Hello,
Hope this email finds you safe in this difficult time. Many people and
Wikimedians have been affected or have suffered a loss. In an effort to
ensure community solidarity where Wikimedians can meet and talk to each
other, we are starting a lightweight interaction zone for the Wikimedians
in India. This interaction zone is named "Stay Safe Stay Connected".
Please see the event page here:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Stay_safe,_stay_connected
The first talk will be on Saturday, 22 May 2021, 7 pm to 8 pm IST (1:30 pm
to 2:30 pm UTC). Asaf Bartov will be the guest of the session. Asaf is a
familiar name and he has been a mentor to many Wikimedians in India. This
will be a lightweight discussion on general Wiki-topic (note the exact
agenda will be updated on the event page before the event)
We invite you to join the first talk. The session will be hosted on Zoom.
Please fill this short form, if you are interested to attend the first
interactive talk on 22 May 2021
https://forms.gle/e85k84tX4oroKkjx7
Please follow the event page for updates. Stay safe, stay connected!
Regards,
Jayanta
Dear Santali Language Wikimedians,
We are inviting the Wikimedians of Santali Language User Group to
participate in *Wikipedia Pages Wanting Photos 2021
<https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_Pages_Wanting_Photos_2021>*, a
global contest scheduled to run from July first through August 31, 2021:
Participants will choose among Wikipedia pages without photo images, then
add a suitable file from among the many thousands of photos in the
Wikimedia Commons, especially those uploaded from thematic contests (Wiki
Loves Africa, Wiki Loves Earth, Wiki Loves Folklore, etc.) over the years.
In its first year (2020), 36 Wikimedia communities in 27 countries joined
the campaign. Events relating to the campaign included training organized
by at least 18 Wikimedia communities in 14 countries.
The campaign resulted in the addition of media files (photos, audios and
videos) to more than 90,000 Wikipedia articles in 272 languages.
Wikipedia Pages Wanting Photos (WPWP) offers an ideal task for recruiting
and guiding new editors through the steps of adding content to existing
pages. Besides individual participation, the WPWP campaign can be used by
user groups and chapters to organize editing workshops and edit-a-thons.
The organizing team is looking for a contact person to coordinate WPWP
participation at the Wikimedia user group or chapter level (geographically
or thematically) or for a language WP. We’d be glad for you to reply to
this email, or sign up directly at WPWP Participating Communities
<https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_Pages_Wanting_Photos_2021/Partici…>
.
Thank you,
Deborah Schwartz Jacobs (User:Deborahjay / debjay.wpwp(a)gmail.com)
Communities liaison coordinator
Wikipedia Pages Wanting Photos campaign
<http://www.avg.com/email-signature?utm_medium=email&utm_source=link&utm_cam…>
Virus-free.
www.avg.com
<http://www.avg.com/email-signature?utm_medium=email&utm_source=link&utm_cam…>
Hello Wikimedians,
We are all passing through a very difficult time as the second wave of
COVID-19 has hit hard throughout the country. It is a bitter and hard truth
that many of us have lost our loved ones, close friends, relatives,
neighbours already. Some of us have faced economic difficulties due to loss
of jobs, losses in businesses, huge hospitalization expenses etc.
In the midst of this crisis, a support program has been initiated to
provide some reliefs to our Wikimedia volunteers residing in India. The
program will support the following -
1. Reimbursement of vaccination costs
2. Sending of COVID-19 protection kits
3. Counseling by experts
The support will be provided by CIS-A2K. The vaccination expenses will be
reimbursed as early as April 30, 2021. The COVID-19 protection kits will
get couriered within a week or more, depending on various logistical
factors. The team will try to support the more vulnerable section of the
community first.
Volunteers are requested to fill up this Google Form to request support -
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLScYcjEeuT7vUxP3NJg7KfIiZaude9IXLyC…
If you do not need this kind of support but you know some volunteers from
your community who are in dire need, you can nominate them too through this
form or mail the support team directly. Affiliate contacts and community
leaders are also kindly requested to help identify the volunteers who need
the support the most.
You can find more details about the support program here -
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/COVID-19_support_for_Wikimedians/India
Please read the FAQ subpage too -
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/COVID-19_support_for_Wikimedians/India/FAQ
The support team would also like to emphasise that,
a) there might be some delay in sending support as there are lockdowns in
different parts of the country and there is scarcity or non-availability of
different items in the market,
b) there might be some unintentional or unexpected errors from the team, as
this is the first time, this kind of support is being set up for Indian
Wikimedia volunteers and the team does not have prior experience to deal
with this kind of global health situation before.
c) the team members are also facing the same critical situation like
everyone else; there are possibilities that they can become sick sooner or
later, which might hamper the support to some extent.
That's why the team would like to request you to understand the limitations
and assume good faith that any failure to serve sometimes would be due to
situations beyond control.
If you want to contact us directly for any questions, concerns,
suggestions, help etc. you can mail us directly at wmwm(a)cis-india.org .
Let's join hands to overcome this situation.
Regards,
Jayanta
On behalf of the COVID-19 support team
Hello;
My name is Mervat Salman, a UCoC Facilitator, Trust and Safety team.
As you know, the WMF Board of Trustees ratified the Universal Code of
Conduct early in February. That's the beginning; the policy itself cannot
be used if the enforcement pathways are not defined. The implementation and
enforcement of the UCoC requires the continuous cooperation to define clear
definitions of enforcement pathways and processes. This needs to be done in
a way that does not contradict with the internal bylaws and codes of
conduct currently in place, but rather to support them and complement their
deficiencies, if any.
In this phase of the process, we would like to invite you to share your
ideas, thoughts and concerns about the UCoC implementation, reporting and
enforcement pathways using this survey:
*(English): *
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLScXmeuAJ718Jzqefxrudc0Z5LxUMgqIm12…
*Notice*: "This survey will be conducted via a third-party service, which
may subject it to additional terms. For more information on privacy and
data-handling, see the survey privacy statement <
https://foundation.wikimedia.org/wiki/UCoC_Affiliates_Survey_Privacy_Statem…
>."
Should you have any questions or concerns, please do not hesitate to
contact msalman-ctr(a)wikimedia.org.
Best regards
Mervat Salman (She/Her)
UCoC Coordinator
Trust and Safety Team
Wikimedia Foundation <https://wikimediafoundation.org/>
*If you don't wish to receive surveys from us, please reply back with
"Unsubscribe" in the Subject line.*
Dear Santali Wikimedians,
The Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees is organizing a call for
feedback about community selection processes
<https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Foundation_Board_of_Trustees/Call…>[1]
between February 1 and March 14. While the Wikimedia Foundation and the
movement have grown about five times in the past ten years, the Board’s
structure and processes have remained basically the same. As the Board is
designed today, we have a problem of capacity, performance, and lack of
representation of the movement’s diversity. Direct elections tend to favor
candidates from the leading language communities, regardless of how
relevant their skills and experience might be in serving as a Board member,
or contributing to the ability of the Board to perform its specific
responsibilities. It is also a fact that the current processes have favored
volunteers from North America and Western Europe. As a matter of fact,
there had only been one member who served on the Board, from South Asia, in
more than fifteen years of history.
In the upcoming months, we need to renew three community seats and appoint
three more community members in the new seats. This call for feedback is to
see what processes can we all collaboratively design to promote and choose
candidates that represent our movement and are prepared with the
experience, skills, and insight to perform as trustees? In this regard, it
would be good to have a community discussion to discuss the proposed ideas
and share our thoughts, give feedback and contribute to the process. To
discuss this, you are invited to a community meeting that is being
organized on March 12 from 8 pm to 10 pm, and the meeting link to join is
https://meet.google.com/umc-attq-kdt. You can add this meeting to your
Google Calendar by clicking here
<https://calendar.google.com/event?action=TEMPLATE&tmeid=MDNqcjRwaWxtZThnMXB…>[2].
Please ping me if you have any questions.
Thank you,
Krishna Chaitanya
[1]
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Foundation_Board_of_Trustees/Call…
[2]
https://calendar.google.com/event?action=TEMPLATE&tmeid=MDNqcjRwaWxtZThnMXB…
Dear Wikimedians,
CIS-A2K is in a process of writing 2021–2022 work-plan. To design the
programs based on the needs of the community and volunteers, we invite your
valuable suggestions and thoughts. We would like to improve our working
continuously taking into consideration the responses/feedback about the
events conducted previously. We request you to go through the various
sections in the form and respond.
Google form link - https://forms.gle/WQ73j4AbjCgwCdEs5
Please write in detail. We would like to discuss over phone/email also if
needed. Contact tito+2020(a)cis-india.org if you have a question(s) or for
further details or detailed comment.
With best wishes,
Jayanta Nath
On behalf -
Centre for Internet & Society's Access to Knowledge Programme (CIS-A2K)