We held a short, sweet birthday for Wikipedia at MIT. Kat, the
Cunctator (carrying the torch of Year One editors), and advisors Mako
and Jing Wang showed up. It took place in the middle of an MIT
tradition: the annual Mystery Hunt, with ~1000 puzzlers (inevitably
heavy Wikipedia users) solving a mystery consisting of 48 hours worth
of puzzles. My team hosted a party with cake, which lasted half an
hour. Around 100 people came by, shared food and names and ideas and
toasts, and talked about the future.
There were a few hacks at the same time nearby: a 3D replica of the
wikiglobe was hung from the ceiling of the largest Lobby on campus[1],
and dozens of halls around MIT were plastered with 'citation needed'
and very targeted cleanup templates:"this hallway needs cleanup",
"this hallway is too long and should be split up", "this facade
contains too much detail", "this building looks like an inappropriate
[random] gallery of images", &c.[2]
And one of the puzzles in the Mystery Hunt, released on Saturday,
looked like a "runaround", a puzzle which gives instructions for
moving around a city or a campus following certain signs or looking
for clues. However this puzzle turned out to be impossible to do in
person -- it is instead a WIKIPEDIA runaround, which takes place
entirely in articles, with links as warps or portals. For a taste of
the Hunt, I include it below -- see if you can make sense of it! It
generally took people an hour to get to the 'final dungeon' and
another insight to solve. [3] This was the first full-fledged Hunt
puzzle to rely on Wikipedia as its substrate.
SJ
[1] After a day of sagging!:
http://ten.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Wp-lobby7.JPG
[2] http://ten.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Wp-inapp.JPG
[3] The full text of the puzzle is included here:
O======================================================O
| Full Walkthrough
| Last Updated: 01/11/2011
|
| This game is a constantly changing labyrinth of levels you have to
| navigate. There are many levels in which you can easily get lost,
| but if you follow this guide you should be able to quickly get to
| the boss battle.
|
O======================================================O
Begin your quest at Kresge Auditorium. Walk past its architect and the
large store. On the next block, you'll see an egg-like object. Just
past it you will find a round portal. Go through it.
At this point you'll be near the Greek's territory. A couple blocks
past is a grey platform filled with warp zones. Take the warp that's
continuously deforming itself. One block past its exit there will be
some gunfire, but dodging all the bullets shouldn't be hard. You
should see another nearby exit similar to the warp you just used. Go
through the well-covered exit immediately before it.
In this region you'll find many men. They all have interesting things
to say, but you need to find the ones pretending to be an officer.
Find these men past some large latex monuments. Follow them into the
next level.
Here you need to eavesdrop on several conversations to get the
information you need to progress. First, head for the block with the
largest group of impersonators. As they disperse, follow a pair of
them for a couple blocks where they'll start squabbling. Listen in,
and you'll notice that you saw one of their two points of contention
earlier in this level. Return to where you first saw it and, you'll
be close enough to hear a discussion about what sounds like French
groups of musicians (but they're actually discussing something much
more fundamental). Go back to the first time you heard this topic
dicussed. The door to the next level is the first one on that block.
A few blocks down is a door back the way you came. Obviously, you
don't want to go there. Instead climb onto the warp platform after
it. These teleporters are guarded by various people. Beam down to
the planet with a group of hackers. On the other side, look up
quickly, because there will be a horde of armed men. You only defeat
the man of steel though since he guards the door to the next level.
Immediately, approach the medical cabal. They won't have what you
need, but the nearby scientists will. It would be a good idea to
activate your thermal shielding before proceeding to the next level.
In this level you need to assemble a key from just two atoms: the
first atom of the gateway below the black machine, and the second atom
in the exit from the right side of the brick room. With both atoms
joined, you have the key to the next level, which you'll find amongst
a group of four shooters (naturally, the shooter with the most ammo is
guarding it).
You'll find a colorful bar in this level. Your energy is probably
pretty low at this point, so drink some caffeine. While drinking, an
informant will sidle up on your left and give you an important piece
of information. Go back to this level's warp platform and use that
information to select a teleporter. One block prior is the door you
want. It is guarded by a punk bragging about how much better he is at
everything. You'd expect more fight from someone yelling so loudly,
but he's a pushover. Defeat him and move on to the next level.
The next level features a parabolic dish with red statues on its
inside. While you slide down it, grab the first statue on the left
and the third statue on the right. Find black replicas of these
statues down the road. Not far past them, you'll notice the same
value repeated four times. Decreasing it by five percent will send
you back to an earlier point in this level. You'll be very close to
your next gateway, which is right before a few flowers.
The key to this zone is contacting the dictator. Recall the location
of his greatest victory over his most prominent rival, and head
straight to that country. Your next door is the one right past it.
At this point you should see a small garden on your right, with a
single prominent plant in the center. Pick it up and use it as a key
on the nearby warp platform. Once you do walk one block up. There
are a number of doors there, but the one you want has a star displayed
prominently on it.
Study the local art for the city of Rome and the world. Afterwards
you know what year it is. You're given a time machine, with which you
should travel forward in time from the current year to the next
chronologically available specific year. Time traveling makes you
hungry, but conveniently there's a candy bar immediately in front of
you. That candy is common in this level, go back and eat the first
one. After eating that candy you're happy, but you need to move on to
the next temperament. Then fly to the next celestial body.
When you arrive here you will need to gather more information. Send
three of your cheapest Khalai units to scout. The the first two will
be short lived in this level, but the third will be perennial. Have
your perennial scout wait 1829 days with the locals and then dive into
the next portal.
Find and equip the rock salt armor. The end of this block will
specify a speed for your warp drive. Go forward that many blocks.
You should see a province in this block. Find a picturesque
promontory within this province. Now switch to a different location
that has the same geological features. Proceed through the next door
after this movement.
Wander past more than a score of blocks until you can jump into a
wrestling match among scientists. Dodge a few dozen shots from their
guns. They will begin by counting these shots out, but you need to
keep dodging them even after they stop counting. Keep dodging them
until you can chat with your buddy on your personal computer. Go in
the next gate.
A pedantic table fills most of this level, but you can ignore its
existence. Find three families of birds. The one of interest to you
is the third one. Find any of the twelve exits from this level to
that bird's homeland.
O======================================================O
| Final Dungeon
|
| You've reached the final dungeon. Assuming you're on an island with
| some Chinese pirates you probably don't need to go back. First you
| will have to explore the final dungeon to find the boss. Then you
| have to find the single event that will defeat the boss. Once you
| learn the identity of this event, you simply have to call out its
| name to win this game.
|
O======================================================O
The best way to get started here is to steal two given names. First
steal the given name of the first person you meet. As soon as you've
established a new identity as that given name, steal the given name of
the previous president. Your latest identity has many fans, but you
need to find an exemplar skirmish in your field of expertise. You are
affiliated with one side of this skirmish. One quarter of your
opposition show up in this dungeon in another form. The local people
control the penultimate of this other form, second only to another
entity. A dangerous encounter between the local people and that
entity is your boss battle.
First find a mayor. He will be quoted saying something at the capital
of the final dungeon. After he's spoken, follow the second person you
see (not counting the mayor himself, of course!). The next time you see
this person, the next portal you see will take you to the final event.
Call out its name.
--
Samuel Klein identi.ca:sj w:user:sj +1 617 529 4266
Hi all,
The tenth anniversary of Wikipedia was celebrated at Madras Institute of
Technology, Chennai. It was attended by ~70 people including English,Tamil
and Malayalam Wikipedians. The event started with a cake cutting ceremony.
Ravichandar spoke about English wikipedia. Mahir spoke about Tamil
Wikipedia,Wikinews and Wiktionary. A book "Tamil Wikipedia"(in Tamil)
written by Tamil wikipedian and writer Theni.M.Subramani was released by
Badri Sheshadri(Publisher,New Horizon Media). Badri then spoke about
Wikipedia,importance of language wikipedia and how books like the one
released is essential in reaching out to masses. There were discussions and
then there was a live chat with Jimmy wales over Skype.
I would like to thank CSMIT for providing the venue, Wikimedia Foundation
for the merchandise and Manian for the cake.
I would also like to thank Manian / Ravishankar (Parithimathi) / Mahir /
Ravichandar for making this event happen.
I would get all the pictures into one place in commons and post the same.
There is a video of the book release / Jimmy chat is available here[1]
[1] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7JFpkx3iEw8
Regards
Srikanth.L
http://srik.me
On 14th Dhaka celebrate 10 years of Wikipedia through Kite flying for
Wikipedia. Here is some photos of the event at Facebook,
http://bit.ly/fIvWVq
Happy Birthday Wikipedia!
Belayet
Wikimedia Bangladesh
--
Belayet Hossain
http://www.facebook.com/bellayethttp://twitter.com/bellayethttp://bellayet.wordpress.com (Bangla)
Knowledge is universal
...so share it.
Hillel____
If I am not for myself, who will be for me?
If I am only for myself, what am I?
If not now, when?
Hi all,
I am posting a detailed summary of the Bangalore celebrations, apologies for
making it long to read, but hey it was 12 hours of celebration!
It was a great start to the day with overwhelming response to see 10
volunteers 8 am at the venue willing to help and with that, the number of
people coming in very slowly but steadily increasing. Around 9:30 AM we
began the days proceedings at Lecture hall with Arunram welcoming the people
with an Introduction of the event and we had informal round of introductions
of people who were there(50 already!). We then had different Indic language
wiki communities presenting reports with Bellayat joining over Skype from
Dhaka being the first to provide an update on Bengali Wikipedia. Arjuna
followed it with Telugu Wikipedia update.HP Nadig followed with update on
Kannada Wikipedia. Sundar followed it with Tamil Wikipedia report and
audience were very receptive so much that we needed to cut short the Q&A for
time constraints.Kiran Gopi provided the Malayalam Wikipedia report followed
by myself giving an update of WP:INDIA Project of English Wikipedia.We also
had a small discussion on Five pillars,policies etc. We broke for tea
around 11:30 AM and the crowd was 75 by then. Arunram continued with
Sanskrit Wikipedia report and then there was an open discussion on way
forward,future which was lively. The final number of people who attended
morning session was close to around 100 people. Each language report
contained information on stats, community, challanges, outreach activities
and way forward.
Just before breaking for lunch we took this picture
http://ten.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Wikipedia-10-celebrations-Bangalore-2011…
showing ten as theme.
We regrouped for Segment 2(Special Interest groups) around 2:15 PM and
Arjuna quickly gave the format of the event.(Collaboration with Special
Interest Groups). There was a Birds track lead by Shyamal and the bird
watching community in Bangalore. The photography track was handled by HP
Nadig covering commons. The technology track had myself presenting overview
of technology / hacks possible with Wikipedia and then Kiran providing a
hands on demo on mwclient and wiki-analysis project. Sundar joined in to
give a brief session on Bots and pywikipediabot framework. The different
language groups had discussions at the foyer area with Arjuna leading
Telugu, Shiju / Kiran leading Malayalam, Sundar leading Tamil and HP Nadig
leading Kannada Wikipedias respectively. The number of people who attended
Segment 2 was around 150 people.
We broke for a tea around 4:30 PM and regrouped ourselves at the main
auditorium around 5:20 when we had a sudden change in the agenda after Jimmy
wanted to have the Skype call earlier. It helped us in a better way with
Jimmy addressing the audience and kickstarting the Segment 3 around 5:40 PM.
Thanks a lot Jimmy :) . We then had Manish explained about how Wikipedia
works, community, Foundation, Statistics, India specific stats and gave an
overall Introductory talk on Wikipedia to the larger audience(Around 200 .
We then played some videos from the WikimediaFoundation youtube channel with
editors sharing their experiences. HP Nadig then formally announced the
formation of the Chapter and did an interactive Session ''Namma Wikipedia''
with audience on How they used Wikipedia. Around 6:30 PM there was a talk by
Lawrence Liang. We had a small break and at 7:10 PM Sundar anchored the
audience session on "How I became a Wikipedian" with editors sharing their
stories on how they became Wikipedians. Then we had a very interactive panel
discussion with renowned people like Prof.Sadagopan - Founder Director
IIIT-B, Writer Madanmohan Rao, Achal Prabhala - Wikimedia foundation
advisory and Sunil Abraham - Executive Director Centre for Internet and
Society, speaking on Wikipedia and its role moderated by Arunram. We called
it a day by 8:15 PM and it was quite a day! [PS: I couldnt update evening
session in detail since i was doing some running around]
230+ people attending the event on a festive day(Sankaranti) was quite an
accomplishment and shows the amount of love people have for Wikipedia :). I
would like to thank each one of them for making this event a success.
I would like to thank Jimmy, Lawrence Liang and the panelists for making it
to the event with their busy schedules.
On behalf of Bangalore Wikipedians, I would like to thank our sponsors,
National Institute of Advanced Sciences (NIAS) for providing an absolutely
wonderful venue for the event free of cost, Microsoft Research India for
sponsoring food,refreshments, Discovery India for sponsoring the publicity
materials, Centre for Internet & Society for providing Wifi,sponsoring
Videography at the event in a very short notice, being always there for
Wikipedian community in Bangalore. [Yes most of the event is recorded and
would be up on commons in a few days!] and Wikimedia Foundation for all
those tees and nice goodies :)
Last but the least the volunteers without which the day wouldnt have been
what it was. Abu,Anoop,Arjuna Rao Chawla, Arunram, Arunganesh, Gautham,
Harsha,HP Nadig, Kiran Gopi, Kiran Jonnalagadda, Manish, Melvin, Philip
Tiju, Sundar, Suma, Srikanta, Sathyamurthy, Swaroop Rao, Tinucherian, Vishal
Gayakvad, Vimal, Srinivas Gunta,
Royson[CIS],Sunil,Ramesh[NIAS],Sashidharan[NIAS]. Sincere apologies if i had
missed anyone on the list.
Since i didnt have camera, there are no pictures from me, expect them from
others soon on commons :)
Let this be a new larger wave of community in Bangalore and hope our monthly
meetup participation increases folds and more importantly more people join
the movement and "edit the world".
Regards
Srikanth.L
(User:Logicwiki)
PS : This also happened to be my farewell wiki-meetup at Bangalore since am
relocating, will miss Bangalore meetups :( :(
As an update, we've added a second stream. This one is free & high def and
only requires you having VLC [1]
The URL for the stream is: http://transcode1.wikimedia.org:8080 - All you
need to do is launch VLC > Media > Open Network Stream.
Again, there is no warranty on the stream. I've got no idea how well the
upload bandwidth will hold out or if the transcode server will survive.
Speak of, A big thanks to Mark Bergsma for setting up the transcode/server
side of this little project with exactly zero heads up.
-Jon
[1] http://www.videolan.org/vlc/
PS. The video is being uploaded at 300k/s, video at 96k/s then transcoded on
the server
On Sat, Jan 15, 2011 at 09:41, Jon Davis <jdavis(a)wikimedia.org> wrote:
> All,
> Since not everyone can attend WCWC11 [1] or a Wikipedia X party, we're
> trying to webcast [2] the event(s). Until about 4 PM PST (UTC-08), the
> stream should be at WCWC11 in San Francisco. Later on in the evenings
> (after 6PM PST), the stream should be from the San Francisco Party [3].
>
> I make not promises about the streams being interesting or even working.
> Feel free to email me comments off list though.
>
> Thanks
> -Jon
>
> [1] http://2011.westcoastwikicon.org/wiki/Main_Page
> *[2] http://www.ustream.tv/channel/wcwc11-wikix*
> [3] http://ten.wikipedia.org/wiki/San_Francisco_Celebration
>
> --
> Jon Davis
> Office IT System & Network Administrator
> Wikimedia Foundation
>
>
--
Jon Davis
Office IT System & Network Administrator
Wikimedia Foundation
415-839-6885 x6777
All,
Since not everyone can attend WCWC11 [1] or a Wikipedia X party, we're
trying to webcast [2] the event(s). Until about 4 PM PST (UTC-08), the
stream should be at WCWC11 in San Francisco. Later on in the evenings
(after 6PM PST), the stream should be from the San Francisco Party [3].
I make not promises about the streams being interesting or even working.
Feel free to email me comments off list though.
Thanks
-Jon
[1] http://2011.westcoastwikicon.org/wiki/Main_Page
*[2] http://www.ustream.tv/channel/wcwc11-wikix*
[3] http://ten.wikipedia.org/wiki/San_Francisco_Celebration
--
Jon Davis
Office IT System & Network Administrator
Wikimedia Foundation
Oh boy - I just heard that on Friday Jan 14th, radio station KGNU
(88.5 FM Boulder, 1390 AM Denver, 93.7 FM Nederland) will interview a
few of us about Wikipedia!. It will be live, for about 5 minutes, on
the "Morning Magazine", which airs between 8:00 and 8:30 (15:00
UTC). It is also streamed live on the KGNU web site, and should be
available for download or streaming later.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/KGNUhttp://kgnu.org/
I couldn't find a page for linking to media coverage of the event. Am
I missing anything?
Neal McBurnett http://neal.mcburnett.org/
