Press releases/Wikimania 2009 Media Registration

¡Viva Wikimanía! ¡Buenos Aires los espera!
''¡Viva Wikimania! Buenos Aires awaits you!''

Media registration is now open for Wikimania 2009 in Buenos Aires

The Annual Conference of the Projects of the Wikimedia Foundation will take place from the 26th to the 28th of August, 2009 in the Centro Cultural General San Martín in the city of Buenos Aires, Argentina. Media and participant registration is still open for the event. Keynote speakers will include Richard Stallman, the father of the global Free Software movement, and Jimmy Wales, the founder of Wikipedia, among other free culture personalities.


 * The registration form for participants is available online at http://wikimania2009.wikimedia.org/wiki/Registration
 * Members of the press can register for media access to Wikimania by contacting press officer Beatriz Busaniche, [mailto:bea@vialibre.org.ar bea@vialibre.org.ar] or by telephone at 00 54 911 67185694.

An on-line schedule for Wikimania (subject to change) can be found at: http://wikimania2009.wikimedia.org/wiki/Schedule

This is the fifth Annual Conference of Wikimania, a global event which has taken place in Frankfurt, Germany; Boston, Massachusetts, USA; Taipei, Taiwan; and Alexandria, Egypt. Wikimania will be bilingual for the first time, in both Spanish and English. This is also the first Wikimania is being held in a Spanish-speaking country. In 2010, the sixth conference will be held in Gdańsk, Poland.

This is a momentous event for the world of free culture and for collaborative free knowledge initiatives. This annual meeting is intended for the global community of users and editors who contribute daily to Wikimedia's projects, including Wikipedia, Wikimedia Commons, Wikibooks, Wiktionary, Wikiquote, Wikispecies, Wikiversity, and Wikinews. Participation is open to all members of the public with an interest in Wikimedia's projects, as well as other wiki-related projects, open-source technologies and platforms, free culture, and open education initiatives. Starting on the 25th of August the event will also function as the hacklab; hacking days will be held for people to work to improve the basic tools of the projects, in particular, the MediaWiki software.

Some of the themes of Wikimania this year include:


 * Wikimedia Communities: conflict resolution, dynamics, reputation, identity, multilingualism, languages and culture.
 * Free Knowledge: open access to information, ways to construct and distribute free knowledge, Wikimedia projects in education, journalism, research, and ways to improve the quality and usability of free knowledge.
 * Latin American challenges: expansion of the projects in the continent, promotion of native languages of the region, and specific problems of the Spanish- and Portuguese-speaking communities.
 * Technical infrastructure, including matters related to extensions and development of MediaWiki, infrastructure, and ideas for its development.

The Argentine chapter of the Wikimedia Foundation, Wikimedia Argentina, is in charge of general coordination of the conference, with the support of the Government of the city of Buenos Aires. As well, it is relying on the help of local volunteers and of Argentine free culture organizations, such as Fundación Vía Libre, FM La Tribu, Buenos Aires Libre, and CaFeLUG, Capital Federal Linux Users Group.

Conference Access
Registration for Wikimania includes:


 * Complete access to all the events and talks included in the Wikimania program
 * Coffee, snacks and lunch during the three days of the event
 * Access to the closing event ceremony on Friday, August 28th

The conference will be bilingual, in both English and Spanish. Simultaneous translation will be provided for the two principal halls during the whole event.

For more information: http://wikimania2009.wikimedia.org