[Foundation-l] Looking for stories of readers affected by Wikipedia

[Virgilio A. P. Machado]

Dear Sue,

Better yet, check this out:

http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Vapmachado#Block

Warmest regards,

Virgilio


At 06:31 11-11-2010, you wrote:
>Hi folks, Megan Hernandez on the staff is 
>looking out for me, for stories of readers whose 
>lives have been impacted by Wikipedia or the 
>other projects. (Donors often send us stories 
>like that, and I am often looking for stories to 
>tell people about the projects. So I've asked 
>her to send good ones to me.) I was writing her 
>a set of criteria for the kinds of stories I 
>want, and it occurred to me that you might 
>yourselves have some good stories of exactly 
>this kind. So I am sending along the criteria 
>here too :-) If you have stories that fit 
>many/all of these criteria, please send them to 
>me, onlist or off. And please forgive my 
>cross-posting to several lists at once. Thanks, 
>Sue * Ideally, they'd be along the theme of "how 
>Wikipedia made my life better." This might be an 
>anecdote, or bigger-picture (ie, 'how Wikipedia 
>makes my life better every day'). * Ideally, 
>they would be stories of people who 
>pre-exposure-to-Wikipedia would have had 
>circumscribed access to information. Because 
>they grew up in a small town with no library, 
>because their school didn't stock certain kinds 
>of books, because materials in their language 
>are of limited availability, because their 
>government limits access to certain types of 
>information -- in general, because their 
>economic/political/socio-cultural circumstances 
>somehow impede(d) easy access to information. * 
>Ideally, the information that Wikipedia gives 
>them is important, and directly, immediately 
>useful. Like, it helped them better understand a 
>health issue they were having, or it equipped 
>them to do some important task better; it helped 
>them understand a new situation or some aspect 
>of themselves, or enabled them to solve an 
>important problem. Maybe it helped them get a 
>job they otherwise couldn't have gotten, or 
>enabled them to avoid some specific danger or 
>risk. * And/or, the information fed a general 
>curiosity and desire to understand the world 
>better. It got them interested in going to 
>college which nobody in their family had done 
>before, it helped them develop a more thoughtful 
>position on a public policy issue, it stimulated 
>them to travel or read more widely, or to 
>question assumptions they had been making. * 
>Ideally, their lives are better today because of 
>the information they are exposed to via 
>Wikipedia. Maybe this would be better in some 
>really specific way -- like, "Three months later 
>I persuaded my doctor to let me try the new 
>treatment, and it worked." Or, it might be much 
>more general. * It is fine if the information 
>they found on Wikipedia might otherwise have 
>been kept from them, either deliberately or 
>through lack of easy opportunity. It is fine if 
>the information is considered risky or 
>controversial in some way. -- Sue Gardner 
>Executive Director Wikimedia Foundation 415 839 
>6885 office 415 816 9967 cell Imagine a world in 
>which every single human being can freely share 
>in the sum of all knowledge.  Help us make it a 
>reality! 
>http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Donate 
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