Wikimedia chapters/Reports/Wikimedia Deutschland/October 2012

Politics and Society

Conference "Zugang gestalten" (Shaping Access)

"Not access to cultural heritage has to be reasoned but the shortage thereof." Pavel Richter, #ke12

For two days, more than 200 representatives of different cultural institutions from all over Germany met at the Jewish Museum Berlin in order to talk about "Making the cultural heritage digitally usable." Most of the representatives present were obviously more interested in "how" to make it available rather than "if."

Even though Wikimedia Deutschland was co-organizer of the conference, Wikipedia and its sister projects were not only the focus for Wikimedians Pavel Richter, Marcus Cyron (Wikipedian in Residence, Deutsches Archäologisches Institut) and Lennart Guldbrandsson (Wikipedian in Residence at the Swedisch National Heritage Board). Many speakers also used them as good examples for a successful conversion of digital data into informaton that can actively be reused.

The conference thus fulfilled an essential purpose for us which was to present Wikimedia Deutschland as a potent cooperation partner when it comes to shaping free access. First meetings that could lead to future projects have already been arranged during the conference.

Conference: "Datenschutz im 21. Jahrhundert" (Data Privacy in the 21st Century)

Federal Minister of the Interior, Hans-Peter Friedrich, invited experts in the fields of science, politics, corporations and privacy to an international conference. As a preparation, Pavel Richter took part in a discussion panel about "Self-Regulation and Competition Law as Elements of the Data Protection Law of the Future." At this conference, he presented a position paper which criticizes the proposed General Data Protection Regulation by the EU. An accompanying blog post by Jan Engelmann especially highlighted the vague implementation of the "right to forget" for Open Content Platforms.

Wikipedian in Residence at the Stiftung Stadtmuseum Berlin (municipal museum of Berlin)

For ten weeks, Kilian Kluge was able to fill the position as Wikipedian in Residence at the Berlin Stadtmuseum and act as an interface between the museum and Wikipedia. The three big foci of his work were the in-house mediation of Wikipedia, determining new options for freeing content as well as the establishment of cooperations between the museum and the Wikimedia community. Kilian conducted more than forty workshops for the staff of the museum and explained the licensing standard of Wikimedia Commons. The in-house response to this pilot project was decidedly positive.

Education and Knowledge

Local Workshops

October was, like every year, a very intense month. It became clear how diverse Wikipedia users and authors are. Therefore, many different workshops for different target groups took place.

In our senior citizen program, Silberwissen, workshops took place at the FrauenTechnikZentrumBerlin e.V. (Women Technical Center Berlin), the Chronisten Potsdam-Mittelmark and in Worms and Hannover. As part of the Hochschulprogramm (university program) seminars started at the University Bremen, the Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz and the HTW Berlin in October. A blog post by Nils Weichert also commented on future plans to work with other universities.

In addition, an interesting workshop with screendesigners took place at the Berufliche Medienschule Hamburg-Eilbektal. During the two days, it became apparent that time and a sensible introduction to the communication and operating style of Wikipedia can lead the participants to positive experiences and a delight in their work. In a Wikipedia workshop at the Medienwerkstatt Berlin artists and people interested in culture came together and were able to exchange ideas about the free encyclopedia. Teachers are also still very interested in learning more about Wikipedia in order to meet the uncritical usage of their students. Together with the EU initiative for online safety, Klicksafe, information from the workshop was gathered and reviewed. As a result, an informative webpage has been set up on Klicksafe's website.

Conferences

This month, many events took place that focused on school school. Elly Köpf talked to teachers about Open Educational Ressources (OER) and free licenses at the EduCamp in Ilmenau as well as the first Netzwerktagung "Medienkompetenz stärkt Brandenburg" (conference "Media Literacy will Strengthen Brandenburg"). She reported on her experiences at EduCamp on the blog of WMDE. It was interesting to notice that teachers are more and more interested in learning more about free licenses and content. Elvira Schmidt participated at the closing event "The Nice Sides of the Internet" and represented the senior citizens' point of view.

Diversity in Wikipedia

On October 23, 2012, an event that was connected to the Wikimedia forums took place in Magdeburg. According to the motto "Wikipedia only for Men? Diversity in Wikipedia," Wikipedia authors and people interested in Wikipedia talked about the encyclopedia, internal editing processes and the question of diversity. Regional events are currently being conducted on different topics. The dates can be found on our website.

Volunteer Support

Portal Meetings

Already for the 11th time, the Wikipedia photography workshop took place in Nuremberg and was heavily funded by Wikimedia Deutschland. During this workshop, the photographers of the Wikimedia projects were trained. Part of the workshop was, e.g., an excursion to the Museum für Industriekultur (museum for industrial culture) and a lecture of the Nürnberger Medienakademie (Nuremberg Media Academy) about historical and political topics of photography.

Scholarships

The photo contest Wiki Loves Monuments was not finished in September after 34.164 pictures from 994 participants had been uploaded to Wikimedia Commons: The German jury, consisting of nine Wikipedia and Wikimedia Commons volunteers met for a weekend in Nuremberg, examined all pictures and chose the most outstanding photos. The meeting was financially and organizationally supported by Gerlinde Thalheim from Deutsche Stiftung Denkmalschutz (Foundation for Monument Protection), Florian Monheim (Photographer of Architecture Bildarchiv Monheim) and Wikimedia Deutschland. Another interesting fact from the contest: 90% of the participants in 2012 were new to the contest, which is a nicely high percentage.

Also nice was the high demand for literature: twelve quality publications could be lent to Wikipedians in October. Articles about witch-hunt, art, pyrotechnics and neurobiology can now be extended and updated to the current state of research.

Community Projects Budget

Sebastian Sooth supported the commission of the Community Projects Budget during a meeting with the applicants of the current call for proposals. The next meeting will take place in Hamburg on November 10. To become a new member of the committee, the community voted for Harald Krichel (Benutzer:Seewolf). News and information about the ongoing projects can be found on the project page.

Toolserver

Ordering and setting up three new servers for the toolserver was prepared in October. These are supposed to be a relief for the toolserver cluster in order to be able to support the growing need for ressources, especially for next year when the preparations for transitioning the toolserver to Tool Labs will happen. Much is to be prepared for that. At the moment, the tech team of the Wikimedia Foundation are working on specifying the respective roadmap.

General Assembly

The next general assembly is just around the corner: On November 24, 2012 the next board of Wikimedia Deutschland will be elected in Berlin and the strategic plan for 2013 will be presented and put to a vote. In October, we sent out invitation cards, looked for candidates for the board and put together the voting papers. Questions about the general assembly can be asked via e-mail, mv@wikimedia.de.

Staff

Nicole Lieger started working for Wikimedia Deutschland on October 1, 2012. Johannes Rohr is not employed by Wikimedia Deutschland any longer.

Research and Development

RENDER

The research project RENDER finished its second year. During a meeting of all project partners in Karlsruhe the presentation of Wikimedia Deutschland focused on current results. The team presented the current state of the supporting tools as well as the plans for the months to come. During that time WMDE will adjust the tools according to the demands of the users and will evaluate the results. An overview of the tools and demo versions, which have been developed by WMDE and the other partners for RENDER, can be found on the website of the EU project.

An important topic in Karlsruhe was also the upcoming review meeting where Wikimedia Deutschland will present the work of the project's last year to representatives of the European Commission. Kai Nissen and project manager Angelika Adam will take part in that meeting in Luxembourg at the end of November.

For further questions about the project and the tools, please write the team at render@wikimedia.de.

Wikidata

In October, the Wikidata team worked on the first part of phase 2 (info boxes). Together with the Wikimedia Foundation, they deployed Wikidata on the domain www.wikidata.org. A huge step forwards was the merging of content handler code in MediaWiki. This allows the MediaWiki software to deal with more types of input than only wiki syntax.

Wikidata took part in many events in October too, e.g. the Wikimedia CEE meeting in Belgrade and the SMWCon in Cologne. The next office hours on IRC have been announced and everyone who is interested can ask their questions (questions can also be asked on the mailing list or discussion page).

The Wikidata team is also looking for help with the initial design of the mainpage www.wikidata.org.

Public Relations

Press Work

In October, the Guinness Book of Records recognized Wiki Loves Monuments as the biggest photo competition in 2011. It was announced shortly after closing Wiki Loves Monuments 2012. The press release of the international organizing committee was translated and sent out by Wikimedia Deutschland.

Together with all the partners of the conference "Zugang gestalten" (shaping access) on October 22 and 23 at the Jewish Museum in Berlin WMDE joined the communication about the event. A joint press release was sent out as well as invitations to journalists. As a co-organizer of the event, Wikimedia Deutschland was also present with a booth and launched a brochure about freely licensed content in cultural institutions. Pictures of the event can be found in the respective category on Wikimedia Commons.

Coordinating Wikipedia authors and journalists was also an essential topic in October. Many press inquiries, e.g. about PR in Wikipedia or the gender gap in the free encyclopedia, were answered. Of great interest was also the beginning of phase 1 of Wikidata. An overview of WMDE's press work can also be found on the website.

Wikimedium

The latest edition of WMDE's free newspaper, Wikimedium, will be published in November - right on time for the general assembly. Since the current edition will also be out right before the annual fundraiser, the cover story will deal with donations and fundraising. Other topics will be the introduction to the RENDER tools, Silberwissen (senior citizen program) and the activities of the Wikipedia community.

International

As Nicole Ebber wrote in her blog post, she is currently establishing the new department "International Affairs" at Wikimedia Deutschland. Her tasks in October were the coordination with WCA member Marcus Glaser, meeting different representatives of international Wikimedia chapters, coordinating with Wikimedians and Wikipedians as well as translating a blog post about the Affiliations Committee (tba) or the publication of best practices, e.g. WMDE's speed dating on Free Knowledge at Wikimania 2012.

CEE Meeting in Belgrade

Nicole Ebber and Nikolas Becker were at the Wikimedia CEE meeting in Belgrade in October. Wikimedia Serbia was the host of this event for app. 60 participants consisting of Wikimedia chapters and community members from middle and east-European countries. An elaborate report (and a picture!) can be found on the blog.

Workshop on International Collaboration

Wikimedia Deutschland invites all those interested in talking about the collaboration between the communities, Wikimedia chapters and the Wikimedia Foundation to join us in workshops and discussions on November 25, 2012. In preparation, Nicole Ebber has talked to potential participants and gathered first talking points. Everybody who's interested is invited to take part in shaping the international collaboration and to bring ideas. You can also write an e-mail to nicole.ebber@wikimedia.de.

Fundraising

The annual fundraiser is approaching quickly. Due to this fact, October was characterized by preparing the coming months. The team switches to fundraising mode.

The most important part the preparations in October was testing the elements of the campaign. In four exciting tests the impact of banners and appeals was tested. With the new facts banner there is a highly successful alternative to the former banners. For the first time this year, we also evaluated alternative appeals to the ones of Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales. We used the appeal of a Wikipedia photographer, a donor and a Wikimedia Deutschland staff member. Other tests will follow in the weeks to come. It is therefore worthwhile to have a look at the fundraising portal. There, we will also announce which banner we will use for the start of the fundraiser.

Even though our tests normally only last two hours they give good insights into the coming fundraiser. The donations are real - just like the many e-mails we receive. There is much to do when it comes to donation management.

This year's campaing will presumably start in mid-November.

Jobs

We publish our job listings on our website. At the moment, we are looking for a project assistant in order to complete the team Politics and Society.