CIS-A2K/Outreach Programs/Handbook/Mail Draft for Photo Club

Hi,

We welcome photographers and people who love photography, hobbyists who have a common interest in photography and in sharing their profession/hobby/talent/passion with others to contribute to Wikipedia/Wikimedia Commons.

What is Wikipedia and Wikimedia Commons?

• Wikipedia: I'm sure you all must be aware of Wikipedia. Most of us use it on everyday basis! But just to provide you some more information - Wikipedia is an online encyclopedia and is the 5th most-visited website on the planet. It's completely free to use and re-use, advert free, available in more than 270 different languages - including 19 Indian languages. Wikipedia articles are written by everyday folks who volunteer to share their knowledge to the world. People like you and me are constantly improving Wikipedia articles, making thousands of changes per hour!
• Wikimedia Commons: Wikimedia Commons is a repository of freely licensed media files (photographs, spoken text, videos, etc). It's completely free and everyone is allowed to copy, use, modify the existing files or contribute new files. It has one of the largest collections of freely licenses photographs in the world. Pretty much like Wikipedia, Wikimedia Commons is also created and maintained by volunteers. The files stored in Wikimedia Commons are often used in Wikipedia articles as well.

Why should you contribute?

• Increase number of pictures available on Indian content: There are approximately 80,000 volunteers from all over the world who contribute to Wiki projects but only about 2,000 of them are from India. If we want more information/pictures about bindi, biryani, bhatura, bhojpuri, bharatnatyam - we'll need more people from India to start contributing.
• There are several articles on Wikipedia that have low quality images or no images at all. We'd like improve the range/quality of photographs on Wikipedia.
• It's not necessary to contribute pictures related to Indian content, please feel free to add pictures of any topic of your interest.

How can you contribute?

• A photography club like yours can contribute wonderful images that can be used on Wikimedia Commons and Wikipedia to showcase your work as well as to spread knowledge to millions.
• You can contribute pictures on any subject matter you like - places (Dilli haat in Delhi, MG Road in Bangalore, Marine Drive in Mumbai etc) food (biryani, jalebi, dabeli pav, dhokla and the likes), monuments (Tughlaqabad fort, Kangra fort, Agra fort, UNESCO work heritage sites), dancers, musicians, animals, species of plants/flowes, whatever you like.

What do you gain out of it?

• Higher visibility of your work: If you post your pictures on Facebook or tweet about them on Twitter you reach out your 600-700 friends/followers. However, if you contribute to Wikicommons thousands of people will view your pictures every month!
• Photographs will be attributed to you: Thou, your photographs can be used and re-used once on Wiki but they should always be attributed to your name!

Let me know if this is something that interests you. We can then figure out how and when we can organize a workshop to help you understand how to contribute on Wikimedia Commons and/or Wikipedia. There are few simple norms that one needs to follow and we'd be happy to provide some guidance.

If you're interested please get in touch with XYZ or drop a mail at XYZ.