and
*Women's History Scotland*. Editing will be on suffrage activists from
every region of Scotland, and the event will include short talks on
Scottish Suffrage history.
Eventbrite signup here: *www.tinyurl.com/WikiWorkshop23April*
<http://www.tinyurl.com/WikiWorkshop23April>
Bitesize training for any new or less experienced editors, and for those of
you more experienced, there's an excellent worklist that you can get stuck
right into.
All the best,
Sara
--
Dr Sara Thomas
Scotland Programme Coordinator, Wikimedia UK
https://wikimedia.org.uk/home/scotland/
<https://wikimedia.org.uk/wiki/Wikimedia_in_Scotland>
<https://donate.wikimedia.org.uk/>
*I work part time, my usual days are Tuesday, Wednesday & Thursday.*
*Wikimedia UK* <https://wikimedia.org.uk/> is the national chapter for the
global Wikimedia open knowledge movement.
Follow us on Twitter <https://twitter.com/wikimediauk>, Facebook
<https://www.facebook.com/WikimediaUK>, LinkedIn
<https://www.linkedin.com/company/496119>, and Instagram
<https://www.instagram.com/wikimediauk/>.
Wikimedia UK is a Registered Charity No.1144513 (England & Wales) SC048644
(Scotland). Company Limited by Guarantee registered in England and
Scotland, Registered No. 6741827.
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 everyone
I trust you have all been keeping well and making the most of the Bank
Holiday weekend and better weather?
With spring well and truly underway, we are turning our thoughts to the
annual nature photography competition Wiki Loves Earth.
Wales is taking part again this year and we would love to hear from you if
you have the time and enthusiasm to be a Lead Volunteer for WikiLovesEarth
2022 in England and/ or Scotland. The annual photography campaign is
running from early May to the end of July, details and links to organising
guidelines are here <https://wikilovesearth.org/2022/03/> and on Wikimedia
Commons here
<https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Wiki_Loves_Earth_2022>. The
activity delivered by Wiki Loves Earth in Wales 2021 can be found here
<https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Wiki_Loves_Earth_2021_in_Wales>.
If Wiki Loves Earth 2022 sounds like something you'd like to make happen
for our community, please let me know. From there we can work out timings
and activities to make it happen.
Many thanks and looking forward to hearing from you
Natasha
--
Natasha Iles MCIOF (Dip)
Head of Development & Communications
Wikimedia UK
<https://donate.wikimedia.org.uk/>
*Wikimedia UK* <https://wikimedia.org.uk/> is the national chapter for the
global Wikimedia open knowledge movement.
Follow us on Twitter <https://twitter.com/wikimediauk>, Facebook
<https://www.facebook.com/WikimediaUK>, LinkedIn
<https://www.linkedin.com/company/496119>, and Instagram
<https://www.instagram.com/wikimediauk/>.
Wikimedia UK is a registered charity in England and Wales No.1144513.
and Scotland
No. SC048644. Company Limited by Guarantee, Registration No. 6741827.
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…>
.
There has been much in the press and social media in recent days about
a new "Aerial Photograph EXplorer" made by Historic England [1]. It is
indeed a treasure trove of aerial photography, including the Aerofilms
archive, much RAF imagery, and more recent equivalents.
Some of the material on the site, particularly RAF imagery made before
30 June 1957, is out of copyright [2] and could be uploaded to
Wikimedia Commons. However, trying to save those images from their
individual pages (by right clicking, in Windows) results in an
interstitial stating "This image is copyrighted" [3].
[1] https://historicengland.maps.arcgis.com/apps/webappviewer/index.htm
[2] "Crown copyright photographs created prior to 30 June 1957 have a
copyright term of 50 years from creation." -
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Copyright_rules_by_territory/Uni…
[3] Example: https://historicengland.org.uk/images-books/archive/collections/aerial-phot…
--
Andy Mabbett
@pigsonthewing
http://pigsonthewing.org.uk
Last week, a report by Andrea Wallace, 'A Culture of Copyright: A
scoping study on open access to digital cultural heritage collections
in the UK', was published, examining UK GLAMs' claims of copyright on
reproductions of 2D works of art whose copyright has expired.
It's really well researched and written, and makes points which align
well with the Wikimedia movement's views on such Public Domain works.
The report (openly licensed and so naturally free to read) is here:
https://zenodo.org/record/6242611
and there's a good blog post about it here:
https://simon-tanner.blogspot.com/2022/03/the-revolution-starts-here-open-a…
--
Andy Mabbett
@pigsonthewing
http://pigsonthewing.org.uk
Dear all
I wrote to the Wikimedia UK membership on Saturday to outline some of the
activities that are taking place in relation to the terrible events in
Ukraine. In that email, I asked members to contact me if they are able to
offer accommodation for people seeking refuge from the war, and three
people have already been in touch. These offers are listed on this page
<https://uk.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=4472720> and I've been in touch
with the Chair of Wikimedia Ukraine in case he is able to help connect us
to people.
Early on in the conflict, I signed CILIP's Statement of Solidarity
<https://www.cilip.org.uk/news/597028/Statement-of-solidarity-with-librarian…>
on behalf of Wikimedia UK in support of Librarian and Information
professionals across Ukraine. The Ukrainian Library Association responded
immediately, saying that “the support of the CILIP community, Government
and people of the UK is highly appreciated in Ukraine.”
As you will probably already know, the wider Wikimedia community has
self-organised extremely quickly to ensure that information related to the
conflict on Wikipedia is as accurate, up-to-date and comprehensive as
possible. In my email to the membership I highlighted the main meta page
<https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/2022_Russian_invasion_of_Ukraine> about
Wikimedia's response to the invasion, as well as the meta page
<https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Saving_Ukrainian_Cultural_Heritage_Online>
outlining ways to get involved with the campaign to save Ukrainian’s
cultural heritage.
Thank you to everyone who is continuing to stand in solidarity with
Ukraine. If you have any suggestions for other things that Wikimedia UK
could be doing (within the bounds of our charitable remit), please do let
me know.
With warm wishes
Lucy
--
Lucy Crompton-Reid (she/her)
Chief Executive
Dear all
We are currently recruiting for a part time (two days a week) Volunteer
Coordinator to join the Programmes and Evaluation team at Wikimedia UK. The
role has a particular focus on underrepresented groups, but will also
provide more general support to the UK volunteer community.
The post is fixed-term for a year, although we hope to raise funds to
extend the post beyond this timeframe.
The details are on wiki here
<https://wikimedia.org.uk/wiki/Volunteer_Coordinator> and the closing date
is Wednesday 30th March. Please do share this with your networks or with
anyone you think might be interested and suitable!
With many thanks and best wishes
Lucy
--
Lucy Crompton-Reid (she/her)
Chief Executive