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Wikimedia chapters/Reports/Wikimedia Österreich/May 2016

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May 2016
Report

Community Support

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Wiki Loves Earth 2016 in Austria

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This was the third year of Wiki Loves Earth in Austria. A total of 90 users participated in the contest, of which 42 were new editors and 48 were existing editors. The national organizing team consisted of four volunteers (active editors), the three WMAT staff members and one external contractor. As in the past years, we used the prejury tool developed by our external contractor. The members of the prejury were 20 active editors, six of them also participated in the contest and 14 were non-participants. The members of the main jury were two active editors (one of them was also part of the prejury), the head organizer of the Children's Photography Award of the City of Vienna, the editor-in-chief of Biorama magazine and one Austrian Alpine Club representative. The Austrian Alpine Club and the Danube-Auen National Park donated several non-cash prizes. In addition, WMAT contributed equipment vouchers as prizes. The national award winners are going to be announced at the end of July 2016. 2093 files were uploaded for WLE 2016 in Austria. 262 images are used in the main namespace of Wikimedia projects, with total image usages of 266 in the main namespace of Wikimedia projects (usage figures retrieved on 2016-06-13). We were confronted with a decline compared to Wiki Loves Earth 2015 and Wiki Loves Earth, both in the number of pictures submitted and used and editors participating.

Individuals involved: 116 (active editors: 67, new editors: 42 (5 that edit a Wikimedia project after four weeks after their registration), WMAT staff: 3). - WMAT support: organizational support, awards.

Wikipedia workshops for SCI volunteers

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Train the trainers for SCI volunteers

"Wikipedia for Peace" has been an incubator project since 2015. It started with the co-organization of the first peace camp with the SCI last August. This year the challenge is - besides organizing a second, refined edition of the peace camp based on our experiences from last year - to make our partnership even more sustainable: Many wiki related activities could be incorporated into other SCI activities - e.g. many other of their workcamps take place in nature reserves, so building in photo hunts to gather natural monuments and uploading them to Commons seems to be an obvious addition to their existing programs. In order to make this possible without having to rely to extensively on our exisiting community or staff, we decided to train SCI volunteers (project and workcamp leaders) to become trainers for Wikipedia and Wikimedia Commons.

Individuals involved: 10 (active editors: 2, WMAT staff: 1). - WMAT support: coordination and WMAT office as workshop facility.

Arbitration Committee meeting in Fulda

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This meeting of the German-language Wikipedia's Arbitration Committee took place in the German city of Fulda from April 28th to May 1st, 2016. Nine out of ten members of the committee participated in this workshop, one of them was Austrian. The meeting was very useful in order to face up to multiple extensive or complicated topics. On the one hand, the members could discuss difficult pending cases. On the other hand, they found a common understanding on fundamental questions such as types of conflicts between Wikipedians, the Arbitration Committee's internal processes and its standing in the "system of Wikipedia". One evening, the participants also met several members of the local Wikimedia community of North Hesse.

Individuals involved: 9 (active editors: 9). - WMAT support: travel grant for 1 participant from Austria.

Report in members wiki (in German)
Arbitration Committee meeting in the German-language Wikipedia

Young Wikipedians meeting in Hanover

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Young Wikipedians logo

The Young Wikipedians ("Jungwikipedianer") are a community of German-language Wikipedians under the age of 18. The purpose of the group is to provide a pressure-free environment, to make friends and to develop articles together. They help each other on-wiki. Once a year there is a Young Wikipedians meeting in real life. This year they met in the city of Hanover in Germany. One of the 16 participants came from Austria. In addition to the important social aspects of this event, the Young Wikipedians also addressed several concrete issues like the restructuring of their Wikipedia pages and skill transfer concerning photography for Wikimedia Commons.

Individuals involved: 16 (active editors: 16) - WMAT support: travel grant for 1 participant from Austria.

Report in members wiki (in German)
Young Wikipedians meeting in Hanover in the German-language Wikipedia

WikiDienstag

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The WikiDienstag (“WikiTuesday“) is a weekly meet-up in the WMAT office. Volunteers share their knowledge and work together on improving the content of Wikimedia projects.

Topics in May 2016:
  • May 3rd: Discussing the results of the survey on newbies
  • May 10th: Writing articles for the Austrian film project
  • May 17th: Wikimania preparation meeting
  • May 24th: WMF site visit

Individuals involved: 20 (active editors: 16, WMAT staff: 3, WMF staff: 1). - WMAT support: infrastructure, co-organisation, promotion.

WikiDienstag in the German-language Wikipedia

Free Content

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Photo Project Austrian Film

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Something’s missing

In most cases, Wikipedia articles about Austrian film artists didn’t include images of the respective people or just unflattering snapshots. This was the case for actors, actresses and film directors and even more so for other relevant people working behind the scenes like screenwriters, producers, directors of photography, film editors, costume designers, scenic designers, film composors and sound designers.

The reception for the artists ...
... and the station where the photography was done
We were prepared

The Austrian Wikimedia photography community has reached a level of outstanding results not only in terms of quality but also concerning their collaborative spirit. WMAT’s pool of photographic equipment built over the past years is fit and the volunteers know how to use it.

They were prepared

Over the past years, the Austrian film industry underwent a sort of renaissance, with successes both at the box office and at international festivals and awards. The Academy of Austrian Film was created. It assembles the most relevant people in the Austrian film industry. Vienna’s international short film festival, Vienna Independent Shorts, became one of Europe’s leading festivals of its kind.

What came out of it

Together with Vienna Independent Shorts we organized a festival reception at the Vienna Künstlerhaus for the members of the Academy of Austrian Film. The Wikipedia articles about our guests were enhanced or newly created in the weeks before the reception. At the Künstlerhaus, we had two stations: one where the portrait photography was done and one where the artists could relax and talk to Wikimedians about Wikipedia and their articles in front of computers ready to be used for article improvements on-site. The event was a hugh success both in terms of high-quality free content for Wikimedia projects and in terms of making the artists aware of the Wikimedia mission for free knowledge.

Content
# of new files 249
# of total image usages in main namespace (2016-07-01) 94
# of distinct images used in main namespace (2016-07-01) 49
# of new articles 37
# of improved articles 18
People
# of Wikimedia photographers 7
# of Wikimedia editors/explainers 4
# of participating film artists 46
# of festival staff involved 5

Individuals involved: 64 (active editors: 11 [engaging 2 editors who have formerly not been or very rarely been active WMAT volunteers into the planning and/or executing], WMAT staff: 2). - WMAT support: equipment, information material, subsidy for catering.

Project page on the festival website (in German)
Project page in the German-language Wikipedia
Images on Wikimedia Commons

Wikimedia CEE Spring 2016

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Wikimedia CEE Spring 2016

Wikimedia CEE Spring is an international event that brings countries from Central and Eastern Europe together to write Wikipedia articles about each other's countries. Each country supplies a list of at least 100 articles that other countries can write about. The 2016 edition included 30 different languages on Wikipedia where users created 5920 articles between March 15th and June 30th, with 11 users from German-language Wikipedia contributing 109 articles with at least 200 words per article. On the other hand, 317 articles were created from Austria's list in other languages, ranking 4th overall. This year's edition also emphasized the creation of new articles instead of expanding on existing ones. Austria's list for the other language versions was compiled by Austrian Wikimedians; Wikimedia Austria provided the prizes ("summer packages" consisting of Wikipedia bath towels, Wikipedia bags, Wikipedia caps and book vouchers) for the three winners in the German-language Wikipedia.

Wikipedia language version # of new articles # of improved articles
German 109 3
Azerbaidjanian (“Austria“ list only) 4 1
Bashkir (“Austria“ list only) 21 0
Belarusian (“Austria“ list only) 77 1
Belarusian (Taraskievica) (“Austria“ list only) 17 1
Bulgarian (“Austria“ list only) 9 5
Czech (“Austria“ list only) 7 17
Greek (“Austria“ list only) 36 3
Estonian (“Austria“ list only) 3 2
Croatian (“Austria“ list only) 7 2
Hungarian (“Austria“ list only) 2 9
Armenian (“Austria“ list only) 29 9
Georgian (“Austria“ list only) 9 0
Kazakh (“Austria“ list only) 0 1
Lithuanian (“Austria“ list only) 1 3
Latvian (“Austria“ list only) 6 1
Macedonian (“Austria“ list only) 8 1
Polish (“Austria“ list only) 9 16
Romanian (“Austria“ list only) 4 5
Russian (“Austria“ list only) 15 33
Slovak (“Austria“ list only) 6 7
Slovenian (“Austria“ list only) 1 2
Albanian (“Austria“ list only) 12 3
Serbian (“Austria“ list only) 2 5
Turkish (“Austria“ list only) 5 5
Ukrainian (“Austria“ list only) 27 18
Total 426 153

Individuals involved: 11 (active editors: 11[engaging 1 editor who has formerly not been or very rarely been an active WMAT volunteer into the planning and/or executing]). - WMAT support: prizes.

Project page in the German-language Wikipedia
International project page

Wartungsbausteinwettbewerb Spring 2016

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Logo

The "Wartungsbausteinwettbewerb" is a contest for removing cleanup templates in the German-language Wikipedia. It is held four times a year. WMAT supports the contest by donating prizes, e. g. "Wartungsbausteinwettbewerb" shirts designed especially for the competition. The Spring 2016 edition had 25 participants who edited in teams or by themselves. The competition resulted in 1121 improved Wikipedia articles.

Individuals involved: 26 (active editors: 25, WMAT staff: 1). – WMAT support: prizes.

Wartungsbausteinwettbewerb Spring 2016 in the German-language Wikipedia

Gallery: Equipment/accreditation support

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We support Wikimedia Commons photographers with equipment from our tech pool and with accreditations for events. This gallery highlights some of the activities in May 2016.


Individuals involved: 13 (active editors: 11, WMAT staff: 2). - WMAT support: equipment and/or accreditation.

Reach / Free Knowledge Awareness

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Edit-a-thons: Pinkafeld Higher Technical Institute

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Edit-a-thon in Pinkafeld

Pinkafeld (5,648 inh.) is a small town in the Austrian state of Burgenland. Since at least the Wikipedia meetup in Pinkafeld in October 2014, there are strong ties between this small town and the much larger Wikimedia community in Vienna, Austria's capital. One Wikipedian from Pinkafeld is a teacher for computer science at the local Higher Technical Institute. He invited Wikimedians from the Vienna area to perform two edit-a-thons with two of his school classes:

Both articles are about buildings – a church and a former synagogue – near Pinkafeld.

The visits to Pinkafeld were also used to enhance the photographic documentation of items in the Pinkafeld Town Museum for Wikimedia Commons (see gallery above).

Individuals involved: 37 (active editors: 2 [engaging 1 editor who has formerly not been or very rarely been an active WMAT volunteer into the planning and/or executing], WMAT staff: 1). - WMAT support: workshops, information material, travel costs.

Report in members wiki (in German)
Images on Wikimedia Commons

re:publica 2016

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Logo of the #fixcopyright initiative at re:publica

re:publica is one of the largest and most exciting conferences about digital culture in the world. Representatives of digital culture share their knowledge and decision-making tools, and discuss the future of the information society. Activists, scientists, hackers, entrepreneurs, NGOs, and journalists mingle, and exchange ideas on topics reaching from net politics, online marketing, network technology, to digital society, and (pop) culture. For WMAT especially net politics is an important topic this year, as there are many important consultations concerning copyright and net neutrality going on among the European electorates, the outcome of which will have a substantial influence on the context Wikimedia communities operate in Europe. Hence, WMAT sent a staff member to join forces with other like-minded communities and NPOs from across Europe and to learn from them regarding campaigning and civic mobilization on these topics.

Individuals involved: 15 (WMAT staff: 1). - WMAT support: travel costs for one staff member.

Open Commons Congress in Linz

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Open Commons Linz is a cooperation between the government of Upper Austria and local communities aimed at providing digital common property that’s freely available to all citizens. WMAT has worked together with Open Commons Linz on various projects: the open data portal, a common publication called the ABC of openness, and most recently the net political evening. As part of their program Open Commons Linz hosts an annual conference on current issues in the digital world. This year's topic was "Digital Inequalities" and WMAT was invited to contribute a presentation. WMAT's ED Claudia Garád decided to give a talk about the gender gap in Wikipedia and to use this opportunity to reach out to new like-minded feminist communities and to build on earlier outreach activities in the region, i.e. the Art+Feminism edit-a-thon in March. The strategy paid out, as we could already establish contact to interested groups of female volunteers who are interested in organizing a common editing event for the International Women's day next year.

Individuals involved: 80 (WMAT staff: 1). - WMAT support: staff time - Open Commons Linz: travel costs, organization, public relations.

Open Commons Linz website

Learning Pattern

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Soup session with Winifred during the site visit
  • In May WMAT had its first WMF site visit since 2013. In order to make the most out of the luxurious situation of getting so much attention for our work and our concerns, we included a lot of community time and project showcasing in the schedule. Thanks to the fortunate timing of the visit, we could even combine it with one of our bigger photography projects this year (see photo project Austrian Film above). A summary of our ideas and experiences around site visits can be found in our latest learning pattern.
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