Support Wikimedia Foundation

In 2015, Wikimedia Mexico presented the Editatona project. This initiative to reduce the gender gap in Wikimedia projects was created by Carmen Alcázar and it’s been replicated over 100 times, as of 2022, in diverse environments both locally and abroad.

Editatona is a feminist version of the edit-a-thons. In Mexico, it’s a separate space where women write about women on Wikipedia. Because of this project, they realized that another twin space was needed, to deepen the conversation about the subjects and questions that arise from the Editatonas. Furthermore, this space is needed to intensively develop skills for women who wish to access the free knowledge domain.

To do this, we colaborated with the Instituto Municipal de Mujeres Regias (Municipal Institute of Regian Women) and the LABNL, organizations from Monterrey and northern Mexico charged with the task of managing the first version of the School of Wikimedia Women, a course that consisted of six two-hour sessions per week, where subjects such as encyclopedic relevance, trusted sources, inclusive language, Wikimedia Commons, Wikidata, article deletion, or how to write and edit a Wikipedia article, among others, were covered. 

This course began on November 3rd and concluded on December 8th, in hybrid modality. Part of the staff of WMMX, as well as guest specialists, facilitated the themes for 20 women who attended the sessions regularly. This produced the conditions to open dialogue and debate about shared information.

As a closing activity, an in-person Editatona was hosted by the LABNL so the participants could apply what they learned at the School of Women, also to get to know one another in person, and strengthen the network of women volunteers in Mexico.

This first version was conceived as a prototype, so that we may develop a new version in 2023 with women from a different city, and make the necessary adjustments to improve on this project, in order to convince more women to approach and compromise with Wikimedia projects.

You may look at more pictures here.

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The Wikimedia movement’s commitment to provide reliable, verifiable information to the world becomes even more critical in times of crisis. The ongoing invasion of Ukraine has already caused unimaginable pain and suffering and impacted millions. Yet in times of upheaval, from pandemics to political turmoil to natural disasters, Wikimedians come together in the service of our collective mission. People are coming to the Wikimedia projects to learn facts, and Wikimedians around the world are collaborating to share their knowledge.

In addition to the work being done on the Wikimedia projects to document this crisis in 100 languages, people across the movement are hard at work to support the affected communities. In the most wiki way, we are starting a page to coordinate efforts on Meta-Wiki – and your help is needed. Anyone in the movement is encouraged to list their Wikimedia activities related to this crisis or ideas they have to help, so that we can collaborate and support each other where needed.

The Wikimedia Foundation stands in solidarity with the communities–those directly affected in Ukraine and all others who work to protect access to free knowledge. We are also reviewing the potential impacts that this crisis and the corresponding threats of censorship being made by the Russian government could have on the entire movement. We remain committed to sharing information as quickly as we are able, and we look forward to hearing from others across the movement.

RightsCon ’19 conference stage in Tunis, Tunisia. Image by Brahim Guedich, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

The Wikimedia Foundation is proud this year to support RightsCon for the second time. This global summit, hosted by AccessNow, brings together people from around the world to discuss human rights in the digital age. This year our financial support of the conference as well as our presence at it are both unique. 

The Foundation has contributed funds to RightsCon’s accessibility initiatives and Connectivity Fund. This assistance is closely tied to our movement’s vision of a world in which all people can freely participate in the sum of all knowledge. By providing support to make the conference accessible in more languages, across more devices, and via additional internet connectivity, we help welcome the knowledge and communities that have been excluded by historical structures of power and privilege. Early numbers released by the RightsCon organizers indicate the fund is likely successful in prompting knowledge equity: out of a total of 717 individual applications, 98% came from the Global South, 54% were from women or non-binary people, and 86% featured first-time applicants. 

To make Wikimedia more visible at the event, this year our Global Advocacy and Public Policy team called upon Wikimedians from around the world to partner with us in order to submit proposals for sessions and conversations that we could host and hold together. Not only does the Wikimedia community have unique perspectives and expertise, but editors and other volunteers are also our strongest allies in advocating for laws, policies, and norms that promote and protect free knowledge and Wikimedia projects. RightsCon ’22 will feature ten sessions where Wikipedians are hosts and/or participants, five of which were co-created with our team. Members of our movement will be championing Wikimedia approaches on emerging challenges to a free and open internet, including privacy and surveillance, internet access, inclusion, and internet shutdowns and disruptions.

Below is an overview of the sessions with Wikimedia participation. Foundation staff or Wikimedia volunteers who are interested in attending RightsCon can register for free until 3 June 2022. We hope to see you there!

Format: Tech Demo

Presenter: Amir Sarabadani (Wikimedian)

Details: This tech demo covers two tools that members of Persian Wikipedia developed to combat government disinformation campaigns. These tools have made it possible to share and update information on Persian Wikipedia without the fear of persecution. As such, they have become crucial to foster the resilience of Persian Wikipedia and may inspire other groups to bring similar initiatives back to their communities.

Format: Workshop

Presenters: Luisinia Ferrante (Wikimedia Argentina), Spencer Graves (Wikimedian), Franziska Putz (Wikimedia Foundation)

Details: This workshop will demonstrate how controversy can be a productive force behind “the wisdom of crowds” that makes it possible for websites like Wikipedia to share freely accessible information online. Case studies on Spanish, Chinese, French, and English Wikipedia articles will demonstrate how their development was informed by social, economic, and political debates in each of the contexts they describe as well as by the different perspectives and approaches between volunteer editors. This session will expose participants to the experience of co-creating knowledge about human rights online.

Format: Workshop

Presenters: Patricia Díaz-Rubio (Wikimedia Chile), Augustina Del Campo (CELE), Kate Levan (Wikimedia Foundation), Nathan Forrester (Wikimedia Foundation)

Details: This immersive workshop brings together organizations with unique, community-led moderation approaches in order to present participants with case studies on disinformation around electoral processes. Panelists will engage participants in analyzing the issues at hand, discussing challenges to moderating specific content, and will then walk the audience through the moderation process employed in their context. The goal of the session is for the audience to experience how hard the job is, as well as the variety of effective approaches there are to content moderation, debunking the idea that there is a single, perfect process for moderating online spaces. 

Format: Panel

Presenters: Rachel Arinii Judhistari (Wikimedia Foundation), Kristina Gadaingan (ASEAN Parliamentarians for Human Rights), Members of Parliament from the Philippines and Thailand

Details: This interactive panel seeks to broaden the discussion about human rights safeguards within internet regulation regimes in Southeast Asia, especially the nuances surrounding online campaigning and the rising threat of disinformation, how they influence political conversations, and also potentially undermine electoral processes. The panel will pose these questions to the members of parliaments, civil society, and platform hosts. It will allow participants to contribute to the free-flowing discussion, and to provide perspectives from their own experiences and contexts as well.

Format: Workshop

Presenters: Faisal Da Supremo (Wikimedia Ghana),  Kolawole Oyewole (Wiki Fan Club, and Lagos State University), Iván Martínez (Wikimedia México), Luisina Ferrante (Wikimedia Argentina), Alex Stinson (Wikimedia Foundation)

Details: This workshop will introduce participants to the basic skills needed to create and edit human rights content on Wikipedia. Experienced Wikipedians will teach basic editing skills, share best practices around citing reputable sources, and answer participants’ questions during this interactive session. Participants are encouraged to identify articles on human rights concepts or content that are lacking or need to be bolstered in their linguistic communities before the session. The session will provide open editing time for participants to create or edit content on their selected topics with the assistance of experienced Wikipedians. It will conclude with a review of best practices, an update on the #WikiForHumanRights campaign, and a question and answer period.

Format: Lightning Talk

Presenters: Ramzy Muliawan (Wikimedia Indonesia)

Details: This lightning talk examines the freedom of panorama (FOP), and how the absence of this limitation on copyright threatens the implementation of Wikimedia’s 2030 strategy to “provide for safety and inclusion,” especially in countries where Wikimedia communities are emerging. The talk will review the existing freedom of panorama regulations (or lack thereof) in Indonesia, and propose to Wikimedia organizations and communities in Indonesia, as well as other emerging Wikimedia communities and like-minded partners, how to best navigate the muddy waters of the clash between the underdeveloped policy landscape and the ever-changing nature of online efforts to preserve and free knowledge.

Format: Lightning Talk

Presenters: Anass Sedrati (Wikimedia Morocco)

Details: Having access to information in your mother tongue is a basic human right. Wikimedia projects may be doing well compared to other actors, but how can they be improved as well? Although languages in the digital world are not represented equally, Wikimedia projects have helped to represent more languages online, since the only prerequisites to have a Wikipedia in a particular language is an International Organization for Standardization (ISO) code and an active community. Yet even on Wikipedia projects this process is imperfect. This lightning talk explores the fraught manner in which languages are represented online, and puts forward the argument that more individuals need to be involved in enriching Wikimedia content, and in diversifying the languages that are represented on other platforms.

Format: Panel

Presenters: Caroline Greer (TikTok), Konstantinos Komaitis (The New York Times), Rebecca MacKinnon (Wikimedia Foundation), Jillian York (EFF), Eliška Pírková (AccessNow)

Details: This panel will discuss the risks associated with policymakers and legislators around the world crafting legislation with a small subset of large companies in mind. The panelists will discuss the theme using the latest policy development initiatives and practical examples. What is the impact on the broader tech ecosystem of one-size-fits-all laws? How can we ensure equitable policymaking that works for users as well? The session seeks to make recommendations on how the risks can be minimized, and how we can evolve to a more sophisticated model of tech policy- and lawmaking.

Format: Social Hour

Presenters: Wikimedians of the Caribbean User Group, JAAKLAC initiative, AfroCrowd, Access Now

Details: Social hours are an informal space where participants with common interests can connect and expand a network or coalition. There is no participation limit, so come along!

Format: Panel

Presenters: Jessica Ashooh (Reddit), Rose Coogan (Github), Allison Davenport (Wikimedia Foundation), Guillaume Rischard (OpenStreetMap Foundation)

Details: The panel will feature policy leadership from a variety of platforms with community content moderation, who will discuss best practices for fostering effective, scalable, and rights-based community content moderation online. Along with touching on the advantages of community moderation, the panel will also discuss challenges with the model, and how policies for digital communication can leave room for individuals to participate in effective self-regulation, collaboration, and good faith moderation of online content.

* Please note that session dates and times might be subject to change. For up-to-date information on these, please check the RightsCon schedule.

Since the return of the Taliban, the international community has watched with growing concern the events unfolding across Afghanistan. In addition to the humanitarian situation, the country’s rich cultural heritage is once again in danger. Vandals and thieves will profit of the instability to steal or destroy cultural heritage for a variety of reasons, including personal gain or political motivation. To protect it, we need to work together. With the joined forces of the International Council of Museums (ICOM) and Wikimedia, everybody can help, even from your laptop.

Nowadays, many of the illicit transactions involving cultural heritage happen online on social media or e-commerce platforms. To respond to the emergency in Afghanistan and the migration of these kinds of crimes to online platforms, ICOM and Wikimedia CH have agreed to give the ICOM Red List of Afghanistan Antiquities at Risk maximum visibility, diversify its use online, and to call for contribution to protect the cultural heritage of the country.

This awareness campaign is based on a previous close collaboration to promote the Interational Museumsday in Switzerland and abroad. ICOM had reached out to Wikimedia CH in order to mobilise the Wiki community and Internet users to contribute to the objective to protect Afghan cultural heritage at risk of looting and illicit traffic. 

Wikimedia CH was quickly convinced by these objectives and created a project page and promote this “call to action” in the global Wiki Movement as you read it here on Diff, on the Social Media, in the Wikimedia CH Newsletter, to press contacts, and on the Wikimedia CH website. We also launched a Banner on Wikipedia and informed the Wikimedia Foundation, other Wikimedia affiliates as well as our partners.

On the project page, under the title “How to participate & contribute”, the Wiki community all over the world is invited to get involved. This can be done by creating new articles, updating, amending, or translating existing articles, inserting pictures from Wikimedia Commons or optimizing the presence of these artifacts on Wikidata. If you have knowledge and access to media files and collections depicting objects from categories included in the Red List of ICOM regarding the Afghan Antiquities at risk, that are in public domain or available under a CC-BY-SA license, you can upload them to Wikimedia Commons and make them visible in a dedicated image gallery available there.

With your help, we will significantly increase the chances of citizens and organisations discovering the ICOM Red List when searching for information on a suspicious object they have found for sale, or when researching on the illicit trade more broadly!

Contact for further information 

ICOM: Alexandra Fernández Coego, Head of Communications and Public Relations 
T. +33 784 12 53 56 Fax. +33 1 43 06 78 62, alexandra.fernandez@icom.museum, http://icom.museum

Wikimedia CH :  Kerstin Sonnekalb, Outreach & Communication, Mobil: +41 78 813 13 26,
kerstin.sonnekalb@wikimedia.ch / press@wikimedia.ch, www.wikimedia.ch