Talk:Communications/Resource center/2015

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Communications Resource Center

Sharing knowledge on Wikimedia communications — Please add!

How about using Learning Patterns?

Hi all,
We have developed a series of toolkits for Learning and Evaluation[1]: guides on how to implement Wikimedia programs, like editathons, photo contests and events, and others. In order to build those toolkits, we have re-purposed many learning patterns (often times written to that end, other times just lesson sharing from the community), and organized them in sections. Learning Patterns are templates to share problem and solution pairs around a topic, and they have gained decent community buy-in at this point.
I was thinking, since the structure of this guide is also around problem and solution pairs, maybe generating new Learning Patterns is a good idea for this as well. It facilitates sharing one-time lessons and promotion of the tool in general, in our experience. It also helps to organize the content and sections, and prevents the creation of super long pages. There are different ways in which Learning Patterns can be included in this toolkit: we have used simple links and also transclusion.
Happy to help think through this!
Best, María (WMF) (talk) 22:42, 17 September 2015 (UTC)

Sounds like very good advice to me! I like how you've linked the example via bullet pointing. --Michael Jahn WMDE (talk) 10:04, 18 September 2015 (UTC)
Relevant Learning Patterns on Press relations

Great! I scanned the Learning Pattern Library and I found a few LPs on Press Relations. I grouped them under a new category: No pages meet these criteria.
Do you want to create new LPs with the problem and solution pairs that are already on the content page in this project, Michael?
Let me know your thoughts on how you would like to incorporate this. I can make other relevant lists for this tool, as well. -- María (WMF) (talk) 22:14, 21 September 2015 (UTC)

Great collection! Personally, I feel like this is neatly grouped and could be inserted right in the press question section. Only thing that keeps me from doing it right away is that I don't want to "spam" the page with my edits. Much content, not many perspectives/review yet. I'll reach out to people! --Michael Jahn WMDE (talk) 21:16, 23 September 2015 (UTC)
One more fresh and hot, from the oven: Grants:Learning patterns/Volunteers vs. Journalists: The evergreen questions. Probably needs language proofreading, it was written in the night. Spiritia 00:13, 24 September 2015 (UTC)
I've started editing the "how do I pitch?" section, but I think we should link these Learning patterns as well, particularly the evergreen questions. Stephane (WMCH) (talk) 10:08, 15 October 2015 (UTC)
Yes, makes a lot of sense! --Michael Jahn WMDE (talk) 13:47, 16 October 2015 (UTC)

"Draftathon"?

Food for thought: I love Wikimedia hackathons. From what I've heard about them they must be a great experience. I'm not nearly skilled enough to participate, so I've never been to one, but the idea of people coming together to get things done and have a good time sharing, grouping and inspiring? It's sounds awesome and very hands-on. There are hackathons at the start of many major Wikimedia events, so I'm wondering why we don't copy the concept for communications/storytelling. Communications people are always at Wikimania and the different regional conferences, just like hackers. For example, we could get together the day before Wikimania, too, and draft stories and messages together. Occasions for working together in the same physical place are extremely rare. When communications people gather, there's never really time for content. Opinions? --Michael Jahn WMDE (talk) 10:16, 18 September 2015 (UTC)

I really like this idea! For this past Wikimania, some of us at WMF CommComm, Community Engagement and Fundraising departments got together to work on the initiative Tell us your story. We worked together to create good questions, share practices, and then we interviewed specific users we wanted to talk to, and other users that promised a good story. We also had a sign on our booth and a special secluded space where we could actually interview people, in the back of the booth. This alone generated a bank of almost 50 stories to use with different purposes: fundraising, outreach, program planning case studies, etc.
I would love to work with comms staff or volunteers from other Wikimedia orgs. What I take from the experience that I described above is that it would be great is to have tasks that we want to solve. Or specific projects. For instance: create a slogan for Wikipedia Education Program, document comms practices for internal comms, for external comms, build a how-to guide, etc. -- María (WMF) (talk) 22:42, 21 September 2015 (UTC)
I really like this idea too. I would be very excited to turn some of our annual events into learning opportunities and strengthen our community as a whole, by learning from each other. Commathons? Just kidding. The Berlin conference and Wikimania are easy-to-identify opportunities. What others do you have in mind? Katherine (WMF) (talk) 04:09, 22 September 2015 (UTC)
Cool! I haven't looked deeper into this but other than Wikimania and the Wikimedia Conference in Berlin: WMCEE, WikiArabia, Iberoconf (can't find a link) or WikiConference USA -- from the top of my head, I'm surely missing quite a few conference settings. I'd say that basically any such event would qualify, if Comms people are there anyway (no extra travel costs) and willing to commit to a "pre-conference". I guess the range of participants would vary depending on where the respective conferences are. As for tasks, María, yes, very much in line with identifying and closing bugs at hackathons! ...Also, Commathons doesn't sound bad, actually :) --Michael Jahn WMDE (talk) 21:51, 23 September 2015 (UTC)

Wikpedia 15 marks

A really quick addition, since the marks were announced yesterday. Michael Jahn WMDE (talk) 18:36, 14 October 2015 (UTC)