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Members for Wikimedia UK's 2020 AGM
by Katie Crampton 26 Mar '20

26 Mar '20

Hi all, hope you're well For the members <https://wikimedia.org.uk/wiki/Membership> of Wikimedia UK, I wanted to let you know that at our (virtual) board meeting last Saturday, we agreed that the 2020 Annual General Meeting will be held online, rather than as an in-person event. We are following the Charity Commission's guidelines <https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/charities-and-meetings-cc48/char…> so we can help keep everyone safe given the current pandemic: The requirements for charitable companies to have meetings of their members, and to transact certain items of business at meetings of their members, can now be dispensed with in certain circumstances. The date of the AGM will be Saturday 18th July. Given the move to an online only event, we will need to work out how best to enable everyone to participate, and what the format and schedule should look like. You can expect to hear more details from us in a few months time, but for now we would be grateful if you could put the date in your diaries. I'll be sending another email to all members soon. If you do not receive one and think you should, let me know so I can check your membership status. Do get in touch with me by email if you have any questions or comments. Best wishes Katie -- Katie Crampton Communications & Governance Assistant Wikimedia UK +44 (0)203 372 0761 *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. 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.*

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Wikimedia UK office closure (COVID-19)
by Lucy Crompton-Reid 18 Mar '20

18 Mar '20

Dear all Firstly, I hope that everyone is staying well - physically and mentally - during the Covid-19 pandemic. These are worrying and difficult times for all of us, and I hope that everyone has a support network in place (online or otherwise) to help them through it. As the people on this list are very aware, although Wikimedia is an online movement it has a strong face to face element, with meetups, editing events, training sessions, conferences, and of course offices including the UK chapter. We have been following the situation carefully over the past few weeks, with many of our upcoming events cancelled or moved online and staff preparing to work from home. Yesterday evening, following the new government advice around reducing contact and non-essential travel, we decided to *close the Wikimedia UK office in London as of tomorrow (Wednesday 18th March).* This closure will last until at least Monday 13th April (Easter Monday), but we will of course be reviewing the situation on an ongoing basis. The whole staff team met today to discuss some of the implications of the office closure - and the wider Covid-19 situation - for us, our partners and our volunteer community. We are already thinking about our programme and partnerships, and considering what events and projects will need to be cancelled but what can be rescheduled, moved online or re-imagined. We are also keen to explore ways in which we can support editors and readers during this period. Some of our ideas at this point include: - Exploring video conferencing platforms, and considering taking out a paid subscription/account which we could share for community members organising online meetups or other virtual events - Organising training in delivering online training/webinars for interested volunteers, particularly our existing lead trainers - Exploring the potential for online editing events specifically focused on producing quality information about the pandemic and associated issues - Joining wider advocacy efforts across the movement encouraging bodies such as the WHO to release their content under open licences - Thinking about how we can support educators - including parents - in a move to online learning (at universities) and homeschooling (for the schools sector) - Encouraging applications to our small grants scheme for books and other research materials, for those of you who suddenly have more time for editing! We realise that an increased emphasis on social distancing is likely to impact on all of you, personally and professionally and within the context of your Wikimedia activities. If you have any other ideas for how Wikimedia UK may be able to support our community over the next few weeks and months, please do get in touch. I would ask you all to bear in mind that this situation is also affecting staff, some of whom are separated from their families, or have underlying health conditions, or are being impacted financially by what is happening. So please bear with us as we adjust to a new reality in terms of our own lives as well as our work. With very 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.

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Cambridge meetup 21 March
by Charles Matthews 13 Mar '20

13 Mar '20

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

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V&A museum of childhood closing May 11 for 2 years
by geni 01 Mar '20

01 Mar '20

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

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Wikimedians in Residence in Amman
by Raya Sharbain 28 Feb '20

28 Feb '20

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

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Movement strategy - last chance to give feedback on recommendations before implementation
by Lucy Crompton-Reid 20 Feb '20

20 Feb '20

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.

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Community Leaders Survey 2020
by Sara Thomas 20 Feb '20

20 Feb '20

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.*

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Blog emails not providing anti-spam headers
by Lewis Cawte 16 Feb '20

16 Feb '20

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

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DH Awards 2019 voting
by Richard Nevell 14 Feb '20

14 Feb '20

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.

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Communications update
by Lucy Crompton-Reid 14 Feb '20

14 Feb '20

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.

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