Wikiup:Wikimania 2019/Dokumentation/Masssly
Report from Masssly at Wikimania 2019 in Stockholm
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This page documents my participation around Wikimania 2019.
My attendance was sponsord by a scholarhisp from Wikimedia Deutschland (WMDE). For the first time from 2019, WMDE tried out tandem scholarship sponsorship together with the Wikimedia Foundation (WMF) to “promote international exchange between the German and the international community”, and “strengthening the movement idea within the German-speaking community”. My tandem partner from the German Wikimedia community for Wikimania 2019 was Leon Liesener, a.k.a User:Vogone.
The header for this page was
What bring I back from Wikimania for me and my work in Wikipedia?
A number of ideas for new projects for my Wikimedia community were formed during my presence at Wikimania. Some of these ideas came to being as a result of my engagement with other attending participants who were running similar projects.
- Wiki Techstorm
I cam to learn about Wiki Techstorm at the poster session on the main conference days. Wiki Techstorm brings women, men and gender-diverse people with an interest in ICT at all levels of experience to share knowledge about Wikimedia technical tools. The plan was for my Wikimedia community, the Global Open Initiative, to host a two-day satellite welcoming workshop and social event for starters in the coding world with a focus on using existing Wikimedia apps and tools, to coincide with the global annual Tech Storm event organized by Wikimedia Netherlands in November.
- Wiki Loves Monuments Photo Competition
Global Open Initiative facilitated the participation of the Ghanaian Wikimedia Community in the 2019 Wiki Loves Monuments global photo competition. See: Commons:Wiki Loves Monuments 2019 in Ghana Discussion to set up the pages to include Ghana begun at Wikimania 2019 when members of the GOI Foundation spoke with organizers of the competition.
- Wiki Loves Africa Research publication
Following discussions at Wikimania 2019 at the Africa group meet-up, regarding the viability of continuing to run Wiki Loves Africa photo competition, the leaders of the project, User:Anthere and User:Islahaddow decided to embark on a survey asking the community if they still wanted to participate in the Wiki Love Africa competition. Aside from the survey, I am leading a quantitative research project with volunteers from the GOI Foundation to assess the extent of the use of Wikimedia Commons images from Wiki Loves Africa photo competition. This research work is a replication of the methodology of this paper that estimated the economic impact of all images on Wikimedia Commons, that I discussed at my State of the Wikimedia Research 2019 session presentation at Wikimania.
What have I learned in the chosen topic area (international exchange or movement strategy)?
Like me, my tandem partner User:Vogone is working to establish a new Wikimedia user group in our various communities. Leon is working at creating the first user group in Lithuania, and I towards creating the Global Open Initiative, the first user group in West African that is focused on Open Educational Resources and the Wikipedia Education Program. We've had the opportunity to brainstorm ideas peculiar to our unique Wikimedia communities, and in the process exchanged ideas about what may work for each of us. The ultimate goal of our interactions is to see the creation of these two new user groups before Wikimania 2020 in Bankok.
What have I contributed to the conference? What worked out well and what not?
- As a session presenter
I am a co-editor and member of the Wikimedia Research Newsletter team. The newsletter is a monthly effort to keep both the Wikipedia community and academic researchers working in the field updated on recent research results in this field. The newsletter team with collaborators give a regular State of Wikimedia Research talk at Wikimania each year. I was a speaker at this year's session, discussing the Impact of Wikimedia projects on the world. (Slides available here). I spent a considerable amount of time preparing for the presentation with my co-presenters. This affected my ability to attend some of the sessions I had previously marked out in my calendar to attend.
- As a volunteer
I spend an average of 3 hours on the conference days as a knowledge saver volunteer, supporting the members of the Wikimedia Sverige community who were putting the Wikimania conference together. As knowledge Savers, we recorded and documented the conference in video and text (etherpad notes) formats respectively, ensuring that film and written documentation was available online throughout the sessions. Again, my involvement in these activities although absolutely worthwhile, held me back from attending some sessions I had hoped to be at during Wikimania.
Which ideas for projects or similar activities came into existence? How have I pursued them so far, what are my plans for the future?
- Wiki Techstorm
The Wikimedia community in Ghana is planning to host the first-ever Wiki Techstorm satellite event in the region, contingent on if funding from Wikimedia Foundation's Rapid grants comes through. The Rapid grant only disburses a maximum of $2000 and so we are looking for alternative sources of funding. We have requested financial assistance from the Wikimedia Netherland but were made to understand that budgeting and planning for the event had already been finalized earlier in 2019 even before WIkimania when we connected with the Wiki Techstorm g team. Nonetheless, the Wiki Tecstorm team together with Wikimedia Netherland has agreed to send one person to help out with technical training on the event day. In the worst-case scenario whereby we do not get funding to host the satellite event, we would make it a point to start soliciting funds early before the next iteration of the event happens in 2020. It is my hope that our effort would be the beginning of an annual regional Wiki Techgstorm satellite conference aside from the one that is held in the Netherland.
Which contacts to international Wikimedians have I made or foster, on which topics? How do they affect my activities in Wikipedia or its sister projects, and how do I intend to carry on dialogue?
- Amir E. Aharoni - I connected with Amir from the Languages Committee to discuss the absence of African languages on the Wikimedia projects. I explained that there is huge potential to get students studying local languages at the university to help Wikimedia community members with professional translations. I mentioned that I had been in touch with someone from the University of Education in Ghana, who has agreed to translate some technical terms from translate.wiki.net as part of their final year university project. Amir gave me some pointers including connecting me with someone who had done a master's in translating local terms in a Slavic language. in the past
- Wikimedia Foundation Mobile Team - I met with and discussed challenges of editing Wikimedia projects on smartphones, with members of the Wikimedia Foundation Mobile development team. I participated in a usability study they were organizing to test out new features for a new software version they were planning to deploy for mobile. We further discussed the challenges of the dwindling levels of participation from the global south sith regards to editing that was probably linked to high penetration of mobile devices instead of desktop computers in Africa. The later is currently the easiest tool to use to edit the wikis.
Three members of the Global Open Initiative team were sponsored to attend the conference from Ghana. We are planning to host a salon to coincide with this event and use the platform to collectively share our experiences with the rest of the community. In the meantime, we also have social media platforms on which we document our activities and educate our followers about our projects.
