WikiIndaba 2024/Report/Martin Hipangwa

Report on the Participation of Martin Hipangwa at WikiIndaba 2024 in Johannesburg, South Africa

Overview

I would describe my participation in the 10th Wiki Indaba as an extraordinary experience. This conference was a bit different from other Wiki Indaba because it was structured differently. I would like to extend my appreciation to all those who served in the organising committee and particularly Wikimedia ZA for funding me to attend such an incredible event.

I participated first as a volunteer, as a the Founder of Wikimedia Community User Group Namibia and as a presenter. I co-presented with [[User:Shikoha Tautiko|Shikoha Tautiko]] , on "Librarians at the forefront: Establishing Wikipedia Community User Group Namibia".

Outcome

The highlight of these conference lies in the sparks that emanated from my librarianship meet up and the session i presented on the role of librarians in the Wikimedia landscape, which resulted in many collaboration of "wikibrarians" beyond the conference.

Another exciting thing is that, the focus on African language and their representation on Wikipedia was astounding and it was not just words but action. This was demonstrated after the outcome of the Hackathon was announced, that speakers of Khoekhoegowab can now develop and write their language because the use of clicks has been enabled by the tech team. This was incredible and my wish is that speakers of these language in Namibia will be reached to document their language on Wikipedia and sister projects.

Impact

This year, we attended as a registered User Group (Wikimedia Community User Group), with three representative in the conference and a satellite event in Namibia alongside the main conference. This was already a highlight to me as this signifies growth and efforts to grow a community in Namibia.

Our exit plans are to strengthen governance and partnership, community collaboration and to further strengthen our content contribution and volunteers skills development.

The conference challenged me to think critically on the issue of user retention and quality contribution as this are the core to sustainability of the community.

The conference also touched on the collaboration that need to happen between librarians and journalists to write

Anything else?

If you have a link to your slides or particular pictures from the event, you can share them here. Please also feel free to share any other feedback, information, or thoughts with us in this section.

I would like to extend my outmost appreciation to Wiki Indaba 2024 programme team for giving me an opportunity to present our work. Many thanks to Wikimedia ZA for financial support that made it possible to attend this conference, and for affording my team with a microfunding to have the same experience in Namibia.