Centre for Internet and Society

8 Challenges for Improving Indian Language Wikipedias

subha — 2016-03-29T17:05:15Z

After more than 10 years in existence, the Indian-language Wikipedias still are not known to many Indian language speakers. Wikipedia became the largest encyclopedia in history as a result of thousands of volunteer editors.

The article was originally published in the Wire on March 17, 2016 and later mirrored on Opensource.com on March 28, 2016.

Whereas native-language Wikipedias are becoming game changers in other corners of the world, the scenario in India is skewed. While speaking at the "BHASHA: Indian Languages Digital Festival," a day-long discourse at New Delhi on Indian languages and their state in the new media (especially on the digital platforms), I shared challenges that Indian language Wikipedias are facing.

1. Language communities

Many native Indian language speakers do not know how to search online using language typed in their script. Because Google's home page does not display their language script as an option, people often think that their language does not exist on the Internet. Google now has nine Indian languages. But this does not stop a Santali or Manipuri speaker from searching in Unicode Ol chiki (script for Santali) or in Unicode Meithei (script for Manipuri). Google and other search engines will display content in any script on the Internet, but not knowing this keeps many people off the Internet, which also means off of Wikipedia.

2. Wikipedia's editor community

Wikipedia is created by people like you and me. From writing to editing, everything happens voluntarily. Many people do not understand that they can correct mistakes and help improve Wikipedia articles. The Wikipedia editor communities for several Indian languages are really small. Although these languages are spoken by millions of people, only a handful of editors contribute in editing the Wikipedia in these languages. As of January 2016, the Hindi Wikipedia had only 89 editors, whereas Hindi falls right behind English on the list of top languages by number of native speakers.

3. Language input in computer

A majority of people in India do not know how to type in their own language. Also, there is little documentation for users to learn about language input. Even though many government-run schools in India are seeing more computers and have Internet access, native language input and several other basic computer training are not widely taught in schools in all states. Free software for language input is available, and the challenges of typing in Indian languages (PDF) that existed in the past are mostly resolved.

4. Language input in mobile devices

With more than 1 billion people in India (PDF) with mobile phones, the 15% Internet penetration rate will soon grow at a faster pace. This growth and tough competition is compelling telecom service providers to drop data charges, which will help more Indians get access to the Internet. If these people are not educated about native language input, then they will be stuck inside an English-centric Internet rather than being able to navigate in their own languages. Many Indians who have smartphones need full Indian language support—and especially built-in input methods—to contribute in their own language Wikipedia.

5. Low availability of Indian-language content on the Internet

Lack of native language content on the Internet is a barrier to accessing knowledge. For example, let's look at my state Odisha. The Kerala (Indian state) government's official tourism portal is available in Odia and other Indian languages, but the Odisha government's tourism portal has no information in the Odia language today. Our languages are largely neglected in our own states.

6. Mismatch of conventional and new media

Many conventional media houses still use non-standard variants of ASCII/ISCII script encoding systems instead of adopting the Unicode standard. As a global standard, Unicode can help unify the world and has been available for Indian languages for almost 25 years. But many of our print media have failed to adopt this, and many popular Indian-language newspapers still aren't available in Unicode.

7. Lack of open access

Much information online, including content created by the government, is under copyright licensing. The pay-wall gardens and copyright restrictions keep information closed and prevents people from sharing content. Wikipedia content, on the other hand, is available under Creative Commons Share-Alike licensing, which allows anyone to use the content (and even distribute commercial copies of it). The idea of opening up content under free licenses can help information reach countless additional people.

8. Accessibility

India has more than 60-million people with hearing impairments. Many people with physical disabilities need good text-to-speech and speech-to-text engines. And these software solutions must be free, so that anyone, regardless of their finances, can contribute to Wikipedia in their own languages.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/open-source-march-28-2016-subhashish-panigrahi-8-challenges-for-improving-indian-language-wikipedias

3 Copyright Tips for Students and Educators

subha — 2016-10-07T00:42:06Z

Copyright is a really complicated topic, and when it comes to online use of creative works, accidentally crossing the line between fair use and a copyright violation is easy. How do you know what is copyrighted? Recently Frederico Morando (Creative Commons, Italy) and I presented a training session on understanding copyright policies at Wikimania 2016, which was originally proposed by Wikipedian User:Jim Carter. We covered topics such as fundamentals of copyright, exclusive rights, Berne convention, copyleft, Creative Commons licenses, Public Domain, fair use, and copyfraud.

The blog post was published by Opensource.com on August 16, 2016. This got mentioned in Wikipedia's newsletter "The Signpost". This was mirrored by Wiki Edu on October 5, 2016. The post republished can be read here.

In this article, I'll look at three copyright tips to keep in mind when you're thinking about using content—even for academic purposes— you find online.

1. Most of what you find on the Internet is copyrighted.

Except content that clearly indicates the work is released under a free license, or that the copyright has lapsed and the work is in the Public Domain, you can assume content is not freely/liberally licensed. A few popular free and open licenses include GNU General Public License (GPL), BSD licenses, Apache License, Mozilla Public License, and SIL Open Font License. If a work mentions the license, usually the license is explained or links to terms for using the work. Spending a little time to find out what license the work is under beats spending time and money on a copyright infringement case later.

2. Fair use can be your friend, but not always.

Fair use means you might be permitted to make limited use of a copyrighted work without prior permission from the copyright holder. The fair use policy varies from country to country. As explained in the Stanford University Libraries site, commentary/quotes and criticism, and parody are cases that often fall under fair use.

Wikipedia article images related to recent music albums, movies, and even people who are deceased are used under fair use policy. Click on a recent movie poster appearing in a Wikipedia article and check the copyright section for an example explanation of why the use on Wikipedia qualifies as fair use.

^{Example Wikipedia explanation for fair use of an image.}

Fair use also gives some freedom to scholars to use copyrighted work for academic research. To be in a safe side if you are not sure your use falls under "fair use," reach out to the copyright holder and get formal permission before using their work.

3. search.creativecommons.org helps streamline Creative Commons content searches.

Where do you go to search for images, illustrations, and other content with Creative Commons licensing? Most images turned up using a search engine are copyrighted and not licensed liberally, for example. A better way to search is using search.creativecommons.org.

You can choose Creative Commons-licensed content from several sites, such as Flickr, Google Images, Wikimedia Commons, and Europeana. You can also specify whether you want to use the content for commercial purposes, or to modify, adapt, and build upon work.

^{Image credit likeaduck. CC BY 2.0}

Note that you still will need to check which Creative Commons license the content uses. As explained in an article by Richard Fontana:

The Creative Commons suite includes licenses that implement various policies. Some, like CC BY and CC BY-SA, are normatively consistent with corresponding permissive and copyleft families of free software licenses. Others, however, particularly its “NC” (no commercial use) and “ND” (no derivative works) licenses, are in conflict with basic principles of free software and free culture. I am not alone in lamenting the application of the Creative Commons umbrella brand to cover licenses with such disparate qualities. One consequence has been a general confusing dilution of the meaning of “openness” in the context of cultural works. A more specific problem is the evidence of confusion on the part of content authors interested in applying Creative Commons licenses to their works, and resulting confusion by those interested in making use of such works. Too often a work is labeled as being licensed under “a Creative Commons license”, without specifying accurately, or specifying at all, which free or nonfree policy the author sought to apply.

If you still cannot find content—images, for example—with free licenses, but you find copyrighted content that fits your academic need, you can reach out to the content creator or copyright holder for permission. Often copyright holders allow usage of their work for non-commercial purposes, such as academic research and publication.

Do you have other sources you recommend for finding Creative Commons or Public Domain content? Let us know about your favorite resources in the comments.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/3-copyright-tips-for-students-and-educators

2nd Odia Wikipedia Edit-a-thon

praskrishna — 2013-04-01T10:17:22Z

The event is being organized today, April 1, 2013 online by the Odia Wikipedia Community, from 10.00 a.m. to 7.00 p.m. The Centre for Internet and Society is supporting this event.

Click to read about the event on Facebook

"ଓଡ଼ିଶା ଦିବସ - ୨୦୧୩" ଉପଲକ୍ଷେ ଓଡ଼ିଆ ଉଇକିପିଡ଼ିଆରେ ମିଳିତ ଗଣ-ସମ୍ପାଦନା ତଥା ଉଇକିପିଡ଼ିଆ ସହ "ଅନଲାଇନ ଓଡ଼ିଶା ଦିବସ ପାଳନ" . ଏହି ଦିନ ଆମେ କଣ କରିବୁ: ସକାଳ ୧୦ ଘଟିକାରୁ ନେଇ ସନ୍ଧ୍ୟା ୭ ଘଟିକା ଭିତରେ ଆମେମାନେ ନିଜ ନିଜର ଗାଁ, ପଞ୍ଚାୟତ, ସ‌ହର ଉପରେ ଓଡ଼ିଆ ଉଇକିପିଡ଼ିଆରେ ପ୍ରସଙ୍ଗମାନ ତିଆରି କରିବୁ । କେମିତି ତିଆରିକରିବେ ପ୍ରସଙ୍ଗ:

୧. http://or.wikipedia.org/s/ 8b -> ଏହି ଲିଙ୍କଙ୍କୁ ଯାଇ ଉପରେ ଥିବେ "Type in Odia" କୁ ଯାଇ "Enable (Ctrl-M)" ରେ କ୍ଲିକ କରନ୍ତୁ । ଖୋଜିବା ପାଇଁ ଥିବା ଘରେ ନିଜ ଗାଁର ନାମ ଟାଇପ କରନ୍ତୂ ।

This ia a mass article writing event or Edit-a-thon on the occasion of "Odisha Dibasa -2013". We are inviting you to join and take part in creating articles about your villages, Grama Pachayata, Block on Odia Wikipedia.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/news/odia-wikipedia-editathon

'Trolled' from US Congress, Wikipedia bans edits

praskrishna — 2014-07-28T10:22:53Z

Online encyclopaedia Wikipedia has issued a ten-day ban against an anonymous editor of its website located on the premises of the U.S. Congress, after the latter engaged in “disruptive editing,” on a wide range of subjects, from moon-landing conspiracy theories linked to Cuba to naming former U.S. Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld as an alien wizard.

The article by Narayan Lakshman was published in the Hindu on July 25, 2014. Pranesh Prakash gave his inputs.

Many of the seemingly humorous edits were tracked by a Twitter ‘bot’ with the handle @CongressEdits, which is driven by a code to automatically monitor Wikipedia for changes to the site made by accounts with a Congressional IP addresses.

Per the Wikipedia ban, only persons editing the site anonymously are barred from making changes, while Congressional staffers who have created named accounts to log into Wikipedia could continue making edits.

Yet some reports noted that the changes “have become almost troll-like,” alluding for example to an edit on the assassination of John F. Kennedy, which changed the text to say that alleged assassin Lee Harvey Oswald was acting “on behalf of the regime of Fidel Castro.”

Another entry revised the biography of Mr. Rumsfeld to describe him as an “alien lizard who eats Mexican babies,” and yet another change suggested that moon-landing conspiracy theories were “promoted by the Cuban government.”

Pranesh Prakash, Policy Director at the Centre for Internet and Society, said to The Hindu via Twitter that Wikipedia’s ban affected up to 9000 people, while only a few pranksters seem to be indulging in vandalism.

“Ironically, it is the public nature of @CongressEdits has led to this increase in attention-seeking vandalism,” he said, adding that such bans, if there are more to come, could “effectively kill projects like @CongressEdits.”

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/news/the-hindu-narayan-lakshman-july-25-2014-trolled-from-us-congress-wikipedia-bans-edits

'Help Konkani Wikipedia come out of incubation'

praskrishna — 2013-09-17T10:10:38Z

The functioning of the free online encyclopedia, ‘Wikipedia,’ is like a true democracy. It is for the people and by the people, said The Centre for Internet and Society Programme Officer (Indian Languages) Pavanaja U B.

The article was published in the Deccan Herald on September 13, 2013. Dr. U.B.Pavanaja was quoted.

He was speaking after inaugurating, "Wikipedia Editing Workshop," organised by Aloysius Institute of Management and Information Technology (AIMIT) in association with The Centre for Internet and Society in Mangalore on Friday.

Stressing on the need for more Wikipedia contributors and editors from India, he explained to students the simplicity of creating a account in Wikipedia and editing articles.

Wikipedia has 50 crore unique visitors and three crore are from India. There are 6,000 editors registered from India, of which, around 2000 people edit in Indian vernacular languages, and only 450 are very active, he said.

There are around 98,000 odd articles in Hindi, 14,600 odd articles in Kannada. However, Konkani Wikipedia is in incubation for the last seven years, as there are only 133 articles and very few registered editors. “To get it out of incubation, many should write Konkani articles for Wikipedia,” he said and added that out of 133 Konkani articles in Wikipedia, over 100 are in Devnagari script, 31 in Roman and just two in Kannada script and none in Malayalam.

Pavanaja added that being a contributor and editor of Wikipedia, will be a positive add on to ones resume. "Today's IT companies need logical thinkers and problem solvers. Writing for Wikipedia, enables one to think and research, hence benefiting one’s personally," he said.

He also regretted that some people try to vandalise Wikipedia, with disruptive editing and deleting articles. Though, this will be corrected by other Wikipedia users instantly, it wastes precious time. Everyone benefits from Wikipedia, hence the contributor should have a positive outlook with regard to helping people and sharing knowledge, he said

He further added, that maintaining a neutral point of view, giving significant coverage and writing on notable topics is important. One should give opposing views and no personal views should be reflected, he added.

St Aloysius College Rector Fr Denzil Lobo said that the present generation is lucky to have knowledge at their finger tips, and they should make the best use of it.

AIMIT Director Rev Fr Pradeep Sequeira, Wikpedia Volunteer Harriet Vidhyasagar among others were present.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/news/deccan-herald-september-13-2013-help-konkani-wikipedia-come-out-of-incubation

'महाराष्ट्र ग्रंथोत्तेजक' होणार लोकाभिमुख, महाराष्ट्र टाईम्स

praskrishna — 2015-12-15T07:55:38Z

Coverage of Marathi Wikipedia in Maharashtra Times.

Scanned version of the media coverage below:

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/openness/news/92e93993e93093e93794d91f94d930-91794d93090292594b92494d92494791c915-93994b92393e930-93294b91593e92d93f92e941916-92e93993e93093e93794d91f94d930-91f93e90892e94d938

"Sau Dhuni Teen" project: Wikipedia workshop in TISS, Mumbai

Abhinav Garule — 2016-06-18T18:08:13Z

A two-day multilingual Wikipedia workshop was organised at the Women's Studies Department of Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS), Mumbai during the 22nd through the 24th August. This was one of the outreach events under the scope of the "Sau Dhuni Teen" project that aims at bringing digital content on 100 notable persons, 100 key books, and 100 key concepts relating to women's studies, gender studies, and more broadly, interdisciplinary social sciences, between January 2015 and March 2016.

This event being a women-only event has participation from both students and faculty. 18 participants signed up for the event where 14 of them turned up for the first day and 10 on the second day. As they were introduced to Wikipedia editing for the first time, none has prior Wikipedia editing or even typing (in their own languages) experience. They were oriented with Wikipedia editing where we showed the “How to edit Hindi Wikipedia” video tutorials. Six new articles were created during the event where three articles were edited and enhanced. Helping out one new editor to type out in Assamese script was slightly tough. The future plans to engage with these participants was discussed and we have planned to meet once or twice in a quarter for an edit-a-thon. The event was organised in collaboration with Centre for Indian Languages in Higher Education (CILHE).

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/openness/blog-old/sau-dhuni-teen-project-wikipedia-workshop-in-tiss-mumbai

"Sau Dhuni Teen" project: Wikipedia workshop in TISS, Mumbai

garule — 2016-03-16T11:31:36Z

A two-day multilingual Wikipedia workshop is being planned to be organised at the Women's Studies Department of Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai during the 22nd through the 24th August. Under the scope of the "Sau Dhuni Teen" project, student and faculty volunteers of TISS will contribute in creating/editing Wikipedia articles in about notable people, books and concepts relating to women's studies, gender studies, and more broadly, interdisciplinary social sciences. The event is being organised in collaboration with Centre for Indian Languages in Higher Education (CILHE).

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/openness/events/sau-dhuni-teen-project-wikipedia-workshop-in-tiss-mumbai

"Free-license Wings To Your Books" in Guntur

Pavan Santhosh — 2017-04-16T10:53:51Z

"Free-license Wings To Your Books" event held at Annamayya Library, Guntur

The "Free-license Wings To Your Books" ("Pustakaniki Rekkalu Swecha Nakalu Hakkulu" in Telugu) event, an event aimed to bring more books and content onto Telugu Wikisource was conducted by CIS-A2K with support from Annamayya Library, Guntur on 5 February, 2017. The event was primarily intended to raise awareness about free-licensing among Telugu writers and involve them in content donation on Telugu Wikisource. Telugu Wikipedia community member, User:Nrgullapalli commented on the aptness of the event saying, "this is the right event in present situation."

As part of the event, Writer Bhusurapalli Venkateswarlu, who had previously released his book into CC-BY-SA license and writer Peddi Sambashivarao, who supported content donation drive by encouraging fellow writers, were felicitated. The first ever Telugu book released in print directly under CC-BY-SA license - Kodihalli Murali Mohan's "Andhra Sahityamulo Biruda Namamulu" was launched at the event. CIS-A2K Community Advocate Pavan Santhosh conducted a session on the importance of free-licenses as a better alternative in current Telugu publications. The writers engaged in a discussion on the same topic. However, the event lacked female participation.

The link to event page on meta can be found here.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/free-license-wings-to-your-books-in-guntur

"Free-license Wings To Your Books" in Vijayawada

Pavan Santhosh — 2017-04-16T10:38:22Z

"Free-license Wings To Your Books" event held at Andhra Loyola College, Vijayawada

Over the course of the last one year, CIS-A2K, with the help of Telugu Wikipedia community members, has been regularly conducting re-licensing events, scan-a-thons and digitization activities in and around Guntur and Vijayawada in Andhra Pradesh in order to raise awareness about free licensing books and content. Notable among these are the series of digitization and proofreading sprints conducted at Andhra Loyola College. The "Free-license Wings To Your Books" held on 8 February, 2017 was a culmination of these series of events in Vijayawada.

This event aimed to raise awareness about free-licensing in Andhra Loyola College, Vijayawada. The awareness session was followed by community felicitations to writers Kanuri Badarinadh, Fr. Poodota Jojayya and Fr. Job Sudarsan who have released some their content into CC-BY-SA. Fr. Job Sudarsan announced at the event that all his works shall be re-licensed into CC-BY-SA. Later, certificates were distributed to student Wikipedians who contributed to the digitization of 3,500 pages in Wikisource by participating in the digitization sprint that took place at the event. Notable attendees at the event were Mandali Buddha Prasad, Deputy Speaker of Andhra Pradesh, Samala Ramesh Babu, Editor, Nadustunna Charitra and Fr. G.A.P. Kishore, Principal, Andhra Loyola.

The link to event page on meta can be found here.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/free-license-wings-to-your-books-in-vijayawada