Centre for Internet and Society

Call for joining the Free Knowledge movement #Wikipedia #Wikimedia

bhuvana — 2019-08-20T07:15:30Z

Every little drop makes a Mighty ocean! Join us in this Free Knowledge movement where your contributions will be used world-wide.

Access to Knowledge team of the Centre for Internet and Society is the partner of the Wikimedia Foundations and the Wikimedia movement. Our work is to support Wikipedia/ Wikimedia projects in India. We conduct and support a series of skill building initiative such as workshops, meetups, photo walks, contest, edit-a-thon etc. We also attend to build sustainable partnerships with institutions, organizations, groups and communities which support the Wikimedia communities to build and improve the content in Wikipedia and other projects.

Are you an individual or do you represent any organisation, institution, groups or enterprises? You can actually help the ‘Free Knowledge’ movement by donating photos, media, content or archives. Let us tell you how.

Wikipedia is a widely read website in the current world. According to Alexa’s rating, Wikipedia is the 5th most highly rated in the world. Also certainly we can say that after searching your query on Google (or any other search engine you use) you should have found Wikipedia as a preferable suggestion or result. We find it astonishing that all content of Wikipedia and its sister projects are created, modified and maintained by volunteers, here we need your support. There are many articles on Wikipedia which are being read by thousands of people but do not have relevant images. The problem is simple there is not any free image available. On Wikimedia/Wikipedia we take copyright very seriously and cannot use any content unless it is on public domain/ under free license/ copyright owner donates it under free license.

For example, there is an article on 2019 Kerala floods which is read by 2000 unique readers at this moment but we do not have sufficient photo coverage. Similarly, we have an article on a famous writer say, Ruskin Bond here also we do not have many photos on him or his works.

Wikimedia community is an independent community. Community decides by itself the content, its style including the media files to be included after detailed instructions. Although we cannot instruct the community we can provide resources which will definitely be of help for the free knowledge movement.

This article is an open call to “YOU” to support the free knowledge movement and Wikimedia movement by donating useful content. The content might be video, useful photos, database and audio. The content you are donating must be under Creative Commons Share-like content. You must have the copyright of the content under CC licenses,a CC license is used when an author wants to give other people the right to share, use, and build upon the work that they (the author) have created. Attributions will be given under every file details.

Think of a world where your content can also be part of the larger free knowledge movement?

This is the overall idea in a nutshell. We are eager to discuss every aspect of the process and your questions in detail. Please feel free to contact Tito Dutta(tito@cis-india.org). Let's schedule a call or meet in person.

[Currently the A2K is conducting a content donation drive and awareness campaign. This blog post was written as a part of this initiative ]

The Knowledge Base is Liberated

Subodh Kulkarni and Madhav Gadgil — 2019-08-05T23:04:33Z

The article published in Sunday supplement of Loksatta newspaper of Express group, written jointly by Madhav Gadgil & Subodh Kulkarni summarises - the status of searchable open knowledge available on web, eagerness of youth generation across the social strata to access knowledge on new gadgets and the approaches to build resources in Marathi on web harnessing potential of Wikimedia projects. It also elaborates major three breakthroughs – Free & open source software movement, Unicode revolution and development of collaborative knowledge building and sharing free platforms like Wikimedia projects easily accessible to people in their own languages.

The article by Subodh Kulkarni and Madhav Gadgil titled ज्ञानभांडार मुक्त झाले.. in Marathi was published by Loksatta on August 3, 2019.

In 2020, Maharashtra state is celebrating its 60th anniversary, it is also 100th death anniversary of Lokmanya Tilak while the state has recently celebrated 100th birth anniversaries of Lokkavi Annabhau Sathe and Lokshahir Amar Shekh. These three social reformers and prolific writers had shaped the socio-political history of Maharashtra. On this occasion, appeal is made to the Marathi community for bringing the complete works of these three reformers in Wikimedia projects in searchable & freely accessible form. It is also mentioned that these efforts are being facilitated by Centre for Internet & Society and other like-minded organisations. The aim is to complete this project before Marathi language day in February 2020.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/loksatta-august-3-2019-subodh-kulkarni-and-madhav-gadgil-the-knowledge-base-is-liberated

Re-licensing Sessions with Authors and Organisations

subodh — 2019-08-05T16:12:42Z

In collaboration with Marathi community, CIS-A2K is getting connected with various authors and organisations willing to re-license their content under CC-By-SA. A2K is facilitating the OTRS process Commons for re-licensing as well as digitisation of the content. The team of trained Wikimedians at Vigyan Ashram, Pabal, District Pune has taken the responsibility of digitising the books and further uploads in Wikimedia projects.

See the information posted on Wikipedia page here

In July, CIS-A2K facilitated the OTRS process of two organisations. Jnana Prabodhini and Saptahik Vivek Hindustan Prakashan Sanstha have released their 6 books and 8 volumes of encyclopedias respectively in CC-By-SA. As the organisations have solely published these books by sponsoring the writers, editors and designers, the authorised signatory of the organisation has to complete the OTRS process. The simple 'How to do' step by step manual was developed to facilitate this process. This process will be replicated by other organisations in near future. These books are valuable & reliable references in Marathi literature.

CIS-A2K conducted three sessions with authors also. In the field of rural development in Maharashtra, thoughts of Late S. G. Majgaonkar are highly regarded. His son Dhananjay Majgaonkar who holds the copyright for his books, completed the OTRS process and released 3 books in CC-By-SA. The books are now on Commons as well as Wikisource project.

Content donation sessions were conducted with Ila Dalwai, daughter of social reformer & writer Late Hamid Dalwai, thinker & writer Hari Narake and grand daughter of Marathi thinker & writer Late Narahar Kurundkar. These persons handed over the books to CIS-A2K for further process. The digitisation of the books has been started at Vigyan Ashram, Pabal.

The links of books uploaded on Commons are given below.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/subodh-kulkarni-july-31-2019-re-licensing-sessions-with-authors-and-organisations

Wikimedia Workshop on Rivers under Project Jalbodh

subodh — 2019-08-05T15:28:41Z

The Indian National Trust for Art & Heritage Pune Chapter is working with various organisations to preserve the natural heritage places like rivers in Pune district of Maharashtra, India. After the presentation of 'Project Jalbodh' by CIS-A2K in River Dialogue organised by INTACH in April 2018, several organisations shown keen interest in collaboration.

Open knowledge creation workshops were organised at four places by different organisations working on river issues. To sustain these efforts and mobilise the larger community to build knowledge on rivers, INTACH has decided to collaborate with CIS-A2K to develop long-term plan. This was the first workshop to develop structure of the project, decide the stakeholders and follow-up action plan for the future. The two day workshop was conducted on 29 & 30 July at INTACH office in Pune. Total 20 participants from seven organisations actively contributed to Wikimedia projects.

Background

As the water crisis and state of rivers is worsening day by day, the citizen's initiatives are taking more efforts to spread knowledge about it. Centre for Internet & Society representative actively participated in the River Dialogue organised by INTACH (Indian National Trust for Art and Cultural Heritage) and SANDRP (South Asian Network of Dams, Rivers and People) on 20–21 April 2018 to introduce the potential of Wikimedia projects to organisations working across Maharashtra state. After this orientation, a follow-up plan is prepared with Prof. Madhav Gadgil in which various groups have expressed their readiness to start content building on water & rivers. Jeevit Nadi organisation took first initiative on 28 May 2018 to train team of activists in open knowledge and Wikimedia Projects. Total 15 activists and researchers from Jeevit Nadi, EcoUniv, Jal Biradari (Tarun Bharat Sangh), Ecological Society, Sagarmitra organisations participated in this workshop.

In the second iteration on 25 July 2018, five participants presented their work, the database and the resources with them. These include photographs, videos, training material and data collected on site. They also worked on category tree and structure of article on river. The media available in the repository were sorted and analysed for uploading. This team has started preparing the database of local issues, maps of rivers and heritage places on the banks for uploading in respective categories.

The third iteration for building content on rivers in Sangli district was organised on 7 December 2018 by Jal Biradari & Tarun Bharat Sangh organisation. In this one day workshop, 11 activists working in Agrani river basin participated. They were trained in basics of Wikipedia editing and uploading on Commons. They worked on category tree of Agrani river basin and structure of articles on water related structures.

The fourth national level iteration was conducted between 22–25 December 2018 at Tarun Bharat Sangh, Bhikampura, Alwar district, Rajasthan for activists of Jal Jan Jodo Abhiyan from eight states. The 30 participants were trained in this four day workshop. They started contributing in various languages.

In collaboration with CIS-A2K, INTACH Pune Chapter has taken initiative to organise two day workshop to build knowledge on rivers in Pune district with various organisations.

Objectives

Many organisations and communities are working for more than 10 years in water sector in an organised way. They have built cumulative knowledge through action and research with an objective to disseminate it to the masses. Hence the 'Project Jalbodh' is being evolved to integrate this approach with the Wikimedia projects for mutually beneficial impact.Knowledge is to be presented in different forms, aspects and in appealing way. The interests and attention of the seeker should be taken into account. Therefore in many areas, the text is to be blended with media, data, graphs, maps etc to give holistic sense of knowledge. The Wikimedia projects can be explored to get this integration.

Facilitators

Supriya Goturkar-Mahabaleshwarkar, Co-convenor & Coordinator, INTACH PUNE CHAPTER
Marathi Wikimedians - Aaryaa Joshi, Kalyani Kotkar

Event Details

Date : 29 & 30 July 2019
Time : 9.30 am to 5.30 pm
Place : Pune, Maharashtra, India
Venue : INTACH Pune office, Kirloskar compound, Erandwane, Pune
Participants :20

Day 1

Day one started with introductions by members of organisations - Jeevitnadi (Living River Foundation), Sajag Nagrik Manch, Parisar, Centre for Environment & Education, Jnana Prabodhini, Ecological Society and INTACH. Then workshop conveners Supriya & Subodh explained the background and objectives of the workshop. The concept of 'Project Jalbodh' was elaborated. The keynote address was given by Prof. Madhav Gadgil. He delivered upon the genesis of knowledge in human evolution and need of open knowledge for healthy development of the society. He also discussed the integration of citizen science and Wikimedia projects. The brainstorming on mobilisation of community was done after this address with valuable inputs from Prof. Gadgil.

Introduction to major Wikimedia projects was given in next session. The examples of river and water related content were taken for understanding the context. The agenda for the workshop and the details were finalised through discussion on needs. The participants then started with opening accounts on Wiki followed by basic editing skills and rules of Wikipedia & Commons. They searched for various articles, infoboxes, categories and media related to river available in Wiki projects. The extensive interaction on status of the existing content happened to arrive at gap finding and listing the same. From this thought process, the importance of developing structure for river articles was realised. Then various members with their vast experience collaboratively evolved the structure of article on river in Marathi Wikipedia. According to local context, relevant sections and sub-sections were designed. Separate project page defining this structure was created on Marathi Wikipedia under the Wiki Project Jalbodh. This was the crucial activity for the project. After this session, the organisations conducted the analysis of the content developed by them which is to be contributed in Wikimedia projects. The planning of next day was done in the last session.

Day 2

On the second day, the activity started with uploading images on Commons. Along with this, the encyclopedic content available with the organisations was discussed for giving references. The articles were created in the sandboxes by groups on similar themes. The content was created as per the manual of style. Various skills like advanced search options for finding online references, archiving of url's on Wayback machine of Internet Archive were also acquired by the participants. The relevant media repositories were also explored. The category tree for the rivers was also designed. The detailed discussions on building databases, maps and media with community involvement was conducted. In the final session, the roadmap for future activities was prepared. Three model articles on rivers - Mula, Mutha & Pavana - will be completed in the next two months. Follow-up workshops will be conducted bi-monthly which will be hosted by different organisations. The discussion on campaign - Wiki Loves River - developed enthusiasm among the members. The meeting on this theme will be organised in September to plan the campaign.

Read the full report on Wikipedia page

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/subodh-kulkarni-july-30-2019-wikimedia-workshop-on-rivers-under-project-jalbodh

Orientation programme, Wikipedia workshop & Action Plan meeting in PAH Solapur University

subodh — 2019-08-05T15:21:16Z

CIS-A2K representatives visited PAH Solapur University, Solapur (PAHSUS) to finalise the action plan and MoU for the year 2019-20.

The collaborative project was launched with orientation programme and Wikipedia workshop for the selected students and faculty on 18 & 19 July 2019. The detailed discussions with Vice Chancellor, Registrar, Head of the departments, faculty and administrative staff were held to finalise the terms of collaboration, operational framework and action plan for the academic year. The deliberations are given in the following sections.

Collaborative open knowledge creation by PAHSUS and CIS-A2K

The MoU was done because CIS and PAHSUS have found common cause in free and open knowledge generation and dissemination. This MoU stipulates the scope of collaboration between these two entities and terms and conditions of conducting the collaborative activities.

Terms of Collaboration

To promote content generation in Indian language, especially Marathi Wikimedia projects (projects such as Wikipedia, Wikisource, Wikimedia Commons, Wikidata etc. https://www.wikimedia.org/) among the institutions under University affiliation.
To organise awareness programs and training workshops to achieve this. For consistent and dedicated efforts, mechanism of subject experts and coordinators will be developed.
To integrate the academic assignments, projects etc. with knowledge building in Wikimedia projects e.g. Wikipedia, Wikisource, Wikidata, Wikimedia Commons.
To facilitate content donation in the form of published thesis, University publications to free library - Wikisource. To write well referenced articles based on these research work.
To develop platform in University for outreach programs on Digital knowledge, Language & technologies, FOSS, Unicode etc. To involve other stakeholders in knowledge business like publishers, writers, printers, designers in these programs.
To take lead in accommodating open knowledge concepts, locally relevant content generation practices while designing the courses.

Operational Framework

A core team shall be constituted by representatives of this MoU for realization of the objectives of this MoU.
The core team shall prepare an action plan with specific goals for achieving the objectives of the proposal and the MoU. They shall take into consideration the academic, commercial and legal aspects of this co-operation. The action plan or work plan may be modified or improved during the academic year according to the needs-assessment of the students, and the core team’s analysis.
The proposed action plan shall be reviewed and approved by representatives of both parties.
The core team shall be supported and authorised by the University Administration to take all necessary actions to implement the action plan in an effective, speedy and dynamic manner.
Program expense sharing shall be decided on a case to case basis by the core team.

Some highlights of proposed action plan

Each department of PAHSUS will facilitate creation of 10 Wikipedia articles related to their course by the students. This activity will be taken up in first semester. The articles will be created on user sandbox or on Google Docs. After review, the articles will be moved to Wikipedia mainspace.
The projects on museum, library and archives will be taken up in the second semester by the groups of students. The photos and other media will be uploaded on Wikimedia Commons and other sister projects after analysing encyclopedic quality of these content.
PAHSUS will issue a circular for selected affiliated colleges in Maharashtra to participate actively in free knowledge creation and the Wikimedia movement. The technical support will be arranged by both the parties.
The digitisation of copyright free books in the library will be taken up under ‘Earn & Learn Scheme’. The books will be uploaded in free library - Wikisource.

Orientation Programme

The orientation programme on Wikimedia projects was conducted on 18 July for faculty and students from 4 departments. The objective was to give perspective of content generation in Wiki projects along with academics. Marathi Wikipedian Arvind Bagale shared his Wiki experiences in this session. Around 50 participants attended this session.

Wikipedia Workshop

The Wikipedia workshop for selected students of 3 departments and faculty was organised on 19 July 2019 in the Mass Communication department. Total 15 participants actively contributed to Wikipedia & Commons. Marathi Wikipedian Arvind Bagale facilitated the training process.

Media Coverage

News in Lokmat Newspaper

See the report on Wikipedia page

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/subodh-kulkarni-july-19-orientation-programme-wikipedia-workshop-and-action-plan-meeting-in-pah-solapur-university

Wikimedia Education SAARC Conference 2019

subodh — 2019-07-04T02:48:58Z

Christ University in association with the Centre for Internet & Society's Access to Knowledge team (CIS-A2K) organized a conference, from 20 - 22 June 2019, at Christ University, Bengaluru. Forty-nine Wikimedians from four countries (Sri Lanka, Nepal, Bangladesh, and India) participated in the event.

The meta report published on Wikimedia Blog can be accessed here.

CIS-A2K is working with various universities and educational institutions to develop content in Wikimedia projects. One such institutional partner, Christ (deemed to be university) has taken the initiative to organize Wikimedia Education SAARC conference in association with CIS-A2K and Wikipedia & Education User Group. The participants included one member from Sri Lanka, four members from Nepal, seven members from Bangladesh and 37 members from India. In all 14 language communities were represented.

The broad objectives of the conference were:

To know the nature of education programs being conducted.
To share the best practices.
Discuss the challenges like retention and quality.
Explore the methodologies to evaluate & measure the work being done.
Enhancing the community involvement in the education programmes.

The applications for participation and thematic submissions were invited from Wikimedians of SAARC countries. The selection committee comprised of representatives from Wikimedia Foundation and community conducted the scrutiny. The scholarships were provided to 49 selected participants. In all 12 submissions on diverse topics were received from different language communities. Wikimedia Foundation’s Partnerships & Global reach team member Praveen Das, Trust & Safety team member Neha Nair and advisor for this conference Tanveer Hasan were also present for some of the sessions during the conference.

The following report gives a summary of all the deliberations at the conference.

Day 1, 20 June 2019

The inaugural session was graced by chief guest Dr. Ramesh Sharma, an expert in open education and Associate Professor of Instructional Design at Ambedkar University Delhi along with Dr. Anil Pinto Registrar of Christ University who was instrumental in launching Wikipedia in education for the students. The other persons on the dais were Tito Dutta, Program Manager CIS-A2K, Dr. Mallika Krishnaswami, Dr. John Joseph Kennedy, and Dr. Sebastian K A.

In this session the speakers stressed upon the advancement of language, to adopt latest knowledge sharing technologies, innovation in education programmes and collaborations with multifaceted institutions to actualize new ideas. The journey of Christ University regarding the Wikimedia education program during the last six years was also elaborated.

The inaugural session was followed by a session on Code of Conduct and Friendly space policies by the Response Team of CIS-A2K. The objectives, diversity statement, general community guidelines, unacceptable behaviour and process of reporting described in CoC were discussed. To explain the motivation and hierarchy of Wikipedia in Education at Wikimedia movement the following sessions were conducted during the conference.

In the keynote address, Dr. Ramesh Sharma revealed many facets of Open Educational Resources (OER) in the field of academic courses, science, mathematics, music, multimedia etc. He shared many experiences of working with Open Education Resource University (OERU) and appealed for future collaborations. He also deliberated upon some wider topics like Government education policies, licenses and quality improvement framework for OERs. In a remote session with Nichole Saad, Senior Programme Manager (Wikipedia Education Programme) from Wikimedia Foundation, she explained the rationale behind the Education in Wikimedia projects and the execution process.

The session on Wikipedia & Education User Group focused on the global user group that supports the work around Wikimedia and Education in various capacities. One of the Board members of user group, Krishna Chaitanya Velaga gave an introduction to the user group, its background, vision, and objectives. Later the functioning of the group was also explained including the membership process and the governance. The three focus areas of the group were explained in detail — community, resources, and outreach. Later, the participants were briefed on various ways in which they can get involved with the group. These included joining the newly formed working groups for each focus area, taking up membership, and also attending the monthly open meetings held by the group, and share their stories to the broader community. The session ended with a brief upon areas where community members could seek the support of the group, such as mentorship, securing resources, advocacy, etc.

The participants were introduced to each other through their work. Session on sharing of various programmes being conducted, it’s learning, challenges and way ahead were very informative and stimulating. The participants from different language communities explained the present status of the education programmes being conducted with institutions. The challenges like lack of initiative, the paucity of resources, trust in Wikipedia and consistency were discussed collectively. New and innovative ideas that were not tried so far were also put forth by the members making it an interesting session.

The last session of the day one was group work on the theme - ' कल आज और कल ' : Past Present Future. The participants were divided into eight groups. Enthusiasm was very high during discussions on the past, present & future of education programmes with the community. The groups collectively worked on the poster presentations.

Day 2, 21 June 2019

The second day started with an interactive session on the topic - The interesting ways of Introducing Wikimedia projects (Wikidata, Wikisource, etc.) into classrooms. The participants shared their experiences with different entry point events other than Wikipedia. Many felt that Wikipedia is complicated to start with. The community also reacted strongly sometimes due to the quality of the articles. This discussion was followed by promoting planned growth process for bridging the gender gap.

The conference submissions on education projects were presented in two parallel tracks. According to interest, the members attended the various sessions. The highlights of the presentations are given below.

Goals of Wikimedia + Education: Content, Retention, Skills: The session started off by asking participants about why they do an education programme, and what else can we include as the goals for any EduWiki activity. Different approaches for achieving each of these goals, and how each of these goals affects the rest were discussed. This included a quick brainstorming on how communities should collaborate with the EduWiki activities so that it adds value to its goals. Eventually, the presenter along with the participants realized that retention of users should be prioritized over the other two goals to easily reach all the three goals. Caution points regarding assignments like copyvio, reliable references were also discussed. The scale of the activity and scoping student interest are also an important criterion.

Challenges of growing communities : Make Wikipedia trustworthy to educators: In this session, challenges before Bangla Wikipedia were discussed. There is a need to collaborate with institutions and capacity building of editors to improve the quality of articles.

Non-Conventional methods of knowledge expansion by programs involving Wikimedia and Education: The formal approaches like giving compulsory tasks for students will not work in the Wikimedia movement. We can expect better outcomes by adopting non-formal methods like digital skills development and team building through collaborative work.

Wikimedia Program Outreach Mentorship: Proper awareness and detailed planning of resources are the key aspects of outreach programmes.

School Wiki in Kerala: State government education department of Kerala has developed School Wiki with Wikimedians in Kerala. In all 15000 articles of schools have been created with their history, location details, alumni, maps, cultural activities, photos and creative works of students like stories, poems and paintings. The innovative project - Folk encyclopedia is also shaping up. The linkages with Malayalam Wikipedia are being established slowly. As the students are now aware of the Wiki environment, there are chances of getting good editors in future.

Wikipedia in School: State government of Tamil Nadu took the initiative to organise capacity building programme for teachers through the EDUSAT on a mass scale. This Wikipedia training started in 2016 and till now 40,000 teachers are trained. Due to this, teachers became active on Wikipedia.

Retaining Tulu Language and culture: the ways and means: Karavali Wikimedians user group is active in the coastal part of Southern Karnataka and Northern Kerala. It is focusing on the preservation of language and culture. They have started the first physical Wiki library with 650 books. Other innovative activities are ‘Karavali Wikimedians to Home’ and Text-Performance-Documentation and Reconstruction of rare Folk Performing art Sidda Vesha.

VVIT WikiConnect : A Year in review : The coordinators of Wikiclub presented the activities conducted in the last two years. The focus is on capacity building of active students, leadership development, quality of content and retention. According to the scoping of students’ interest, various events were conducted like Edit-a-thons, Photowalks, Wikidata workshop, 1lib1ref session, Wikimedia Strategy Salon, Mini Media Wiki training, Thematic workshops, etc. The user survey was also done to get the feedback of students.

Wikipedia Student Association at Alva's College Moodubidire: The regular Wiki activities have resulted in active Students’ Association at Alva’s College. The major activities are publishing of wall magazine - Wiki Suddi : Mundu and newspaper - Wiki Samachaara, Wikicamp and internship by Department of Journalism.

Wikipedia in Education at Christ University: The coordinator presented the journey of six years programme at Christ. The process of engaging students from day one to the last day of the second semester was explained. The students learn digital skills, language typing, writing articles on the topic of interest and respective stream. From writing in the sandbox, they even progress up to documenting case study on research related to Wikipedia. The structure of monitoring and evaluation systems within the department was elaborated. The community engagement aspect was also discussed in detail. The challenges and the preparations for the next curve of WEP Christ were presented.

In the last session of the day, groups presented their work through posters visualising ‘Past, Present & Future’ of the education programmes. The interaction and loud thinking provided many ideas to be taken further for implementation.

The second day ended with Cultural programme by Christ University students. The vibrant performances of music and dance were enjoyed by the participants.

Day 3, 22 June 2019

The day started with early morning ‘Bird Walk’ at the university campus with rich biodiversity. Seven enthusiasts joined this walk and captured images of 22 different species of birds which is documented on eBird portal.

The last day of the conference started with a remote presentation on OER by Wayne Macintosh (Director OER Foundation, and UNESCO - ICDE Chair in OER). Wayne started with an overview of demand for education vis-a-vis the infrastructure available in the global south. The fundamentals of OERs, OER Foundation and OER University were elaborated. He stressed the need to start at least two OER courses by every Indian University. They can join the OERu network for free to host the courses. The credit system for various micro courses was explained through examples. He also discussed the WikiEducator programme and appealed Wikimedians to join this evolving community as all courses run using media-wiki software. Regulatory issues for universities to adopt OER courses are to be looked into in Indian context. Dr Ramesh Sharma assured to facilitate in this matter.

The next session, ‘Strategy in Wikimedia and Education’ by Pavan Santhosh intended to help participants understand the importance brewing Strategy and figuring out a Big dream in their programs. This session started with demystifying the word strategy. With examples from the Wikimedia movement that participants can relate, the presenter explained how can a Big dream help prioritizing activities and programs. Later in an interactive part of the session, participants came up with ideas to run a strategy process in their programs and communities.

Lively group activity - ‘Revolving cafe’ happened after the strategy session. The activity was planned around five themes - Program and Events Dashboard, Wikidata, Communication & Blogging, GLAM in Education and Support structures (WMF grants and CIS Requests page). As the groups were small, the participants utilised this opportunity to clear doubts through one to one dialogue. The session was mutually beneficial for group leaders as well as participants.

After the cafe activity, Wikimedia Education Staff member Sailesh Patnaik deliberated upon the outreach and communications aspects. He stressed on using social media effectively and give publicity to innovative activities through newsletters. He also explained about upcoming Greenhouse pilot.

The last session, ‘Wikisource in education’ was conducted by Jayanta Nath. He explained how Wikisource activity is complementary to the qualitative growth of Wikipedia. The basics of Wikisource like licenses and workflow were discussed in detail. Various ways to combine the education programme with Wikisource were explored in interaction.

The conference closing ceremony was meaningful with spontaneous feedback from the participants.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/subodh-kulkarni-june-22-2019-wikimedia-education-saarc-conference-2019

What is Wikimedia Education SAARC Conference?

sailesh — 2019-06-22T09:37:23Z

The Wikimedia Education SAARC conference is on 20th June 2019. A conference for Wikimedians, Wikimedia education leaders, educators and researchers engaged with Open Education and free knowledge movement.

The South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) is the regional union of nations in South Asia. Wikimedians belonging to these nations share several common challenges and many of them are emerging communities within the Wikimedia movement. The community members to attend the Wikimedia Education SAARC conference are involved in Indic language Wikimedia projects.

Wikimedia Education SAARC conference will be the first of its kind conference in SAARC countries which will engage Wikimedians, education program leaders, educators and researchers engaged with Open Education and free knowledge movement. We believe that the students of all ages should not only consume the knowledge available on the Internet but also be a part of the larger Open Internet movement, and help in creating open knowledge resources.

The event will be organised in and by the Christ (Deemed to be University) in Bengaluru from 20th June 2019 to 22nd June 2019. CIS-A2K team has been working with the department of languages in this university from 2013, where students of the university are contributing to multiple Wikimedia projects. Our education activity at this university has inspired us to plan this event. To know more about this university, Please see here.

This conference will allow us to understand the different efforts made by the SAARC communities involved in the Wikimedia Education movement. This will help us to create models, templates and documents that can be replicated in by other institutions or programs.

Conference Goals:

To know the Wikimedia Education activities happening in South Asia by different community members/Languages.
Sharing the knowledge and best practices of how to build "trust relationship" with new partners/teachers and how to improve trust in Wikimedia projects.
Challenges on student retention and how to engage them in the broader Wikimedia movement.
The best method to evaluate and measure the quality of the work done by the students.
To introduce tools like the dashboard, not in your language, and other tools which will be useful for the tracking, assessment, allocation of the topics and others.

The program structure for Wikimedia Education SAARC conference has been developed by keeping the general and specific challenges and opportunities in South Asia, and the submission selected from the participants.

Follow the hashtag #EduWikiSAARC19 for more updates.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/what-is-wikimedia-education-saarc-conference-1

MoU between PAH Solapur University & CIS-A2K

subodh — 2019-06-05T06:21:47Z

In 2019, the students completed assignments in the form of Wikipedia articles. Looking at the interest of students and knowledge creation process, other departments also expressed their willingness to adopt this methodology in academics. Vice Chancellor Dr. Mrunalini Fadnavis took initiative to conduct introductory meeting to discuss the larger collaboration with University courses. The department heads agreed on working in Wikipedia, Wikisource, Wikidata, Commons and other Wikimedia projects to enhance the skills of students. As a result, principle level MoU to accommodate Wiki programs in academics as policy for the next academic year was signed between University and Centre for Internet & Society (CIS-A2K) on 15th May at Solapur. On this occasion, Program Manager Tito Dutta was present to sign on behalf of CIS. From University, VC, Registrar, Prof. Ravindra Chincholkar- Coordinator and HoD's of 4 departments were present. The summary of MoU is given below:

Terms of Collaboration

To promote content generation in Wikimedia projects among the institutions under University affiliation. To organise awareness programs and training workshops to achieve this. For consistent and dedicated efforts, mechanism of subject experts and coordinators will be developed.
To integrate the academic assignments, projects etc. with knowledge building in Wikimedia projects e.g. Wikipedia, Wikisource, Wikidata, Wikimedia Commons.
To facilitate content donation in the form of published thesis, University publications to free library - Wikisource. To write well referenced articles based on these research work.
To develop platform in University for outreach programs on Digital knowledge, Language & technologies, FOSS, Unicode etc. To involve other stakeholders in knowledge business like publishers, writers, printers, designers in these programs.
To take lead in accommodating open knowledge concepts, locally relevant content generation practices while designing the courses.
To promote content generation in Wikimedia projects among the institutions under University affiliation. To organise awareness programs and training workshops to achieve this. For consistent and dedicated efforts, mechanism of subject experts and coordinators will be developed.
To integrate the academic assignments, projects etc. with knowledge building in Wikimedia projects e.g. Wikipedia, Wikisource, Wikidata, Wikimedia Commons.
To facilitate content donation in the form of published thesis, University publications to free library - Wikisource. To write well referenced articles based on these research work.
To develop platform in University for outreach programs on Digital knowledge, Language & technologies, FOSS, Unicode etc. To involve other stakeholders in knowledge business like publishers, writers, printers, designers in these programs.
To take lead in accommodating open knowledge concepts, locally relevant content generation practices while designing the courses.

Plan of Execution

A core team shall be constituted by representatives of this MoU for realization of the objectives of this MoU. This core team will be constituted by 10 June 2019.
The core team shall prepare an action plan with specific goals for achieving the objectives of MoU. They shall take into consideration the academic, commercial and legal aspects of this co-operation.
The proposed action plan shall be reviewed and approved by representatives of both parties.
The core team shall be supported and authorised to take all necessary actions to implement the action plan in an effective, speedy and dynamic manner.
Revenue sharing shall be decided on case to case basis by core team.

Media Coverage

The news of this event was published by major media houses:

Lok Mat (22 May 2019).
Pudhari (22 May 2019).
Sakal (22 May 2019).
Surajya (22 May 2019).

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/mou-between-pah-solapur-university-and-cis

Wikisource Workshop at Vigyan Ashram, Pabal

subodh — 2019-06-23T03:26:53Z

The Centre for Internet & Society's Access to Knowledge team (CIS-A2K) organized a workshop in collaboration with Vigyan Ashram, Pabal on May 25-26, 2019 at Pabal. Total 12 participants attended sessions during this two days workshop. The basic skills in digitisation, uploading on Commons and Wikisource process were imparted in the workshop. Jayanta Nath was the facilitator.

Active members of Wikisource at Vigyan Ashram have expressed their interest in learning advanced skills on VP. Previously, they have scanned & uploaded 50+ books on Commons, OCR'd 10,000+ pages and proofread few pages. This team wants to learn advanced skills in processing scanned books, metadata linking with Wikidata, Wikisource - proofreading & layout skills, tools etc. The institution has also planned to integrate proofreading activity with the Unicode/FOSS training courses, so that the students will be involved in next academic year. The primary objectives of the workshop were:

To impart :

Basic orientation to Wikisource
Understanding of Wikisource work flow
Skills required from scanning to OCR of book
skills for Proof-reading, transclusion methods

Agenda

Introduction to Wikisource - features, scope and future potential
Wikisource work flow - explanation of different stages
Upload tools and Copyrights
OCR4Wikisource and Indic OCR
Proofreading methods and Tools required
Wikisource tools, gadgets
Transclusion methods
Wikidata linkage

Day 1

Day one started with training on Scanning and post processing methods. The expert trainer explained various programmes to clean files & make the pdf of book. He also reviewed the previous work done at Vigyan Ashram and gave important suggestions. All the participants scanned 20 pages and processed them for practise. Then copyright issues and various licenses were discussed with some examples on Commons. The big size books were uploaded by chunkedupload tool. This will be useful in future as it reduces time and space also. After the uploading session, the basics of Wikisource project were explained by Jayanta Nath. He demonstrated proof-reading methods and the related tools, gadgets required. Some scripts for proof-reading are not imported in Marathi Wikisource. The need analysis was done to identify basic minimum templates and gadgets.

The participants learned to make their common.js pages to install the scripts. The hands-on activity was done by distributing the pages of one book for all the members. Day one started with training on Scanning and post processing methods. The expert trainer explained various programmes to clean files & make the pdf of book. He also reviewed the previous work done at Vigyan Ashram and gave important suggestions. All the participants scanned 20 pages and processed them for practise. Then copyright issues and various licenses were discussed with some examples on Commons.

The big size books were uploaded by chunkedupload tool. This will be useful in future as it reduces time and space also.After the uploading session, the basics of Wikisource project were explained by Jayanta Nath. He demonstrated proof-reading methods and the related tools, gadgets required. Some scripts for proof-reading are not imported in Marathi Wikisource. The need analysis was done to identify basic minimum templates and gadgets. The participants learned to make their common.js pages to install the scripts. The hands-on activity was done by distributing the pages of one book for all the members.

Day 2

On the second day, three active Wikimedians and one new member from Pune joined group at Vigyan Ashram. After the recap of first day activity, the review of status of Marathi Wikisource was taken. The practise session for proof-reading & layout of pages continued till lunch break. In the second half, final process of transclusion was explained in detail. The participants also learnt about the various methods for different forms of books. The final layout for reading the books on Wikisource and formats for downloading the books were also discussed.

In the last session, the future plan of Wikisource activity was discussed. The organisation has decided to involve all the trainees in this activity to enhance the skills as well as knowledge. The active community members have planned to spread the awareness about the Wikisource in the society for more content donation and increasing editor base.

Follow-up

Consistent activity for the new trainees is planned with trained team at the institute. Scanning of rare and re-licensed books from libraries is in progress. This activity will be scaled up in near future.

The blog post was originally published on Wikimedia Blog

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/subodh-kulkarni-may-26-2019-wikisource-workshop-at-vigyan-ashram

Youths come forward to augment Assamese Wikisource project

NE NOW NEWS — 2019-05-21T16:03:43Z

Assamese Wikisource is a sister-project of Assamese Wikipedia, where Assamese books with expired copyrights are available.

The blog post was published in NE NOW NEWS on May 17, 2019.

In order to take the Assamese Wikisource project forward, few young men and women of the state involving in different fields, recently gathered in Guwahati to attend a workshop.

Assamese Wikisource is a sister-project of Assamese Wikipedia, where Assamese books with expired copyrights are available. The project owned by Wikimedia Foundation was launched in 2013.

A total of 14 volunteers from across the state participated in the workshop hosted by Centre for Internet and Society-Access to knowledge (CIS-A2K) in a city hotel.

Two experts–Jayanta Nath from Kolkata and Tito Dutta from Bangalore–were present as trainers for the workshop, say organisers.

The two-day event was coordinated by Gitartha Bordoloi, a physician based in Silchar and the administrator of Assamese Wikipedia and Wikisource.

“Wikisource sources hosts books, plays, lyrics, letters etc which are available in open source,” says an organiser.

PDF or similar files are added to Wikisource which are then converted to unicode form so that every information becomes searchable on the internet.

In addition to books that are hitherto copyright free, new books can also be donated by authors and can be added to the field.

Everyone can access and contribute to this collaborative project. Presently, Assamese Wikisource stands at ninth position out of eleven Indic languages. This can be due to less Wikisource projects and also lack of contributors.

In addition to the basic navigation on Wikisource, the participants learnt searching and uploading public domain works, using OCR to get the texts, correcting errors and creating final product for the readers, he says.

As a part of the workshop, the participants fully digitised three old Assamese books within a few hours. They also discussed the future aims, perspectives and goals of Assamese Wikipedia and Wikisource.

As a result of their persistent efforts, works of Srimanta Sankardev and Madhabdev, Lakshminath Bezbaroa, Jyotiprasad Agarwala, Rajanikanta Bordoloi, Hiteshwar Barbarua and some others are now available on Assamese Wikisource.

With the target of digitizing the books by an author in every one or two months, the volunteers have mulled to digitize the works of Padmanath Gohain Baruah, a luminary of Assamese literature.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/news/northeast-now-may-17-2019-youths-come-forward-to-augment-assamese-wikisource-project

Ahmedabad Wikisource Workshop

Admin — 2019-05-13T01:38:31Z

Report of the Ahmedabad Wikisource workshop published in Vishwavihar.

Above: Report of the Ahmedabad Wikisource workshop published in Vishwavihar, a mouthpiece of Gujarat Vishwakosh Trust

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/news/vishwavihar-may-13-2019-ahmedabad-wikisource-workshop

Sunil Abraham - Key Listener Speech at Wikimedia Summit 2019

sunil — 2019-05-04T03:34:15Z

The Wikimedia Summit 2019 – formerly known as "Wikimedia Conference" or "Chapters Meeting" – took place on 29–31 March 2019 in Berlin. Sunil Abraham made a speech at the summit organized in Berlin.

Sunil answers a series of questions at the closing session of the Wikimedia Summit 2019:

What stands out?

Money. Creative Commons revenues are pegged at 2.4 million dollars. Mozilla Foundation gets 24 million dollars. Wikimedia Foundation gets 91 million dollars. So the job of pulling off the "Big Open" or the "creation of the meta movement" or "the movement of movements" is primarily the responsibility of the Wikimedia community given the scale of resources it is able to mobilize. For example, the Open Access movement has lost funding as its key donor Open Society Foundation after supporting the movement for 17 years is unable to support any further. The Wikipedia movement can easily save the global access movement by just allocating 1 million dollar for it.

What concerns me?

Homogenization. Homogenization of time frames, homogenization of process. Should we, for example, stagger the time period for online community consultation on the draft recommendations, so that there is less 'consultation fatigue' By homogenizing the processes at the Summit, it would be risking infantilizing the community. Would this meeting have been more exciting and useful, if Working Groups had the freedom to fork the process, and do what works for them.

What have I learned from my own journey and work?

Working with lawyers for the last 10 years, has led me to appreciate tests over principles. For example, in the open standards movement there is a constant question: is this particular standard an open standard? There, free software acts as the canary in the coal mine: If we cannot implement a standard using free software, then it is not an open standard. Working with lawyers for the last 10 years, has led me to appreciate tests over principles. For example, in the open standards movement there is a constant question: is this particular standard an open standard?There, free software acts as the canary in the coal mine: If we cannot implement a standard using free software, then it is not an open standard.

What have you learned that could be useful for the strategy process?

From the process architect I have learned that we shouldn't focus on solving /this/ particular instance of the problem, we should focus on working on developing processes that solve these problems in the future. So, the emphasis is on process fixes. This is really the bleeding edge of regulatory theory these days. Since we are in Germany, I must mention the name of the German academic Gunther Teubner who developed this concept of reflexive regulation 26 years ago in his article 'Substantive and Reflexive Elements in Modern Law.

What would you suggest to improve the strategy process?

The core of responsive regulation is community consultation processes. However, closing the loop on the consultation process is critical, otherwise participants feel that they have wasted time providing feedback. For example, the Indian telecom regulator first issues a consultation paper. Then solicits the first round of feedback, then solicits a second round of counter comments then they hold round tables, and, finally, they issue the recommendation or the regulation. But when they do that, they make sure they close the loop.They provide reasoned explanations for why suggestions were rejected. This might have to happen at both stages for this strategy development process. The working groups will have to say why they rejected certain pieces of feedback, and also the board will have to explain why they rejected certain recommendations from the working groups.

What would be your wish for this movement?

As we enter adulthood as a movement, it is important that we do not lose our youthful idealism. Idealism at two levels: ambition and vocabulary. Global civil society is broadly divided into two groups. Those who work on tractable problems, like getting rid of polio. And those who work on intractable problems, like saving and developing democracy. When monitoring and evaluation becomes a primary management lens for our movement, it shouldn't make us more and more risk-averse. Let us not focus on the easy problems let us always focus, as a movement, on the hard problems. When it comes to vocabulary, I am not totally sure that phrases like 'product experience', 'target markets', and 'Knowledge as a Service' is the vocabulary of the movement. Maybe, we need to think of two types of vocabulary, External facing vocabulary and internal facing vocabulary.

Watch the Video

Video, via Wikimedia Commons, source: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Wikimedia_Summit_2019_-_Key_listener_Sunil_Abraham.webm.
Author, Anna Rees (WMDE): Uploader: Cornelius Kibelka (WMDE), This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/openness/sunil-abraham-key-listener-speech-at-wikimedia-summit-2019

Wikipedia assignments workshop for Post Graduate students in PAH Solapur University

subodh — 2019-06-22T03:21:39Z

On May 3, 2019, Centre for Internet & Society's Access to Knowledge team (CIS-A2K) along with PAH Solapur University conducted a Wikipedia workshop for students from the post-graduate stream in PAH Solapur University. Ten students from Mass Communication department and three faculty members participated in the workshop. Prof. Ravindra Chincholkar and Subodh Kulkarni were the facilitators for the workshop.

CIS-A2K is working in collaboration with PAH Solapur University, Solapur in Maharashtra on Wikimedia projects. The Mass Communication and Journalism departments are involved in content generation on Marathi Wikipedia & Commons for the last two years. In 2019, the department has given assignment in the form of Wikipedia articles for Post graduate course. The primary objectives of the workshop were:

To review the articles by students. The articles are given as assignment by Mass Communication department.
IPWT sessions for potential students for quality improvement and retention

The Mass Communication department has involved students in Marathi Day and Independence Struggle edit-a-thons conducted by Marathi Wiki community. After this experience of Wikimedia projects, the faculty decided to give assignments on the theme - Newspapers & notable editors in pre-independence era. The students explored offline & online references for the content. They first prepared the articles in Word document, which were verified by faculty and A2K representative. The manual of style, using citoid for references and Wikipedia pillars were explained. After the verification of content, the articles were uploaded on Marathi Wikipedia. About 40 articles were created by 10 students and two faculty members. As the stories of editors and journalists in the British period were full of sacrifice & adventure, the students got inspiration also. The faculty reviewed the assignment completion process with the stakeholders in the last session. The department has decided to plan the process more systematically in the next academic year. It has also decided to replicate this methodology for other departments in the university.

This was originally published on Wikimedia Blog

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/subodh-kulkarni-may-3-2019-wikipedia-assignments-workshop-for-pg-students-pah-solapur-university

CIS-A2K proposal to Wikimedia Foundation for 2019-2020

Ananth — 2019-04-15T08:05:23Z

The Centre for Internet & Society's Access to Knowledge team (CIS-A2K) has submitted its proposal form for the year 2019 - 2020 to the Wikimedia Foundation. CIS thanks all community members who gave valuable suggestions and inputs for drafting this proposal.

Grants:APG/Proposals/2018-2019 round 2/The Centre for Internet and Society/Proposal form

The Centre for Internet and Society (CIS) is a non-profit organisation registered in India that works in different areas such as accessibility, openness, internet governance, telecom, research, etc. The organisation's official website may be seen at cis-india.org. Annual reports of the Centre for Internet and Society may be seen here.

The Access to Knowledge (A2K) program of CIS^[2] is dedicated to supporting and serving Indian Wikimedia projects and the communities. In the last few years, CIS-A2K has worked towards creating sustainable programs and building community capacity. The primary objectives of CIS-A2K are:

Supporting and serving the Indian Wikimedia communities in all possible ways.
Building institutional partnerships.

Bringing more content under free license
Designing and executing projects with community participation.
Strengthening the Wikimedia volunteers.
Fostering and enabling an appropriate legal and technological ecosystem.

In 2018–2019 CIS-A2K worked with Kannada, Marathi, Odia, and Telugu communities as Focused Language Area, and Punjabi Wikisource as a Focused Project Area. Some of the major events conducted by CIS-A2K in last 1 year were:

Train the Trainer
MediaWiki Training
Advanced Wikidata Training
Wikisource workshop (Patiala, Ahmedabad, Bangalore)
Wikigraphists Bootcamp
TWLCon
Women's TTT
Wiki Women for Women Wellbeing (WWWW)

CIS-A2K is also working with like-minded organisations and institutions such as Christ University, Bangalore, Maharashtra Knowledge Corporation, Vigyan Ashram, Punyashlok Ahilyadevi Holkar Solapur University, Odisha state government etc to improve content on different Wikimedia projects and to bring more content to the projects.

Proposal overview

1. Please provide a brief description of your organisation's work in the upcoming funding period.
The Centre for Internet and Society – Access to Knowledge is submitting the work-plan for the period 1 July 2019 to 30 June 2020. Our plans and programs may be divided into the following verticals:

in Content Enrichment, we are proposing activities like edit-a-thons, Wikisource proofread and validation campaign, Wikidata label-a-thons and data-thons, photowalks etc. We'll also work with like-minded institutions and organisations to conduct thematic edit-a-thons or similar activities that will help to improve content on different Indic Wikimedia projects;
in Skill Development Initiatives, we are proposing to conduct activities like Zonal Wiki workshops, MediaWiki Training, and Wikidata workshop etc. We will also conduct zonal and regional workshops on different Wikimedia projects.
in Partnership, we will continue our work with the existing partners, and we'll build new partneships. We are proposing activities like outreach, awareness sessions, and workshops for content donation, increasing awareness about the Wiki movement and bridging gender gap;
in Leadership, we are proposing activities like Train-the-Trainer, Wikisource Conference, Wikimedia Summit India, Intensive Personal Wiki Training, supporting Indic Wikimedians through request page etc.

In this work-plan year, CIS-A2K will continue its transition from Focused Language Area (FLA) to Focused Project Area (FPA).

Focused Language Area: Focused Language Area is an approach of CIS-A2K, where we work with a community with all its projects and activities. In other words, CIS-A2K supports all wiki-activities of a particular language community. So far Kannada, Konkani, Odia, Marathi, Tulu, Telugu have been our FLAs.
Focused Project Area: Focused Project Area or FPA is an approach of CIS-A2K introduced in 2018–2019 work-plan where CIS-A2K mainly focuses on projects. In 2018–2019 CIS-A2K collaborated with Punjabi Wikimedians, and our focused projects for Punjabi Wikimedians were Punjabi mostly Wikisource and Institutional Partnership. In the same year, we increased our support towards Wikisource communities in India, appointed a Wikisource project advisor, and conducted and supported several Wikisource project events. In November 2018, we conducted a national-level Wikisource consultation.

We'll plan programs and activities accordingly keeping (Wikipedia) and Wikisource and Wikidata in mind. We will focus on these two projects as based on our interaction with Indian Wikimedia community members, we have found several Indic Wikimedia communities want further support and focus on these projects. CIS-A2K earlier put some effort to support these projects, and this work-plan year we will put more effort.

CIS-A2K will continue working towards creating an inclusive Wiki atmosphere in the Indian subcontinent. With an emphasis on creating safe spaces, promoting gender gap bridging activities A2K team would like to work with all the Indian communities, projects and individuals with interesting ideas and for the overall development of Wikimedia movement. Bridging gender gap will remain as a primary focus of CIS-A2K. We'll try to ensure at least 25% of female participants in all the events conducted by CIS-A2K. We'll conduct a quarterly audit, and present the report in our newsletters.

Read the full proposal on Wikipedia page

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/ananth-subray-april-15-2019-cis-a2k-proposal-to-wikimedia-foundation-for-2019-2020

Wikimedia projects orientation session at Tata Trust's Vikas Anvesh Foundation

subodh — 2019-04-09T00:56:25Z

Researchers in development sector produce a pool of training material and case studies. However, these do not trickle down to the society and many in the public domain are unaware of the same.

Largely the research is restricted to non-profit organizations or their funding agencies during the project period. If the research carried out in development sector is re-licensed and then linked to Wikipedia articles as references we could see a larger section of the society gaining access to such information. The twin advantages of posting such content is that the information will be searchable online through search engines and the Wikipedia page with numerous hyperlinks leading to different sources will act as a reference resource. Larger sections in the public domain will have access to information which would perhaps be hard to gain access to.

Pictured above: Meeting at Vikas Anvesh Foundation office to discuss the possibility of disseminating the research work done, through Wikipedia. Subodh Kulkarni was the resource person for the meeting. [Picture by Sdeora14 licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license].

Orientation Session

Keeping this in view an orientation session was conducted by Centre for Internet & Society’s Access to Knowledge wing (CIS-A2K) at Tata Trust’s Vikas Anvesh Foundation (VAF) in Pune. CIS-A2K and VAF joined hands to explore possibilities of content enrichment in Wikimedia projects. Dr. Ajit Kanitkar and Subodh Kulkarni were the facilitators for the session attended by eight participants.

Report

The researchers at VAF presented their publications in the form of study reports, papers in journals and conferences and datasets. Advisor Ajit Kanitkar presented story of 'Gems of Purest Ray Serene', a book about the life stories of twenty-two outstanding Indian social workers. The content of the book is uploaded on VAF's website socialworkindia.in which is freely downloadable. The book is published in Marathi and Hindi language also.

After the presentations from VAF, CIS-A2K facilitator presented different Wikimedia projects.In the discussions, it was realised that Wikipedia articles related to social issues and development sector lack reliable references. The research work on VAF website can be linked as references. The publications could be uploaded on Wikisource for wider reach. The images and videos during the work can also be uploaded on Commons.

Follow-up

VAF will discuss the process of content donation with management and decide on the further steps. The training regarding Wikipedia editing and Commons uploads would be planned.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/subodh-kulkarni-april-9-2019-wikimedia-projects-session-at-tata-trust-vikas-anvesh-foundation

Centre for Internet and Society

Call for joining the Free Knowledge movement #Wikipedia #Wikimedia

See also

The Knowledge Base is Liberated

Re-licensing Sessions with Authors and Organisations

Wikimedia Workshop on Rivers under Project Jalbodh

Background

Objectives

Facilitators

Event Details

Day 1

Day 2

Orientation programme, Wikipedia workshop & Action Plan meeting in PAH Solapur University

Collaborative open knowledge creation by PAHSUS and CIS-A2K

Orientation Programme

Wikipedia Workshop

Media Coverage

Wikimedia Education SAARC Conference 2019

Day 1, 20 June 2019

Day 2, 21 June 2019

Day 3, 22 June 2019

What is Wikimedia Education SAARC Conference?

MoU between PAH Solapur University & CIS-A2K

Terms of Collaboration

Plan of Execution

Media Coverage

Wikisource Workshop at Vigyan Ashram, Pabal

Agenda

Day 1

Day 2

Follow-up

Youths come forward to augment Assamese Wikisource project

Ahmedabad Wikisource Workshop

Sunil Abraham - Key Listener Speech at Wikimedia Summit 2019

What stands out?

What concerns me?

What have I learned from my own journey and work?

What have you learned that could be useful for the strategy process?

What would you suggest to improve the strategy process?

What would be your wish for this movement?

Watch the Video

Wikipedia assignments workshop for Post Graduate students in PAH Solapur University

CIS-A2K proposal to Wikimedia Foundation for 2019-2020

Grants:APG/Proposals/2018-2019 round 2/The Centre for Internet and Society/Proposal form

Proposal overview

Wikimedia projects orientation session at Tata Trust's Vikas Anvesh Foundation

Orientation Session

Report

Follow-up