Let’s play! Photographers capture the art of fun for the Wiki Loves Africa photo contest

Children playing around a wrecked airplane. A toddler plays peek-a-boo. Teens play barefoot street soccer. Welcome to the wonder of Wiki Loves Africa, an annual themed photo contest which aims to re-balance the lack of visual representation and content that Wikipedia and Wikimedia Commons hold about the continent. Over the last five years, Wiki Loves….

Read more

Liv Inger Somby, journalist and scholar, to speak at Wikimania about the Sámi people and bringing indigenous languages online

“For us, the Sámi people, digital platforms like Wikipedia are very important. My dream is that Sámi children across national borders communicate in Sámi languages, and common revitalization projects on the Wikimedia platforms are a great tool to reach that goal.” – Liv Inger Somby The Sámi, a group of indigenous people, have lived in….

Read more

Liv Inger Somby, journalista ja fágabargi, galgá hupmat sápmelaččaid birra ja dan ahte galggašii buktit eamiálbmotgielaid internehttii

“Midjiide, sápmelaččaide, leat digitála vuogádagat nu go Wikipedia hui dehálaččat. Mu niehku livččii ahte sámi mánát gulahallet daid iešguđet sámegielaiguin riikkarájiid rastá. Wikipedia vuogádagaid oktasaš ealáskahttin doaimmat livčče buorit reaiddut dán ulbmila joksat.” –Liv Inger Somby, “spotlight” logaldalli Wikimanias 2019:s Sápmelaččat leat eamiálbmot, geat leat duháhiid jagiid orron davvin, guovllus mii ođđaáiggis lea oassin Norgga,….

Read more

Smithsonian brings images of diverse figures from the history of US women’s suffrage to Wikimedia

The Smithsonian—one of the leading museums and research centers in the United States—has added over 200 images of women involved in the battle for women’s suffrage in the country to Wikimedia Commons, one of the world’s largest collections of freely licensed media. The donation helps advance the Smithsonian’s strategic plan, which calls for reaching one….

Read more

‘Bootcamp’ teaches India’s Wikimedia editors the intricacies of vector graphics

Have you ever tried zooming in on an image on your computer? Did you notice how the quality steadily got worse and worse? This is an unfortunate feature of “raster graphics,” the file formats that use a rectangular grid of pixels to make up an image, and present a particular problem for people making maps,….

Read more

By digitizing venerable translations, they’re bringing the world’s literary history to Punjabi speakers

Imagine a world where you grew up in a world where the greatest literary works in history never existed. For many of the world’s language speakers, this can be their functional reality. Titles like these have either never been translated, or were translated decades ago and now hide in ancient paper-bound texts on dusty library….

Read more

A growing Wikimedia movement, with training and learning at its core

How do we make knowledge creation truly participatory for every community on our planet? The Wikimedia movement has been growing steadily, with more volunteers joining, and new affiliate groups created every year. Affiliates represent our movement at the local level and are charged with organizing activities and events to get people and organizations involved in….

Read more

Wikipedia’s annual conference, Wikimania, is coming to Stockholm

The annual conference behind Wikipedia, one of the world’s most visited and beloved websites, will take place in Stockholm from 14–18 August 2019. The event will bring together members of the global community behind Wikipedia and the other Wikimedia free knowledge projects: volunteer editors (Wikimedians) from around the world, museum and archival experts, leaders of….

Read more

With Wikipedia in the classroom, a former student has become the teacher

Four years ago, Ismael Andani Abdulai was in graduate school at the University of California, Berkeley, working towards a master’s in law. One of the required courses for that degree was on cyber law, focusing on legal issues related to computers, the internet, and information technology. Appropriately, the professor in charge of the class assigned….

Read more

Wikimedia Argentina and the National University of La Plata partner to promote free knowledge

Last month, Wikimedia Argentina (WMAR) and the National University of La Plata (UNLP) signed an agreement that will see them working together to produce, facilitate, and distribute free knowledge through Wikipedia. The agreement with UNLP, one of the premier universities in Argentina, is the first of its kind for WMAR, an independent chapter affiliate that….

Read more