Wikimedia Community User Group Uganda/Events % Projects/Wikimania 2021/Cn22760/Report

Event

Wikimania 2021

Experiences

Username: Cn22760

Librarian here, I got a scholarship from Wikimedia Community User Group Uganda to attend Wikimania 2021. It was a five day virtual conference which commenced on August 14th and ended on August 17th. The Theme was "Past, Present and Future"

It was my very first virtual conference, it ran smoothly and was well executed. I must say, I had a pretty good experience as I learned lots of things outside of libraries.

The training sessions were flexible, spread out across different time zones, some sessions were on weekends which was pretty convenient for me. There were no costs whatsoever on my part, internet was paid for by my Community User Group from Uganda.

I enjoyed watching the cook along by Chef Hnoi and the entertainment session - we composed a Wikimania Anthem with the help of Ric and Roo. I enjoyed watching affliate and individual presentations because the content was appropriate for my skill and experience as a Librarian. I gained knowledge and skills relevant to my position as a Librarian, and a newbie editor in the Wikimedian movement. One session that I found fascinating was the "Wikimedian of the Year 2021" Various categories of people were celebrated for their contribution to the movement. There was a Wikimedian for Tech, 20th Year Honorary, Honorable Mentions, New Comer of the Year and Rich Media of the Year.

On the flip side, in the beginning I found social interactions very nerve wrecking I don't know whether it was because I was full of nerves, or the fact that Remo was a new territory for me. Any way I overcame it later, with the help of Berverly Jiang and Hogu who were kind enough to interact with me. Later on, I interacted with members from my user group -- Geoffrey Kateregga and Drake Tamale, we talked about the upcoming Wiki Indaba. The friendly spaces policy was in full effect because I felt safe, respected and comfortable participating in this event.

Some of the sessions I attended:

How The Wikipedia Library can help you write great articles - Sam Wanton
The Top 9 Things to Know about Safety and Inclusion at Wikimedia Online Events - Adélaïde Calais et al …
. Changing the Self-Censoring Tradition: One Librarian at a Time
.Wiki Loves Monuments: 2021 and Beyond
.Wikimedia And GLAM in the Global South
.Importance of reliable sources: citing dictionaries, glossaries and atlas as an example. – how can we know what we read is reliable and where to find these sources.
.For Grandmas, Girls and GLAM Queens: Women Edit
. Can we rid Wikipedia of its content gender gap? Views from Women in Red
. English as a lingua franca of the Wikimedia movement: how do we ensure people's inclusion?

Please note that all these sessions are available on Youtube. Search for a channel called "Wikipedia Weekly" and subscribe.

Connections

I connected with members from my user group in Uganda -- Geoffrey Kateregga and Drake Tamale and we talked about the upcoming Wiki Indaba 2021.

Outcomes

I plan to use the Wikipedia Library while editing in future. There's an eligibility criteria for accessing this Library and I intend to meet this criteria for automatic access.

500+ edits
6+ months editing
10+ edits in the last month
No active blocks

I watched a session called "English as a lingua franca of the Wikimedia movement: how do we ensure people's inclusion?" and one of the Speakers Anasuya Sengupta said that they should give Translators *Wikimedian of the Year* because they do an excellent job. So I plan to take at least one long article from English Wikipedia and write a "normal length" shorter one for Luganda Wikipedia.

We are in a pandemic which means that most meetings are happening online at the moment. I learned about different meeting platforms, specifically video conferencing tools such as Big Blue Button, Google Meet, Jitsi, Wonder Me and Zoom. And REMO of course! what a marvel.

Thank you so much Wikimedia Foundation and Wikimedia Community User Group Uganda for the Scholarship.