Wikimedia CH/Newsletter/01/01/2017/en

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Wishing you all a very Happy New Year, we are thrilled at the idea of collaborating with you all on wonderful projects for 2017.
Please find Wikimedia CH's newsletter for the month of January
If you wish to share an event or activity through this newsletter, please feel free to send us a message at info@wikimedia.ch. Happy reading!

Association[edit]

Welcome Lantus
As a longtime WIkipedia honorary author, Lantus joined the association since the beginning of the year in the capacity of community liaison for the german speaking community. For instance, by helping to submit pre-events micro-grants and helping members and volunteers to apply for travel expenses after the end of the trip. As a link between the community and the association, he will report on Wikimedia CH's activities and participate in establishing projects and budgets. His second important focus will be to contact and coordinate GLAM institutions by organizing events as well as support their employees. Here, too, he will have an open ear for their concerns and needs. Through his many years of professional activity as well as his strong network, he will be able to carry on Muriel Staub's valuable work . We are delighted to welcome him to the Wikimedia CH team.

Interested in candidating for the Wikimedia CH board ? Contact us !
In anticipation of the next Wikimedia CH general assembly, which will take place on 8 April in Luzern (see below), we are looking for candidates willing to join our board! In the past, it was not always clear for candidates what is expected from them once they are on the board -- and, perhaps even more importantly, what is not expected from them (for example, board members are not supposed to push for their favorite projects or to support particular causes), and how they can integrate themselves in an organization that is already established In order to improve this situation, the board would like to ask all potential candidates to contact Frédéric Schütz (frederics.schutz@wikimedia.ch), or another member of the board, so that they have the opportunity to discuss these issues and get the information required as soon as possible. In addition, thanks to Frédéric, we are working on a Board handbook (available on this wiki), which documents the work of the board and the role of its members. Contributions, comments and questions are welcome, either directly or on the discussion page.

We are looking forward to your candidatures !

Reminder: governance review
Last September, this newsletter, we announced the start of a governance review, with the intent of discussing potential changes to the bylaws and the various Wikimedia CH policies (including creating new ones if needed). Despite the opinions that were expressed at various events last year, almost no member expressed any interest in this process. The board believes that these issues are important, and would really like to see members involved. Before assuming that our members are not interested, we'd like to reiterate our call: if you are interested in participating, or if you have suggestions about the changes required, please have a look and contribute to corresponding page on our members wiki or contact Frédéric Schütz (frederics.schutz@wikimedia.ch) for more information.

Administrative elements
Please note a few good practice habits we wish to communicate about to facilitate the reimbursement process for members of our community. When confronted to a reimbursement procedure, please download the following WMCH expense sheet in a first step. Fill it out and send it with the scanned copies of your original expenses by email to sabine.ray@wikimedia.ch as well as copying in the email of your respective community liaison. In a second step, please send the original expenses by post to Wikimedia CH, 8008, Zurich. Please bear in mind that all requests for reimbursement of expenses for the association of a specific month should be handed in no later than the 3rd of the following month. We much appreciate your help & support in carrying out these procedures.

Announcement[edit]

Wikipedia is now 16 years old

Wikipedia 10 Milano, Lyonora 4178 Leonora Giovanazzi CC BY-SA 3.0

Last Sunday, 15th January, Wikipedia celebrated it's 16th birthday all around the world!

Save the date for WMCH's general Assembly in Lucerne on the Saturday 8th April
Wikimedia CH's next General Assembly will be taking place at the Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts. As of today the program for the day is as follow:
- 10h15-14h00: WMCH General Assembly
- 14h00-15h00: Standing lunch/catering
- 15h00-15h45: Podium Discussion (with people from the uni, Wikimedia and Wikitolearn)
- 15h45-18h00: 2 workshops
One about becoming a new Wikipedia contributor and a second one about Wikitolearn for people teaching at the University.
More information will be provided via our website's page.

What is coming up next?[edit]

Register for Magnus Manske's conference on the 4th February 2017

Magnus Manske. CC-BY-SA 4.0 Jason Krüger

Magnus Manske will come to Bern on the 4th of February 2017 for a Wikimedia CH conference and will talk about «The history of Mediawiki and the prospective for the future». The event will take place in Bern at the Impact Hub at Spitalgasse 28 (Entrance in the Ryffligässchen). Please register for the event by sending an email to info@wikimedia.ch so that we may plan for the catering accordingly.

Save the dates: Women Edit Switzerland 2017
Save the dates for Wikipedia Editing-Sessions for Women in 2017: February 7th, March 29th, May 11th, September 19th, October 18th and November 16th, from 6:30 to 9pm. More information will follow soon.

Save the date: Art & Feminism 2017 from 3 to 5th March in Romandie
The Art & Feminism Edit-a-thon will take place all over the world during the month of March, and also in Switzerland. Save the date, we will be providing you more information in our next communications about the various events taking place locally.

Save the date: 16th and 30th March from 11am to 4 pm for Wikipedia workshops at the Library of Art and Archeology in Geneva to celebrate the month of French contributions

The registration for GLAM-on-Tour in Freiburg (28th April/1st May) is now open
The registration page for the 2nd GLAM-on-tour in Freiburg is open. It will take place from 28th April to 1st May. Right within the Röstigraben, the bilingual event is concerned with the topic of Gutenberg and the counter-Reformation. In addition to the classical writing workshop on this complex theme, there will be lectures, a museum tour and a guided tour of the city with historical stations of the counter-Reformation. Entrance to the museum is free for the participants. In addition, a digital copy of the Froschauer Bible, which is located in the Museum's collection, will be produced to be uploaded on Wikimedia Commons. If you are interested, feel free to read further about the event and register to participate via the project page in German.

List of events[edit]

Date Events Location
28.01.2017 Wikipedia Atelier Swiss National Library Bern
30.01.2017 Wikimidi meeting animated by the project les sans pagEs Cafeteria Uni Dufour, Geneva
02.02.2017 Wikipedia Introduction ProSenectute Bern
04.02.2017 Wikimedia conference by Magnus Manske on the history of mediawiki and the prospective for the future Impact Hub at Spitalgasse 28, Bern
06.02.2017 Wikimidi meeting animated by the project les sans pagEs Cafeteria Uni Dufour, Geneva
02.03.2017 Wikipedia Introduction ProSenectute Bern

About recent events[edit]

Wikimedia CH New Year's Brunch 2017

WMCH Brunch 2017 Romandie by Rama CC-BY-SA 4.0
WMCH Brunch 2017 Chiasso by Cassinam CC-BY-SA 4.0

Several community brunches took place during the month of January in Chiasso, Lausanne and Zurich to kick off the year 2017 and celebrate Wikipedia's 16th birthday.

Call for action[edit]

#1lib1ref 2017 initiative
Librarians offer the gift of a footnote to celebrate Wikipedia’s birthday via #1lib1ref 2017. You may read more about the global initiative here.

CC-BY-SA 4.0 Xendzi

Wikipedia for Peace
The project "Wikipedia for peace" is organised as a "workcamp", where people from different backgrounds come together for about two weeks to write and edit content about topics related to peace on Wikipedia. Wikipedia for Peace took place for the first time in 2015 in Vienna and is a community project organised by Wikimedia Österreich and Service Civil International Austria.
In 2017 we would love to get involved by providing scholarships for people from Switzerland to attend a "Wikipedia for Peace" camp. If you're interested to get active in this amazing project, please get in touch with Gabrielle. Please note that you would need to be available from March 30 - April 4 for a training as well as be willing to conduct one to two "Wikipedia for Peace" sessions in your city of origin. We're excited and are looking forward to receive your e-mail!

We need you for the National Archives day 9th June 2017

Logo Swiss association of archivists

Wikimedia CH is currently on the lookout for motivated volunteers who wish to participate & help support Archives across Switzerland who wish to host edit-a-thons during the National Archives day on the 9th June 2017. This project is the result fo the collaboration between VSA-AAS and WMCH in order to help promote free knowledge. It is the opportunity to explain to Archives across Switzerland the importance of opening up content and helping them to put it up on Wikimedia projects, you may read more information here. Check out the wikipedia project pages and feel free to add your username.

Should you wish to join or learn more about this initiative please contact: gabrielle.marie[at]wikimedia.ch.