Wikimedia Eesti/Wikimedia Eesti News

This is a short summary of late activities of Wikimedia Eesti. It is updated about once a month (or a maybe little more - or less - often, but we won't promise anything.)

July 9-15

• Wikimedia Eesti is represented on Wikimania 2012. We are have discussions on several cooperation projects. Also, we're actively participating in the work on Wikimedia Chapters' Association.

July 2-8

• July 3, Tuesday: According to a vote conducted in Doodle, Wikimedia Eesti's summer days and general meeting will be held on the first weekend of August, on the en:Muhu:Muhu island.

June 25-July 1

• June 25, Monday: An interview with one of our board members about Tartupedia project ran on Vikerraadio, the most popular radio channel in Estonia.

June 18-June 24

• June 18, Monday: Unfortunately, the preparations for our seminar on cooperation of Finno-Ugric Wikipedias seems to take more time and effort than has been foreseen. On our board meeting, it was decided to postpone that event to 2013 so we can be sure everything will run smoothly. We're also going to recruit more volunteers for that project.
• June 21, Thursday: An editor meetup in Tallinn's Seaplane Harbor.

June 11-June 17

• June 14, Thursday: Official prize ceremony of translation competition on Estonian Wikipedia, 2012. 139 articles, 56 translators, and 13 languages, ranging from English and Russian to Võro and Tok Pisin. Pretty good coverage in Estonian media.

June 4-June 10

• June 5, Tuesday: Editor meetup in Tallinn.
• June 5, Tuesday: On our weekly board meeting it was decided to postpone our celebrations on 100,000th article in Estonian Wikipedia until Estonian Wikipedia's birthday on August 24. It's summer, people will be on the beach; we're going to have better coverage in the August.
• June 8, Friday: In Estonian Sports Museum, a pilot project for QRpedia in Estonia was announced. This will also be the first actual step towards Tartupedia, a project for both covering Estonia's second-largest city in Wikipedia, and referring to that content in the actual city via QR codes.

May 28-June 3

• May 31, Thursday: Wikimedia Eesti took part in the meeting of non-profit organizations of Tartu County.
• June 3, Sunday: Meeting with the people organizing Days of Ida-Viru County next year. We're going to have an article and photo competition, and we also might erect a Wikipedia booth on their public events. We are also establishing relations with the organizations of ethnic minorities.

May 21-May 27

• May 22, Tuesday: We participated on a high-level seminar on copyright law in Tallinn.
• May 23, Wednesday: Wikimedia Eesti was represented on Estonian Internet Conference.
• May 23, Wednesday: The news about launching Monmouthpedia circled Estonian media (e.g. here). If a Welsh town has made it in Estonia, it's definitely famous. Congratulations!
• May 25, Friday: One of our board members visited a meeting of emerging Estonian Pirate Party in Tartu. We're not going to be involved, but as we have interest in common issues, we'll pretty much keep in touch.

May 14-May 20

May 15, Tuesday: A meeting with the museums of University of Tartu.

May 7-May 13

May 10, Thursday: We got an agreement for uploading articles from recently deceased popular science magazine "Wise Folk's Club" ("Tarkade Klubi") to Wikisources. The actual work will be conducted throughout this summer.

April 30-May 6

May 4, Friday: Sad news about our visionary conference. Since two speakers (Jimmy Wales and Pavel Richter) announced they couldn't come in May, we postponed it to October 10th. There are no foreseeable additional expenses, although we might have difficulties with our venue.

April 23-29

• Apr 26, Thursday: Talks with our partners in the magazine "Estonian Nature" ("Eesti Loodus") about having a Wikipedia prize in their next nature photography contest.
• Apr 28, Saturday: Discussions with Estonian Academical Oriental Society went well, we'll be working on future cooperation.
• Apr 29, Sunday: Some more volunteer digitizers were found.

April 16-22

• Apr 16, Monday: In the City Museum of Narva, a joint exhibition was opened by WMEE and WMRU, showcasing the best pictures from Wiki Loves Monuments in Estonia and Russia.
• Apr 18, Wednesday: Yet another 1st place in the quiz club. Wikimedia Eesti: Veni, vidi, vici!

April 9-15

• Apr 9, Monday: A volunteer, Mari Kirss, started digitizing books in Estonian Literary Museum. Her first book was Matthias Johann Eisen's classic "On the Estonian Folk-Belief" ("Eesti usundist"). (BTW: in English, her name would be Cherry Berry. Cool!) More on our digitization project: http://et.wikimedia.org/wiki/English/Digitizing_Estonian_Literature

April 2-8

• Apr 4, Wednesday: Another quiz in University of Tartu quiz club. Another 1st place, with a major success. Now we're bragging.

March 26-April 1

• Mar 27, Tuesday: Twenty minutes before our representatives were due to court concerning our dispute with Estonian Tax Board, we were announced that Tax Board has cancelled its earlier decision and given WMEE tax deduction retroactively, starting from Jan 1, 2012. Happy happy joy joy? Not so much. We were genuinely hoping to have a decision that would have provided some reliable precedent for other non-profits, too. Now, all they can deduce is that it is better to go to court rather than be meek and suffer. Well, that's something, too. Article

March 18-25

• Mar 21, Wednesday: Wikimedia Eesti's quiz team nailed the quiz in University of Tartu's quiz club... again! Wikipedians rule!
• Mar 22, Thursday: One of our board members visited Tartu city government, discussing our proposal to start Tartupedia, a project not dissimilar from Monmouthpedia, also providing material for equipping tourism objects all over the town with QRpedia codes. We received a warm welcome.
• Mar 23, Friday: The same board member happen to publish an article about our digitization efforts. We were contacted by Tartu Public Library and promised all the e-books they have digitized for publication in Estonian Wikisource. We hope for a long and fruitful partnership.
• Mar 24, Saturday: Blog post about Võro Wikipedia
• Mar 25, Sunday: Starting cooperation with the Office of Estonian President, we got our first batch of pictures. Also, a member of Estonian Writers' Union who is also an somewhat active Wikipedian gave us permission to use his pictures of writers, so we shall soon all see who makes all those fancy books people complain about.
• We changed our mail address from Tallinn to Tartu, as that is where all our board resides. Our new address is "Domus Dorpatensis, Raekoja plats 1/Ülikooli 7, 51003 Tartu". It's a non-profit hub, and we seriously contemplate about registrating an office there. We don't yet have a serious need for an office, but it might become comfortable soon, as our activities widen.
• Our wandering exhibitions are on the move again: Science Photo 2011 moved from Tartu to Tallinn University of Technology, The Best of WLM went from Tartu to Kuressaare, Saaremaa.

March 11-17

• Mar 12, Tuesday: WMEE provided an opinion (joint with another non-profit, Estonian Internet Community) on an European legal document on protection of personal data, stressing the need to make certain reservations not only for media etc, but also to open databases and encyclopedias.

March 4-10

• Mar 5, Monday: Had a meeting in Museum of Estonian Literature, concerning our project for digitizing Estonian literature. The answer was enthusiastic. After all, they have one of the largest folklore archives in the whole world, and would gladly publish it in the Internet, if they only had enough people to do it. It might just be we can provide a little help.

February 27-March 4

• Mar 3, Saturday: A blog post about recent discussion on Estonian Wikipedia's version of Village Pump: how many Wikipedians will it take to screw in a light bulb? The right answer is 34 (until it is found that EU directives forbid unauthorized electric installations by non-certified electricians). "Mitut vikipedisti on vaja lambipirni pessa keeramiseks?"

• Mar 1, Friday: Wikimedia Eesti and European Union's local representation started a two-month translation contest for articles from other Wikipedias. By the end of March, participation is quite good, and translations are made from English, Russian, Finnish, German, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Hungarian, Võro, and Tok Pisin.

• Feb 28, Tuesday: One of our members visited Estonian Olympics Committee to discuss the use of "Biographical Lexicon of Estonian Sport" in Wikipedia. Situation looks hopeful.

February 20-26

• Feb 21, Tuesday: Had a meeting with the nice folks in Estonian Literary Museum, discussing our digitization project. We were met with a lot of enthusiasm. There will be next meeting on March 5.
• Feb 23, Wednesday: A quiz in the quiz series of University of Tartu Quiz Club was arranged by the Wikipedian team. In the end we were told we gave a little too harsh questions, yet it was fun. (A typical example: who was that Estonian socialist revolutionary who was sentenced to death in 1905, had to flee the country and sat in the prison while his wife died, yet later said in a speech in front the Estonian parliament: "Revolution means subverting authority, counterrevolution means reconstructing authority." - The answer.) More information on the quiz on our blog (in Estonian): "Mõnusalt ull mäng oli"
• Feb 25, Saturday: General meeting of WMEE in Tallinn. Our annual financial report was presented and accepted, an overview of past and future activities was given, a new member was added to the board, bring gender ratio to 2:2. We have 27 members now. Further information on our wiki (in Estonian): Üldkoosolek 2012

February 13-19

• Feb 18, Saturday: Ivo started our recruitment campaign.
• Feb 19, Sunday: A meeting was held, preparing the quiz show to be arranged by Wikimedia quiz team in Tartu.

Wikipedia on media

• An article by Ivo on the photo competition of pictures of Estonian nature (HELP2) that was arranged in last December was published in the magazine Eesti Loodus (Estonian Nature). Ivo Kruusamägi: "Kuhu koguda häid Eesti looduse pilte?" Eesti Loodus, Feb 2012

February 6-12

• Feb 8, Wednesday: Quiz in University of Tartu Quiz Club (Eva, Ivo, Madis, Margus, Raul). 5th place.
• Feb 9, Thursday: Ivo held a lecture about Wikipedia to the geography students in University of Tartu.
• Feb 10, Friday: A blog post with the summary of last year's photo competition of pictures of Estonian nature (HELP2). Really nice pictures, forests and wetlands all over. Mushroom mushroom! "Kuhu koguda häid Eesti looduse pilte?"
• Feb 11, Saturday: 3 million edits in Estonian Wikipedia. Hurrah! Banzai!
• Feb 11, Saturday: Some of our members participated on the anti-ACTA meetings in Tallinn and Tartu, organizing and holding speeches.

Wikipedia on media

• Feb 12, Sunday: Wikipedia was discussed in the TV show "Jüri Üdi klubi" on Estonian national TV channel ETV2, the main theme being Estonian encyclopedias. Currently, Wikipedia is the largest encyclopedia in Estonian with 100,000 articles, although in cannot contest in quality yet. Last complete encyclopedia project was started in the Soviet times, and there is currently an ongoing commercial project that is lagging behind its schedule and on a somewhat shaky economic ground. In this situation, Estonian Wikipedia has obtained a unique position. Wikimedia Eesti was represented by Raul. "Jüri Üdi klubi: Uue aja lugu ehk elu pärast ENE-t"

... (to be retrofitted)