Written by Jacob Rogers, Associate General Counsel at the Wikimedia Foundation. Here, you may find the link to the original interview.

We share some considerations about the application of the recently adopted Digital Services Act (DSA), which lays down a new set of rules for online platforms. Under these new rules, Wikipedia has been designated as a VLOP and therefore bears some specific obligations. After one year of formal application, a first preliminary evaluation can be done. In this sense, the interview highlights Wikipedia’s specific characteristics, analyses the compliance burdens for the Wikimedia Foundation and offers some guidance for the future in order to preserve the Wikimedia model.

This week marks one year since the European Union’s Digital Services Act (DSA) formally applied to Wikipedia. The DSA is a law that governs how to host websites for people in the European Union (EU). Wikipedia is just one of 19 platforms to be designated as a “Very Large Online Platform”; (VLOP) under the DSA because of its many European readers, meaning it now faces greater regulatory scrutiny. Notably, Wikipedia stands apart as the only VLOP that is hosted by a not-for-profit organization, the Wikimedia Foundation.

For many, including tech journalists and policymakers, it may come as a surprise to learn that Wikipedia is in the same DSA category as some of the best known for-profit social media websites, such as Facebook, TikTok, X (Twitter), and YouTube. Besides its nonprofit status, Wikipedia is unique because it is truly community governed. The information on Wikipedia is written and verified by a global community of over 265,000 volunteers, contributing to more than 63 million articles in over 300 languages. Moreover, those users, and not the Wikimedia Foundation as website host, set the editorial policies that determine what information will be on Wikipedia and how to write about it.

Volunteers compile and share information on notable subjects, citing reliable sources such as newspaper articles and peer-reviewed journals, according to the encyclopedia’s editorial policies and guidelines. Only encyclopedic content is allowed on Wikipedia. Personal experiences, opinions, or original research are not permitted. The site is not funded by advertising; it does not track your activity, sell your information, or use algorithms to promote content. No matter where you are in the world, which device you are using, or what’s in your browser history, everyone sees the exact same information on Wikipedia.

After one year of working to meet a wide range of obligations under the DSA, we are reflecting on our learnings and perspectives on this law and its possible impact in the EU and beyond. While there are many positive aspects of the DSA — such as its emphasis on human rights, transparency, and accountability — the law presents compliance burdens for nonprofits like ours, and its approach may backfire if applied to countries with weaker governance systems.

The Global Implications of the DSA: A Cautionary Note

The DSA aims to create a safer internet by requiring platforms to implement measures that mitigate risks, prevent the spread of illegal content, and ensure users’ rights are protected. These principles have long been championed by Wikipedia: The platform’s open-editing system, combined with robust moderation by volunteers, has made it a trusted source of information for people worldwide.

We believe the DSA is a solid blueprint for legislation in other democratic jurisdictions with strong regulatory institutions, free press, and independent legal systems. It has the potential to help protect the rights of internet users across Europe. However, we are concerned about how the DSA’s approach and requirements could be misused in countries with weaker democratic institutions, where the law’s provisions could be used to intimidate website hosts into stifling free expression and access to information.

Even within the EU, during this past year, several people have attempted to use claims of illegal content to get legitimate information removed from Wikipedia. These “SLAPP” (Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation) cases are lawsuits in which powerful individuals or entities try to use claims of illegal content to prevent public discussion and knowledge sharing on important topics. In regions without robust safeguards, regulations like the DSA that require platforms to respond to these demands of illegality could push platforms into the role of censors on behalf of governments or those with power.

Compliance Burdens for Nonprofits

A major challenge of the DSA is the compliance burdens it places on nonprofits like the Wikimedia Foundation. While we recognize the value of Wikipedia’s compliance with the DSA, and are working tirelessly to meet its requirements, the burden is substantial.

Other VLOPs are primarily for-profit corporations with vast resources that are able to absorb the DSA’s regulatory impact more easily. Wikipedia, on the other hand, relies on donations and volunteer support. Even with highly efficient compliance efforts, the DSA likely represents a larger share of the Wikimedia’s Foundation’s resources than for any other VLOP. Despite these challenges, we have adapted to the DSA with resilience, demonstrating the strength of our model, centered on the contributions of hundreds of thousands of volunteers around the world who strive to make reliable knowledge accessible for all.

A Call for Harmonized Risk Assessments

We applaud that the DSA asks VLOPs to consider the risks their platforms pose to society, requiring annual risk assessments. When looking ahead to how internet regulations are developed worldwide, we advocate a harmonized approach to risk assessments that supports global human rights standards. This would minimize additional legal burdens on platforms and avoid a situation in which we must repeat nearly the same exercise to satisfy multiple jurisdictions.

Further, a harmonized approach would be particularly beneficial for platforms like Wikipedia, which operates on the basis of language, not country or jurisdiction. The online encyclopedia must appear the same wherever it is accessed in order to enable volunteer editors, wherever they are, to collaborate together in their chosen language.

By streamlining compliance, we can continue to focus on what we do best: providing free and open access to knowledge for everyone.

Community Resilience and Positive Impact Under the DSA

Over the past year, Wikipedia’s volunteer communities have successfully navigated the threats of misinformation and disinformation to multiple elections held within the EU. By providing reliable and accurate information about candidates and issues to millions of people across several languages, volunteers demonstrate the alignment between Wikipedia’s mission and the intent of the DSA to benefit society.

The DSA’s respect for and support of this community-led approach have been crucial to protect Wikipedia as a vital information resource. The DSA has played a role in ensuring that platforms like ours can continue to serve the public good without compromising our values of openness and neutral point of view.

We are proud of our progress in meeting the DSA’s standards. While we share in much of the DSA’s spirit, there are important learnings from our experiences of working to comply with the law. Looking to the future, there are opportunities for improvement in how internet regulations are developed worldwide. To support websites like Wikipedia that are built in the public interest, governments must ensure compliance burdens are reasonable for nonprofits. Further, we encourage all governments to ensure that their laws do not inadvertently force websites to become censors for the rich and powerful.

As the Wikimedia Foundation reaches this one-year milestone, we reaffirm our commitment to transparency, accountability, and free knowledge. With the support of our global volunteer community, we’re ready to continue to make reliable knowledge available for everyone, everywhere.

• Aruba report: Vacancy Wikimedian in Residence for Wikipedia on Aruba – Aruba on Wikipedia project
• Brazil report: Technology and biodiversity: “Amazonian Knowledge on Wiki”
• Colombia report: Colombia in Wikimania Mood
• Czech Republic report: Cooperation between National Library and Wikimedia CR was presented at Wikimania 2024
• India report: Wikimedians-in-residence assigned to add lexicographical data of 5 endangered languages of West Bengal
• Netherlands report: 10 reasons why the National Library of the Netherlands moved its Wikimedia-related publications from SlideShare to Zenodo, and keeps them on Wikimedia Commons
• New Zealand report: Looking for Aotearoa’s next roving Wikipedian, a Wikidata Te Papa research expeditions publication & the Wikidata WikiProject IBC follow-up workshop
• North Macedonia report: An insight of Wkikimedia MKD’s 2024 GLAM Programme
• Poland report: What’s up in GLAM-Wiki in Poland
• Switzerland report: Swiss GLAM Programme
• UK report: Indonesian Featured Article award
• USA report: Wikimania report and meetups
• Biodiversity Heritage Library report: BHL-Wiki Working Group August monthly highlights
• Special story: Global GLAM Wiki Meetup – Future meetings and outcomes
• AvoinGLAM report: AvoinGLAM at Wikimania
• Content Partnerships Hub report: Content Partnerships Hub at Wikimania; The Helpdesk; Metabase; UN collaboration day
• WMF GLAM report: Commons Impact Metrics, WikiLibCon25, and WikiConference North America
• Calendar: September’s GLAM events

🕑 23 minutes

It's another BTB Digest, with highlights from five recent episodes. Jeffrey Wang discusses competing for European users, Taavi Väänänen describes the RealMe extension, Megan Cutrofello defends video game wikis with "spoilers", Moritz Schubotz analyzes MediaWiki as a math publishing tool, Viktor Schelling reminisces on the early days of a consulting company, and more!

When you think of the ocean, what’s the first thing that comes to mind? Perhaps you envision well-known animals like whales or sharks, or the seemingly-endless horizon across the water. Few of us would picture the estimated 25 million underwater mountains rising from the ocean floor, and even fewer would think of the unique and diverse microscopic ecosystems which live on these seamounts.

Ecologically critical yet underrepresented in public knowledge, these underwater microbial communities piqued the interest of two science students at the University of British Columbia. The duo teamed up to enhance the way we understand the ocean and some of its smallest life forms – through a new Wikipedia article for all to read.

“Seamount microbial communities play significant ecological roles that are not well-documented, and we wanted to shed light on their potential impact on oceanic nutrient cycling and biodiversity conservation,” said fourth-year student Alia Kogiso. “This topic offered a unique opportunity to explore an underrepresented area in marine microbiology.”

Kogiso, an Integrated Sciences major with a focus on Environmental Chemistry, Ecology, and Structural Geology, worked with biology major Alyssa Jung to collect, review, and synthesize the related existing literature on the microbial communities. Together they brought the new, robust article to Wikipedia as their final project for Dr. Curtis Suttle’s marine microbiology course this spring.

As the article outlines, seamounts provide a variety of habitats, including rocky surfaces and hydrothermal vents, which support a wide range of microbial life. The microbial communities, characterized by their microbial diversity and adaptability to extreme conditions, such as high pressure, low temperatures, and limited nutrient availability, play crucial roles in nutrient cycling and ecosystem functioning, making them a critical part of ocean life. 

“Our main goal was to ensure literature was being well-documented in an easier format than scientific paper,” said Jung, underscoring Wikipedia’s role as the world’s go-to source of information. “We hope that readers get a glimpse of the importance of microbes in an underexplored biodiversity such as seamounts.”

Jung and Kogiso also ensured greater awareness of the implications of microbial communities in seamount ecosystems on biodiversity and ecological productivity, known as the “seamount effect.”

“The seamount effect alters ocean current patterns, enhancing biodiversity and productivity, making these areas crucial for understanding microbial community structures and ecosystems,” explained Kogiso. “We hope that our article helps readers unravel this complexity and inspires further exploration in this field.”

The science students added an impressive 9375 words and 89 references to create the article, contributing to the incredibly impactful work of their class. Collectively, Suttle’s students in the spring 2024 course added 86K words to Wikipedia while creating 10 new articles and enhancing 35 existing articles through their Wikipedia assignments. Their work on Wikipedia has been viewed nearly 500K times. 

“I loved this assignment because it allowed us to engage with a wider audience and develop skills in communicating science to the public, which I believe will be invaluable in a professional setting after graduation,” said Kogiso, who plans to pursue a career in environmental consultancy and project management. “This kind of opportunity is often lacking in traditional assignments.”

From scientific research to writing in a neutral, accessible style, both assignment partners noted a range of skills and knowledge they developed throughout the process. 

“Writing this article not only enhanced my research skills but also deepened my understanding of marine ecosystems from a microbiological perspective,” said Kogiso, reflecting on her assignment experience. “I learned how to adapt complex scientific information for Wikipedia, which requires unique editorial considerations such as maintaining neutrality and citing reliable sources extensively.”

Echoing her classmate’s reflection, Jung also emphasized the fun of learning new science-related concepts.

“My family is very science-oriented,” Jung explained. “My father always taught me the fundamentals of the scientific method and different topics he was working on – I am glad to have something new to tell him!” 

Kogiso particularly enjoyed the collaborative nature of working on Wikipedia, noting both the challenge and pleasure of bringing different perspectives and expertise into a cohesive, unbiased narrative, a process that enhanced her own understanding of the topic.

“The project was meaningful because it allowed me to contribute to a public platform that educates both myself and others, reinforcing my passion for environmental science and biology,” said Kogiso, who plans to continue to edit Wikipedia.

Like Kogiso, Jung also emphasized her interest in editing Wikipedia in the future as topics and new research catch her eye. Jung plans to pursue a career in secondary education, bringing her biology expertise to the high school classroom.

Our support for STEM classes like Alia’s and Alyssa’s is available thanks to the Guru Krupa Foundation.

Interested in incorporating a Wikipedia assignment into your course? Visit teach.wikiedu.org to learn more about the free resources, digital tools, and staff support that Wiki Education offers to postsecondary instructors in the United States and Canada.

GitHub is and has always been a great code host. But they’ve never had great code review. Even today, they’re still lagging behind.

Oh yeah, there’s pull requests now

– GitHub blog, Sat, 23 Feb 2008

When GitHub launched, it had no code review.

Ten years later, when Microsoft acquired GitHub for $7.5 Billion, GitHub’s Pull Request model—“GitHub flow”—had become the default way to collaborate via Git.

But the Pull Request was never designed. It emerged. Though not from careful consideration of the needs of developers or maintainers.

GitHub swallowed software by making it easy to host code. Code review was an afterthought.

“Code Review = Discussion + Code”?

In 2010—two years after GitHub launched—GitHub introduced Cross repository (sic) compare view—git diff between two repos, but on the web.

This new feature, alongside an unthreaded comments section, became the new Pull Request, Pull Requests 2.0²

There was code. You could talk about it.

But, unlike other contemporary code review platforms, GitHub still lacked inline code commenting.

[Just a quick post to get info in one place, sorry!] Info I have a GPD Pocket: running Ubuntu 24.04.1 LTS with a BCM4356 802.11ac Wireless Network Adapter (PCI ID 14e4:43ec) with some issues: It appears like only 2.4GHz networks are being detected, and not 5GHz networks. That being said, our router is dual-band and I can’t see either network. Attempting to connect to a random 2.4GHz network crashes the network manager (WiFi icon/settings entry disappears, then reappears after a few seconds).

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Feature news

• Starting this week, the standard syntax highlighter will receive new colors that make them compatible in dark mode. This is the first of many changes to come as part of a major upgrade to syntax highlighting. You can learn more about what’s to come on the help page. [1][2]
• Editors of wikis using Wikidata will now be notified of only relevant Wikidata changes in their watchlist. This is because the Lua functions entity:getSitelink() and mw.wikibase.getSitelink(qid) will have their logic unified for tracking different aspects of sitelinks to reduce junk notifications from inconsistent sitelinks tracking. [3]

Project updates

• Users of all Wikis will have access to Wikimedia sites as read-only for a few minutes on September 25, starting at 15:00 UTC. This is a planned datacenter switchover for maintenance purposes. More information will be published in Tech News and will also be posted on individual wikis in the coming weeks. [4]
• Contributors of 11 Wikipedias, including English will have a new MOS namespace added to their Wikipedias. This improvement ensures that links beginning with MOS: (usually shortcuts to the Manual of Style) are not broken by Mooré Wikipedia (language code mos). [5]

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

Hi! This is User:Eugene Ormandy, a member of Toumon Wikipedian Club Japan. I’m very happy to announce that Wikimedia Japan, Malaysia, and Turkey Friendship Editing Month September 2024 has started!

What is it?

It is a Wikimedia editing campaign during September 2024. In the campaign, participants contribute to Wikimedia projects about something related to Japan, Malaysia, or Turkey.

There are no strict rules! If you are interested in this activity, don’t hesitate to add your name to MetaWiki [[Wikimedia Japan-Malaysia Friendship/Wikimedia Japan, Malaysia, and Turkey Friendship Editing Month September 2024]] and edit! It doesn’t matter which countries you live or which languages you use.

History

This campaign is for the one year anniversary of Wikimedia Japan-Malaysia Friendship and Wikimedia Japan-Türkiye Friendship. For these projects, various events such as a Japan-themed editathon at Istanbul Bilgi University and simultaneous editathons in Japan and Malaysia, have been implemented.

In addition, because of the contribution of the projects, Caner, one of the organizers from Turkey, was selected as one of the Wikimedian of the Year 2024 winners! (Needless to say, it is just one of the reasons — Caner achieved a lot of things!) To celebrate the achievements and strengthen our friendship more and more, we decided to hold editing month.

Flexible activities

We welcome flexible activities for the editing month! For example, we already had an online meetup on 1 September 2024 and we will write collaborative Diff posts. Moreover, I will join the CEE Meeting 2024 in Istanbul on 20-22 September from Japan.

For future

I hope this editing month strengthen the friendship between the three countries and encourage global Wikimedia Movement. If you are interested in this project, don’t hesitate to join!

Members of the Human Rights Team presented at Wikimania in Poland to raise awareness about some of the human rights risks that may be associated with volunteering on wiki projects and provide contributors with recommendations to maintain a safe and secure environment.

Human rights are a little like oxygen: people tend to take it for granted until something goes wrong. We also tend to assume it’s all the same all over—at least until we transition from sea level to higher elevation and find out it’s not just the view that’s different. But the human rights that are recognized vary from place to place–not only across legal boundaries, but in different spaces within them. For instance, many of us can recall a time where online harassment was not taken seriously anywhere in the world. Additionally, the freedom to share information safely is not a guaranteed right. The United Nations has undertaken to recognize some human rights as universal, and in 2021 it affirmed that the same rights that people have offline must also be protected online. 

The Human Rights Policy commits the Wikimedia Foundation to protect, respect, and support the rights of users within our ecosystem. This includes how we respond to and protect members of our movement against demands and threats from governments that violate the human rights of people who contribute to or interact with the Wikimedia movement; how we respond to and protect against threats by malign non-state actors; how our projects and platforms can protect the rights of children; and all other ways that the activities and operations of our foundation, projects, and movement might affect the rights of employees, volunteers, audiences, donors, and the communities they belong to.

“Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of person.”

It is unfortunate that some people and entities would challenge the human rights of those who seek to share knowledge. As one of the teams at the Foundation committed to this work, the Human Rights Team supports volunteers being persecuted by governments or other organized actors for their good-faith contributions to the movement. Our objectives are twofold: first, to raise awareness among Wikimedia volunteers and the broader community about the potential human rights challenges that can arise from their invaluable work so that they can make informed choices about where and how to participate. Second, to present effective tools, strategies, and support to safeguard themselves against these risks, helping to create a safer and more secure environment for all contributors. 

Sharing with our contributors some of the fundamental threats against human rights can help create and foster a culture of respect and vigilance. The Human Rights Team believes that an informed volunteer is an empowered volunteer. We also aim to provide digital and physical safety measures for those at risk. 

Human Rights are essential to enable the 2030 Vision. 

While the Human Rights Team has a very specific focus, we work with other teams at the Foundation who are charged with creating the safety our movement needs to reach its 2030 vision: “By 2030, Wikimedia will become the essential infrastructure of the ecosystem of free knowledge, and anyone who shares our vision will be able to join us.” For example, we partner closely with the Global Advocacy team whose role includes, among other things, overseeing the framework to ensure all Wikimedia Foundation operations and movement activities respect and protect the rights of everyone who touches and is touched by our projects. Like us, they also raise awareness of potential risks as they advocate for laws that enhance the safety of people participating in the free knowledge ecosystem. 

At our presentation and digital safety clinic in Poland, drawing from best practices and advice of multiple teams and community members, the Human Rights Team outlined some recommendations designed to enhance personal security, digital security, protect privacy, and promote a culture of respect and safety online for our volunteer community. Focusing on some of the more common issues encountered online, we discussed cyberbullying, doxing, and harassment, which are only some of the ways the human rights of people online are harmed.

You can learn more about digital security and human rights by accessing our Learning Modules: 

• Assess your digital security risks
• Safety for Grant Recipients

You can also view some of our online safety resources on Meta-wiki.

Safety is crucial if we are to meet our goal of promoting the free exchange of information. 

Recognizing the importance of our work in free knowledge cannot be done without mentioning the importance of mental health for those doing the work. The Foundation has created and curates a list of resources for Wikimedians struggling with emotional challenges. In addition, for those Wikimedians working with our Human Rights Team because they are targeted by organized efforts to compromise their freedom and safety, we may be able to recommend access to counseling and support groups, ensuring our contributors can work safely and confidently without compromising their well-being. Please contact us at talktohumanrights@wikimedia.org if you would like more information about this service.

Our duty and our responsibility.

Our vision is powerful, and it comes with a cost. Ghanaian diplomat Kofi Annan said, “Knowledge is power. Information is liberating. Education is the premise of progress, in every society, in every family.” He also said that “What is so thrilling about our time is that the privilege of information is now an instant and globally accessible privilege. It is our duty and our responsibility to see that gift bestowed on all the world’s people, so that all may live lives of knowledge and understanding.” Upholding the right to safety while also enabling the free exchange of knowledge and ideas is critical to building a reliable knowledge ecosystem. 

Please contact us at talktohumanrights@wikimedia.org if:

• You or someone you know face an organized threat to your safety or freedom based on your contributions to Wikimedia
• You want more information and resources to proactively protect yourself or your community against threats associated with your contributions to Wikimedia

For emergencies that require immediate response, please email us at emergency@wikimedia.org 

29/08/2024-04/09/2024

Mapping

• [1] Koreller showed us a series of tricks and tips on drawing buildings (and shapes in general) using JOSM with the best symmetry and alignment.

Mapping campaigns

• Inspired by the Paris 2024 Olympic Games the UN Mappers hosted a mapping competition in August. Check out the final results.

Community

• Bastian Greshake Tzovaras wrote about why Panoramax is an important contribution to the open source mapping landscape.
• In Episode 249 of the Geomob Podcast, Ed interviewed Jo Walsh, an early OpenStreetMap pioneer, exploring the beginnings of the open data movement, the rise of initiatives like OpenStreetMap, and the ongoing challenges and future prospects for open data.
• Ceejay Abilay shared his experience of speaking at the OpenStreetMap in-person training event hosted by Grab Philippines and the OpenStreetMap Philippines Community.

Events

• SotM Latam 2024 has extended the deadline for submitting proposals until Tuesday 10 September. You can send your abstract of up to 500 words via the event’s Pretalx platform. Those who are unable to attend in person will be able to submit their presentation, in video format of up to 10 minutes, at a later stage. Registration is free.

Education

• Marcos Dione had an OpenStreetMap editing session with his kids and later asked if there was a staging tool for parents to review and correct their children’s edits. NeatNit recommended using the OSM sandbox instance for this purpose, while Matt Whilden suggested using the iD/Rapid export edits feature.

OSM research

• A team of researchers has developed a suite of computer-assisted map design tools, aimed at creating maps accessible to visually impaired individuals, based on OSM data.
• HeiGIT reported that they have assessed the completeness of OSM building data using new data. Results indicate that from 2023 to 2024 completeness in most areas of the world rose more slowly than in previous years.

Software

• Due to the introduction of a new class of anti-feature and problems with the F-Droid update, Organic Maps has been hidden from the default F-Droid search results for some users.
• Yohan Boniface invites you to participate in the beta testing of a new version of uMap.
• catme0w, a Google Summer of Code 2024 contributor, has shared their progress made on Stadia Maps’ Ferrostar project, an SDK for building turn-by-turn navigation applications.
• The latest version of JOSM has a new option, ‘warn’, to only print warnings and errors to the terminal. This can be useful when collecting information to report a bug.
• Miles Alan has developed Mepo, an OSM map viewer app for mobile and desktop Linux.
• A bug in the Android version of Organic Maps 2024.08 is adding outdoor_seating=no to POIs when they are edited. The bug is currently being worked on.
• Raymond Camden explained how to load CSV data into a Leaflet web map.

Programming

• BuntingLabs has a fee-based service for downloading OpenStreetMap data as GeoJSON. You can filter by tags, select by bounding box, and export as GeoJSON, all in a single curl command.
• Marquis de Geek has developed FlightSpy, a JavaScript application that generates an itinerary of what you’ll see from an aeroplane’s window throughout your entire journey. It uses both Flightradar and OSM data.

Releases

• Beta 1.1.0 of the Panoramax Android app has been released. It allows you to conveniently contribute street images to the open Street View alternative from your mobile phone. The release has an APK attached, in case you want to give it a try.

Did you know …

• … that you can monitor OpenStreetMap edits in real time using OpenStreetMap live edits, OSM In Realtime, or Show Me The Way?

Other “geo” things

• Mountain biking in Germany’s forests will be still allowed ►, at least according to a new draft of the Federal Forest Act. A previous draft of the act last November (we reported earlier) caused significant concern in the biking community, as it proposed major restrictions on mountain biking.
• Geoo is a geography learning game where you guess flags, capitals, and landmarks, and then compete with others on an online leaderboard.
• In the latest episode of Developer Voice, Stadia Maps’ co-founder, Ian Wagner, discussed Ferrostar, Stadia Maps’ Rust-based open-source navigation SDK.

Upcoming Events

Where	What	Online	When	Country
Stadtgebiet Bremen	[Bremen] Mobile Mappingparty mit Kuchen		2024-09-01 – 2024-10-01
Nairobi	State of the Map 2024		2024-09-06 – 2024-09-08
Bengaluru	IndiaFOSS 4.0		2024-09-06 – 2024-09-07
København	OSMmapperCPH		2024-09-08
Grenoble	Atelier de rentrée du groupe local OpenStreetMap de Grenoble		2024-09-09
中正區	OpenStreetMap x Wikidata Taipei #68		2024-09-09
Hamburg	Hamburger Mappertreffen		2024-09-10
Salt Lake City	OSM Utah Monthly Map Night		2024-09-12
Stainach-Pürgg	14. Österreichischer OSM-Stammtisch (online)		2024-09-11
Lorain County	OpenStreetMap Midwest Meetup	✓	2024-09-12
Berlin	195. Berlin-Brandenburg OpenStreetMap Stammtisch		2024-09-12
Bochum	Bochumer OSM Treffen		2024-09-12
München	Münchner OSM-Treffen		2024-09-12
	OSMF Engineering Working Group meeting		2024-09-13
Lynnwood	Mapping Lynnwood		2024-09-14
Bielefeld	OSM Ostwestfalen-Lippe		2024-09-16
England	OSM UK Online Chat		2024-09-16
	Missing Maps London: (Online) Mid-Month Mapathon [eng]		2024-09-17
Lyon	Réunion du groupe local de Lyon		2024-09-17
Bonn	180. OSM-Stammtisch Bonn		2024-09-17
London	Geomob London		2024-09-18
Karlsruhe	Stammtisch Karlsruhe		2024-09-18
Kiel	OSM auf den 22. Kieler Open Source und Linux Tagen		2024-09-19 – 2024-09-21
Amsterdam	Maptime Amsterdam End of Summer Meetup		2024-09-19
Dresden	Stammtisch Dresden		2024-09-19
Dresden	OSM auf den Datenspuren Dresden		2024-09-21
Dublin	OpenStreetMap Ireland AGM 2024		2024-09-21
Lamego (Almacave e Sé)	Dia do Software Livre		2024-09-21 – 2024-09-22
Strasbourg	1er Atelier de cartographie sur OpenStreetMap		2024-09-23
Arlon	Rencontre OSM Luxembourg		2024-09-23

Note:
If you like to see your event here, please put it into the OSM calendar. Only data which is there, will appear in weeklyOSM.

This weeklyOSM was produced by MatthiasMatthias, Raquel Dezidério Souto, Strubbl, TheSwavu, barefootstache, derFred, rtnf.
We welcome link suggestions for the next issue via this form and look forward to your contributions.

A pandemic baby of the Wikiverse has come to stay. For Wikimedia Deutschland in Germany and Wikimedia Österreich in Austria, the video conferences of the GLAM Digital event series have gone from being an emergency solution to a permanent additional service. The idea is simple: virtual specialist lectures by selected cultural and memory institutions (GLAMs) on various topics, followed by direct exchanges between our Wikipedia communities and the institution.

On the occasion of the 100th guest lecturer, it’s time to take stock. The 100 speakers came from 64 institutions. We have welcomed 1022 participants to the 41 events held to date. The participating institutions ranged from large institutions such as the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna or the Museum Barberini in Potsdam to discoveries such as the Archive of German Women’s Movements or the Wurzerhof Farm Museum in East Tyrol. Museum associations and national UNESCO commissions were also among the guests.

The range of content was broad: from sharpening the art-historical view of individual exhibits to understanding socio-political contexts in the history of minorities. As we all know, sharing knowledge is not a one-way street. The institutions also gained new insights into free knowledge and the Wikimedia projects during the discussions. With GLAM Digital, we can provide old and new strategic partners with an attractive additional offer that gives them low-threshold direct contact with our communities in Austria and Germany.

How it all began

During the first major Covid lockdowns in February and March 2021, Wikimedia Österreich and Wikimedia Deutschland began holding the first GLAM video conferences of this kind, initially side by side. These were intended as a temporary solution and as a makeshift translation of existing GLAM event formats into the virtual space. An unexpected added value soon became apparent.

In Wikimedia Österreich’s general community survey in 2021, respondents were asked what kind of virtual Wikimedia events they would be interested in attending. Guest lectures by cultural organizations were at the top of the answers. In the direct feedback from participants on Wikipedia, we read things like: “Thank you very much for the great, entertaining tour and the patience with our questions” and “I’d be very grateful for a continuation of the event series and I’m already looking forward to it.” Wikimedia Deutschland and Wikimedia Österreich then combined their activities and developed a concept for GLAM Digital as a joint ongoing series of events.

What happens next

We’re again planning ten virtual events for next year. The two-hour video conferences will take place on Monday evenings as usual. All interested Wikipedia editors are invited to take part in the meetings; our code of conduct for video conferences applies. Registration takes place on the Wikipedia page for the individual event. You can also add your name to the invitation list for GLAM events and will then receive a notification of upcoming events on your user discussion page.

Links (in German)

• GLAM Digital
• Invitation list for GLAM events

As part of its annual programs, the Dagbani Wikimedians User Group held a training workshop to train Dagbani teachers on how to use Wikipedia as a teaching tool to facilitate teaching and learning as part of the Reading Wikipedia in the Classroom’ program. Reading Wikipedia in the Classroom is the Wikimedia Foundation’s flagship teacher training program that seeks to help educators develop vital media and information literacy skills for the 21st century. This program helps secondary school teachers learn how to integrate Wikipedia into their classrooms to foster media and information literacy (MIL) skills. The curriculum of this program is aligned with UNESCO’s Media and Information Literacy Framework, and it connects different approaches and methodologies used in the classroom to leverage the power of Wikipedia. The Dagbani Wikimedians User Group is therefore using program to train Dagbani language teachers in and around Tamale on how to effectively utilize Wikipedia as a teaching and learning resource in their classrooms.

Fortunately for the User Group, three of its team members were privileged to have previously undergone a RWCR training of trainers’ program organized by the Wikimedia education team and have thus become certified trainers. The two of RWCR-certified trainers in turn organized a training workshop for the rest of the team members to ensure their effective participation in the upcoming training for teachers. The training sessions led by Abdul-Rasheed Yussif focused on three modules: how information is produced, accessed, retrieved, and evaluated on Wikipedia. 

as the projimplemented in collaboration with the Dagbani Teachers Association (DTA). The DTA assisted in mobilizing 30 teachers of the Dagbani language for training. The certified trainers from DWUG, with the help of other team members of the DWUG, commenced the main training session on March 30th, 2024, for selected Dagbani language teachers to equip them with 21st-century ICT and media and information literacy skills. In all, three sessions over three weeks (every Saturday) were held at the DWUG office to take participants through the three modules of the RWCR training manual. Below are the details of the training sessions for the various weeks and modules:

Week One

Participants were introduced to the Reading Wikipedia in the Classroom program. Here, they were taken through the need for the program and its significance for teachers and learners. They were then introduced to the first module of the RWCR program, which focuses on ‘Accessing Information. Participants were introduced to Wikipedia, as most of them were new in the Wikimedia space. They were taken through what Wikipedia is, the common misconceptions people have about Wikipedia, why they should use Wikipedia, who does and doesn’t write Wikipedia, and how to navigate Wikipedia, among others. The team assisted participants new to Wikimedia to create their Wikimedia accounts. Participants could not hide their excitement at getting the opportunity to create their own Wikimedia accounts.

Week Two

This week’s focus was on Module 2 of the Teachers Guide, where participants were taken through the 5 pillars of Wikipedia and notability criteria guidelines, an overview of a Wikipedia article structure, references and verifiability, ways to evaluate a Wikipedia article, and facilitating access to quality academic sources on Wikipedia and more. Participants were especially shown how to search for articles on Dagbani Wikipedia relevant to their Dagbani lessons, so that the same can be used for teaching in their classrooms. A Dagbani teacher at Hanara Junior High School remarked, “This has been educative, and I will do the same with my students by teaching them what Wikipedia is and how they can use it. Together, we will be able to edit on Wikipedia and also help our language be recognized online“.

Week Three

In the final week of the training, participants were taken through Module 3 of the RWCR manual, which focused on ‘Information Creation’. This was more of a practical session for participants after two weeks of theoretical training. They were taken through the steps to create a user page for themselves and various ways of editing on Wikipedia. Participants felt excited for being able to make their first ever contribution to Wikipedia. They were also introduced to the various campaigns and programs organized by the Dagbani Wikimedians User Group. All participants after successfully completing week 3 of the workshop were awarded certificates of participation and were integrated into the Dagbani Wikimedia community. A participant shared; “Through the training, I have been able to create a Wikipedia account and learned how to search for information on Wikipedia. Also, I have shared the site (dag.wikipedia.org) with the parents of my students who find it difficult to help their wards with their Dagbanli homework. Another participant, a Dagbani teacher at Excel for Children’s Education, also shared, “The training has improved my digital skills, which will help me have a collaborative classroom. With regards to information, I will be able to access and analyze it on Wikipedia, this will help me deliver the lessons successfully.“.

We are extremely excited about our partnership with the Dagbani Teachers Association (DTA) and the generous support from the Wikimedia Foundation, and we hope to expand this program to cover the other 4 language communities that are currently being supported under the Dagbani Wikimedians User Group.

See more photos at Category:Reading Wikipedia in the Classroom, Northern Ghana

There are many ways to learn about Wikipedia when you’re just beginning.

Previously I ran edit-a-thons and introduction sessions with Wikimedia Australia, as well as online drop in sessions to help beginners with any questions they had. But they all required people to take time out of their day to attend.

I wished there was an online course someone could take to learn about Wikipedia in their own time. So I created one!

An Introduction to Wikipedia is a free online course for beginners that guides them through everything from how to edit Wikipedia, understanding good references and notability, to creating a new Wikipedia article.

The lessons are presented as short videos, and students watch my screen as I guide them through each step so they can learn how to contribute to Wikipedia.

Each section is followed by a quiz to reinforce the lessons, and at the end each student receives a certificate and micro credential badge to show they have completed the course.

Below each video lesson are links to download the videos from Wikimedia Commons.

There is also a PDF version of each lesson for people who prefer to read along, rather than watch videos.

Then there are links to relevant pages on Wikipedia, such as help pages, policies, and guides.

The course is hosted on WikiLearn, an online learning platform that hosts courses developed by and for the Wikimedia community.

Unlike most Wikimedia projects, it doesn’t run on MediaWiki and instead uses Open edX. But anyone taking a course can log in using their Wikimedia identity (OAuth). So after signing up to an account on Wikipedia (or other Wikimedia project), they can log in using the same account.

The course is broken up into 11 sections. Starting with an introduction and ending with a final quiz.

In between, I explain what Wikipedia is, what all the menus and notifications are, how to use your Homepage, User page, and Talk page, where to get help, how to edit your Sandbox, a brief introduction to copyright and Creative Commons, how to add good references, as well as how to find your local community and attend events like Wikimania. Finally, we cover notability and how to create an article.

That’s a lot to take in! But I made the course self-guided so students can complete the course in their own time, with no deadline.

If you want to do it all in one week or over several months, it won’t affect whether you can get the certificate.

I hope that this course will serve as a simple introduction to beginners, and bring newcomers into the Wikimedia movement who will contribute for years to come.

You can also adapt the materials as I’ve released them under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike License, and they can all be found on Wikimedia Commons. Additionally, anyone interested in translating the course into another language for WikiLearn should reach out to the Community Development team in charge of WikiLearn.

An Introduction to Wikipedia is live on WikiLearn for anyone to enrol now.

For more information on how I created this course, you can watch my Wikimania 2024 presentation here.

Recently, Bangla Wiktionary has achieved a remarkable milestone by surpassing 100,000 entries, marking a significant moment for the Bengali language. After Bangla Wikipedia, this is the second Bangla project to cross this landmark number of content entries. This achievement not only expands the digital resources available in the Bengali language but also reflects the collective dedication and passion for our language.

As of now, Bangla Wiktionary has a total of 100,893 entries, and the number is steadily growing. This milestone was reached during the recently concluded Wiktionary Entry Contest 2024, which aimed to further enrich Bangla Wiktionary. Throughout the contest, a total of 9,117 new entries were created, playing a vital role in reaching this goal.

As the organizer of this contest, I would like to extend my heartfelt thanks and congratulations to each and every participant and contributor who made this success possible. The combined efforts of those who created entries, the volunteers who assisted in various ways, and the team working behind the scenes to ensure smooth coordination all played an essential part in achieving this milestone.

This achievement is more than just a number; it is a testament to our commitment to preserving and promoting our language. Bangla Wiktionary will continue to grow in the future, becoming an even more valuable resource for Bengali speakers by adding new entries and expanding the knowledge base. Our journey doesn’t end here—there’s more to achieve, and we will continue to enrich the digital database of our language.

Together, our collective efforts will help shape a brighter digital future for the Bengali language, and we look forward to even greater accomplishments.

Akwa Ibom State, Nigeria — August 26, 2024 — The Nigeria Oral History Documentation Project, a pioneering cultural preservation initiative led by the Wikimedia User Group Nigeria (registered as Wikimedia Nigeria Foundation), is making significant strides in documenting the languages and dialects of Akwa Ibom State. Supported by the Wikimedia Foundation, a global non-profit organization, this project is committed to safeguarding Nigeria’s rich linguistic and cultural heritage for future generations.

Project Genesis and Motivation

Africa is home to over 2,000 languages, with Nigeria alone accounting for 25%. Sadly, many indigenous languages in Nigeria are primarily used for informal communication and are not supported in education or commerce. As a result, these languages are at risk of extinction, as they are gradually being abandoned in favour of foreign languages.

The Wikimedia Nigeria Foundation launched this project following an alarming warning from UNESCO’s Advisory Committee on Language Pluralism and Multi-language Education. The committee projected that the Igbo language and its cultural heritage could face extinction by 2025, overshadowed by more dominant languages in Nigeria. Responding to this critical situation, the Nigeria Oral History Documentation Project was created to help prevent the loss of such invaluable cultural assets.

The project commenced in 2021, documenting languages in Nigeria’s southwest. In 2022 and 2023, it expanded to Cross River and Rivers States. This fourth edition aims to extend the preservation of linguistic diversity by documenting the languages and dialects of Akwa Ibom and Delta States.

With the Wikimedia Foundation’s support (WMF), the project aims to safeguard these languages and make them accessible globally via Wikimedia Commons, contributing to the global knowledge repository.

Team Composition and Field Activities

The Nigeria Oral History Documentation Project is led by a team of cultural preservation experts dedicated to achieving the project’s goals:

1. Ambassador Olushola Olaniyan – Project Lead and Strategist, overseeing the strategic direction and ensuring successful execution.
2. Dr. Isaac Olatunde – Deputy Project Lead- guided academic research and documentation efforts.
3. Tunde Asaolu – Production Coordinator, managing all project logistical and technical aspects.
4. Ayokanmi Oyeyemi – Lead Photographer, capturing visual stories accompanying the linguistic documentation.
5. Tunde Oladimeji – Project Director, a renowned filmmaker and actor, creating compelling audiovisual records of languages and their cultural contexts.
6. Adebayo Ajibola – Cinematographer, transforming the recordings into engaging cinematographic content.

This team has been working in the field in Akwa Ibom State since August 20, 2024, and will continue through September 2, 2024. Their primary activities include interviewing native speakers and documenting languages, dialects, and oral traditions while preserving cultural insights unique to these communities.

Achievements and Documentation Progress

As of August 26, 2024, the Nigeria Oral History Documentation Project has made remarkable progress. It now holds one of Africa’s largest repositories of indigenous language audiovisual content, with over 200 unique recordings. The team has documented 22 distinct languages and dialects in Akwa Ibom State alone. Additionally, 15 languages, including variations of Urhobo and Ijaw, have been recorded in Delta State.

Key highlights of this edition include:

• Documenting a Catholic Mass conducted in the Ibibio language in Uyo.
• Recording the cultural traditions surrounding the Ekpo Festival.
• Capturing linguistic nuances through collaboration with scholars at Ibibio Alive.
• Engaging with Chief Brown Mene at the Palace of the Olu of Warri to document the Ijaw language.
• Collaborating with Urhobo Youth leaders to record 11 dialects from different Urhobo kingdoms.
• Recording oral histories with HRM Noble Eshemgam Orefe III, Uku Oghara of Oghara land, as he shared his people’s traditions in their native language.

These materials will be archived in the U.S. Library of Congress and Wikimedia Commons under a CCBYSA-4.0 license, enabling academic reuse and educational research while ensuring this knowledge remains freely accessible.

Broader Impact and Future Plans

The Nigeria Oral History Documentation Project is part of a more significant movement to document and preserve Nigeria’s cultural and linguistic heritage. The team plans to showcase the audiovisual materials collected during the project on International Mother Tongue Day in 2025. The documentation will serve as an invaluable historical resource, underlining the importance of linguistic diversity and cultural preservation.

After completing work in Akwa Ibom, the team will extend their efforts to Ogara in Delta State, collaborating with local linguists and traditional leaders to continue documenting endangered languages and cultures.

Call for Support and Collaboration

The Nigeria Oral History Documentation Project recognizes that collaboration is vital to success. The project team calls upon the Nigerian government, cultural professionals, linguists, and all stakeholders in Nigeria’s heritage ecosystem to support this vital initiative. Together, we can create a more inclusive and vibrant cultural archive reflecting Nigeria’s traditions’ diversity and richness.

Bioinspired armor – it may sound like something out of a science fiction novel, but what exactly is it? Thanks to the brand new Wikipedia article created by Liv Vizzini and her classmates at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute this spring, our curiosity can be satisfied.

“Throughout our Biological Materials course, we explored the remarkable ways nature has evolved to provide living organisms with structure and protection,” said Vizzini. “We were surprised to discover that there wasn’t already a dedicated Wikipedia article on this topic!”

As the new Wikipedia article explains, bioinspired armor are human-created materials inspired by the microstructures found in nature’s defense mechanisms. 

From mollusk and turtle shells to horns, hooves, and scales, naturally-occurring protections against high-speed collision, blunt impact, and puncture provide no shortage of inspiration for the creation of high-performance materials like helmets, military and sports equipment, and even medicinal applications.  

“The materials and structures we discuss in the article have been perfected over millions of years through evolution,” explained Vizzini. “Even with all our modern techniques and technology, engineers and scientists still struggle to replicate them. It’s incredible that such complex and effective designs can emerge from such humble origins.”

For Vizzini, who graduated in May with a biomedical engineering major and a philosophy minor, the Wikipedia assignment was a unique opportunity to deepen her research and writing skills while exploring a topic she found particularly fascinating.

“Writing this article taught me a lot about various organisms – from sharks to spiders to goats – but more importantly, I learned how to present complex information to a broad audience in an accessible way,” reflected Vizzini.

To organize their work, Vizzini and her three groupmates first outlined the sections they intended to include based on the common themes they found in their research, then assigned each student to a section that matched their interests, ensuring tasks were evenly distributed.

“I wish I could do this assignment for every class!” emphasized Vizzini, who expressed gratitude to her professor, Dr. Edmund Palermo, for incorporating the Wikipedia assignment. “It’s truly a win-win: we gained a deep understanding of the subject, had the chance to share it with a broader community, and contributed to the already vast Wikipedia library.”

Reflecting on the assignment and the impact of her work, Vizzini underscored the role of Wikipedia in shaping public knowledge.

“Wikipedia is incredibly powerful because it’s often the first place people go to learn about a new topic,” noted Vizzini. “Its accessibility and broad reach make it a key resource for spreading knowledge and increasing awareness on a global scale.” 

Vizzini hopes readers of the new article come away with her same sense of appreciation for nature and the way it can inspire innovation.

“In writing this scientific article, I was able to dive deeper into the intricate relationship between biology and technology,” said Vizzini. “It reinforced my passion for finding innovative solutions to the real-world health challenges that drew me to the field of Biomedical Engineering in the first place. Sharing this knowledge felt rewarding since it could have a similar impact on others!”

Vizzini, now working as an engineer in test method development at Becton Dickinson, plans to continue editing Wikipedia. She particularly enjoys editing text and formatting articles, noting the ease of the citation and insert functions.

Our support for STEM classes like Liv’s is available thanks to the Guru Krupa Foundation.

Interested in incorporating a Wikipedia assignment into your course? Visit teach.wikiedu.org to learn more about the free resources, digital tools, and staff support that Wiki Education offers to postsecondary instructors in the United States and Canada. Apply by September 8 for the fall 2024 term!

My first Wikimania was a really great experience. It was a place, where I met many new people, many people which I knew online from Telegram, and online partnerships, as well meeting many of my connections from the CEE Youth meetup in November 2023. It was a place where you could witness the collaboration of the open. And a place where I got a lot of knowledge.

Before Wikimania

The journey began in November 2023, when I applied for a scholarship. Then after some waiting came February 26, 2024 where I was delighted to learn that I was awarded a scholarship to attend Wikimania in Katowice this year. Then, in March I was offered by the CEE Hub the opportunity to volunteer as a program reviewer as the COT looked for local cee reviewers. Two other Greek speaking Wikimedians also volunteered, in what is probably the first time that Greeks volunteered in some committee in Wikimania. It was a big honor, and a good training to get a grasp how a conference is made, it’s format being formed, and getting an idea that will help you for future conferences you might want to host with your affiliate.

A great pushing factor behind the desire to attend Wikimania was my development as Wikimedian after June 2023: when I began to meet Wikimedians online, and get informed of their activities, I was inspired to work more on the local movement, and strive to learn for new initiatives to help the Greek community.

Arriving to Katowice

Fast forward to August, I left for Poland in Monday 5th. During my stay in the Warsaw airport I met many other Wikimedians from many parts of the world. We met well each other, and I got to learn more about the movement in their countries, the challenges faced by the Indian community, and get to know better each other. I also met some CEE people there, including representatives from Slovenia and Serbia. Then in Katowice I met some other people as well, including the first Wikiipedian in residence from Romania.

In Tuesday, the pre conference day, I didn’t attend any pre conference meetup but spent the day outside. I met many online friends and the Greek delegation for first time in person this day, and many other people. We also had an in depth talk with Shahen of the Western Armenian community, learning more about what they are doing and discussing potential partnerships as many Armenians live in Greece, and there are many Greece-raised Armenians who speak Western Armenian.

That day I spent in the park, having a good time with Wikimedians from 3 countries, after going to the planetarium which included a really great spaceflight simulation. My day concluded with the tour in the Silesian museum, the in person gathering of the Greek delegation, where I met my fellow compatriots for first time in person. We were visited also by some open source Greek activists who passed from the city on the sidelines of another open source conference. Then, we had dinner with Barbara and Klara where we discussed in depth a lot of stuff, like Hubs, Youth development and planning in CEE, local movement developments and other stuff. I also met the head of Trust and safety for the Wikimania at this point, where I learned a bit about the T&S processes in a conference, and discussed general stuff of youth engagement and Wikimania.

At Wikimania

Then, let’s go in Day 1. It was a brilliant day and I had my session about Extracurricular Wikimedia organizations too at that date, copresenting it with Ege and Aafi online. I was amazed by the interest and the attendance, as many people asked us questions, including people from Wikimedia Polska. I also liked the opening ceremony, and though I didn’t attend many sessions, I was able to socialize and receive various learnings about what other countries are doing to self develop their movement. On the Ecwo stuff, I was also able to meet my Japanese colleague Eugene in person, with which we are collaborating in the global Ecwo alliance. I attended a session of Klára about their activities in Czechia for students as well. One thing that impressed me was the Wiki Sud Italia program, to foster editing among people in South Italy, as we share similar problems of unequal regional distribution of the Wikimedian community. We also discussed about diasporas and Indic community engagement with Satdeep, an Indian Wikimedian who is a member of the language committee. The Wikimedian of the Year session was brilliant; in particular I loved the decision of honoring Caner, a very good colleague and friend from Turkiye, as Media Contrubutor of the Year, and Hannah Clover, one year older than me, with the highest honor, the youngest Wikimedian of the year. Also Barbara spoke in the podium about CEE Youth Group and the recognition of Cyprus user group, which we support as Wikimedia Community User Group Greece.

Day 2 was also nice. I watched sessions about Hubs, a session about Wikiproject LGBT in Spanish, among others. The latter one is something that I have studied as I am interested on researching the learnings of various communities in order to adapt them into the Greek community for our improvement; meanwhile I also attended the Youth meetup which was such a success that there were 35 people there. Given that I am one of the leading members of the CEE Youth Group, that meetup was very important for me. This is because networking between young people is very significant to bring the youth scene forward, helping with doing youth strategy and generally because the challenges of young Wikimedians are around the same. We discussed how we can increase youth engagement, presence of young people, exchanged lessons. We made friendships and learned a lot about other youth groups like Jungwikipedianer in Germany. In a side note, in the same time was running the Wiki for Minorities meetup, a project where I am one of the leading members.

I also watched the session of Asaf Bartov, about the Big funnel approach to increase community engagement and post-outreach user retention in Africa. I always love to learn about the initiatives to increase participation among the underrepresented communities. I also attended Lightning talk showcase which was very interesting, and I liked the partnerships of Wikimedia Armenia about Financial wikimonth, done by my friend Mari. I wish I attended more sessions, but I also met many Wikimedians, fostering new friendships, and learning what they are doing in their respective local community. I spent some minutes in the Higher education meetup, telling about Ecwos, and learning about some initiatives chapters and affiliates take to increase presence of students at Wikimedia. I then helped with the CEE Youth program, that the CEE Hub was already arranging with the organizers since spring. I also both played and volunteered on the language similarity game headed by Mari. I also had the opportunity to meet Jimmy Wales here. Then I participated on the photowalk of Commons Photographers UG, and we had a wonderful time.

In third day I attended the keynote speech. I also saw what was done by people in various parts of the world to empower linguistic minorities and then I watched the interesting presentation about emotions and misinformation. That was really a mind-opening presentation because it’s impressive how emotions can bring misinformations; for example, when you’re amazed about e.g. a music event, you may spread mistakenly false information. Then I presented about the CEE Youth Group on Wikimania, my second session where I was a speaker, together with my colleagues and friends Mari of Armenia and Caner of Turkiye. Caner invited also Isna and Toprak as co-speakers, two presidents of student clubs in Turkey. We had a wonderful time presenting, and we answered some interesting feedback.

Then I chatted with Anton of Ukraine as well, about Young Wikimedians in Ukraine, the Ukrainian movement and the situation in the country. The Ukrainian resilience against the Russian invasion, and the fact that despite the hardships, our Ukrainian colleagues are doing a lot of brilliant things in the movement, are the reasons why I admire the Ukrainian Wikimedians a lot. After then, I spoke with various colleagues, then attended the Friday first learning clinic of Let’s connect, which I joined last month officially. Then I met Vjollca from Albania, discussing about engagement of students in Wikimedia, working with underage students, something well developed in Albanian movement and about partnerships for our countries. One of the things I learned in detail is about working with schools and people under 18, something key for CEE Youth Group, but unfortunately something underinvested too in both Greece and many CEE countries.

I then attended a speech of Toni and Barbara about the Hub, and I attended the Lightning talk showcase where among others, Daryna of Ukraine a great colleague I met in Prague gave an interesting session about how the Russian invasion in Ukraine has impacted the monuments in her country. Still, the other presentations were great and I liked the Scotland-inspired fairytale a lot.

After attending those sessions I went to the poster session, to present the CEE Youth Group poster with Caner, and then to the CEE meetup that had lots of people. I gave a very short update on CEE Youth Group activities since the last catch up and then played a Menti game where I finished sixth out of 43. We learned many things about the movement, in a menti made by Maciej and Philip. I then walked down the city with the rest of the Greek delegation and Başak from Turkey that joined us later. We could learn some things for the CEE Meeting so that we prepare us more in case we get the hosting for 2025.

Day 4: it was a bit sad that this was ending. But I had a good time. I attended many sessions, like one about Ukrainian libraries in the time of war and the Malaysia, Turkey and Japan Friendship program of Taufik, Caner, Eugene which is a program which proves that Wikimedia can unite countries and has earned my admiration since I learnt about that. Generally I spent my day with more networking, and attended some sessions. I met some Wikimedians from Brazil as well, and some Ukrainian colleagues during the dinner. The time passed quickly with some more sessions and connections and I met Farah later, a colleague from Palestine. I attended the closing ceremony as well. I hope, I will be able to attend Wikimania in Nairobi as well, in 2025. In day 4, I also met Butch, one of the COT members in past year’s Wikimania, where we got familiarised with each other’s communities, talked about movement developments and other stuff.

Then, I went to the Silesian opera house, the venue for the closing party. I met many wikimedians there, including Wojciech from the program committee. Then I went to dinner, and then walked back to the venue, where I met some more Wikimedians, and chatted with friends from Turkiye, Japan, Central Asia and beyond. Overall, I spoke to with around 130 Wikimedians, and had extensive talks with around 40 or 50, facilitating a knowledge exchange. If I can summarise what I got from Wikimania, these are divided in the main axises: getting to know new people, making new connections, increasing my knowledge and capacity on fields like event organising, education and community engagement. I also got immersed with what other countries are doing as well. That helped me to compare with the Greek community and act as inspiration to bring new initiatives that will help us develop further.

Epilogue

For me, the connections, the knowledge exchange and everything that happens confirms my opinion that Wikimedia is a global village of people who support each other. I am so proud to get an opportunity to attend it, and I hope I’ll be able to attend Wikimania in Nairobi, Kenya next year too. I am also proud of serving as reviewer for the community engagement track of the program. The last day was mostly spent on the flight and waiting to get boarded, but also chatted with as more Wikimedians as tens of us left for their countries through Warsaw. It was my first Wikimania. Wikimania is also very wonderful, for the following reasons: At first, the most important, you get immersed about what the other affiliates are doing to further our mission, and our movement, their wonderful projects, then come the connections you will make, which only increases the feeling of community and can help with projects/make partnerships, but also, the souvenirs that you’ll get in the end, like coins, etc. everything, that will remind you the immersive and amazing experience of Wikimania. This article aspires to cover as much more as possible of the things I did in Wikimania. I had meaningful conversations with people from more than a couple of dozen countries and talked with many more. All these conversations resulted, in a personal level, in a considerable amount of experience acquisition and connections.

Wikimania unites us. Wikimedia is a global community, and those events are these who make us to be together and foster a session of community. Thanks to Wikimania, the movement is growing more and more every year. I hope that this event, which had 5 Greek speakers of which 4 from Greece, the highest ever participation, will help us to grow.

Thanks to the Scholarship committee for giving me the opportunity to attend with a scholarship. Thank you COT for delivering us an unforgettable experience. Now, I am wishing to apply the learnings of Wikimania, while I am looking forward for CEE Meeting (the flagship meeting of the host region’s affiliates and volunteers) in Istanbul, Turkey one month later. Thanks to the COT, for delivering a great Wikimania, an unforgettable experience for everyone, and for trusting me to help with making it. It was a great experience.

Are you tired of workshops or events that lack tangible results? Wikimedia Deutschland and the Movement Ecology Collective have created a playbook that helps transform collective deliberations into tangible results and next steps.

Have you ever left a workshop or event feeling frustrated by the lack of tangible results, wondering what impact those discussions would actually have? We have, too. It’s not easy to enable collaboration, build convergence between diverse viewpoints, and create a space for equitable participation despite power dynamics. We believe that many organizations and individuals face similar challenges when it comes to bringing people together to advance common goals.

That’s why Wikimedia Deutschland worked with the Movement Ecology Collective to create a playbook designed to transform workshops into outcome-driven deliberations, ensuring your discussions lead to concrete actions and results. And since Wikimedia is all about free knowledge, we want to share it with everyone, as a gift to contribute to the sum of all knowledge.

What’s the purpose of the playbook? 

This playbook draws from the lessons that Wikimedia Deutschland learned designing international strategic events with Wikimedians for many years. It offers a how-to guide to designing and facilitating a process for a group to discuss, assess and decide upon their collective position on a strategic or governance proposition. This playbook can be adapted to individual situations within and outside the Wikiverse, to deliver the intended outcomes and advance your goals. It is particularly suited for single organizations and large conglomerates of organizations from different backgrounds developing a common strategy, writing a foundational document or developing organization-wide values. 

We have developed and tested the process for the Wikimedia Summit 2024, a three-day event where 170 participants from different backgrounds and continents were able to find a strong collective position on a major governance document, the Wikimedia Movement Charter. Most of the participants left the event with a feeling of having made significant progress (here are quotes from the feedback received in the anonymous event evaluation survey): 

How to use the playbook? 

The process consists of 15 steps from gathering feedback on the initial proposition to developing proposals on how to adapt and improve it and to making a collective decision about these proposals. It is divided into four sections which can be read in order or separately, depending on what you’re most interested in – key learnings, setup, process, and tools. Each section is illustrated with examples from Wikimedia Summit 2024. 

When adopting the process, adapting it is key: to deliver the intended outcomes, it needs to be tailored to the group who’s using it, its goals and its needs. This playbook helps asking the right questions and finding practical answers.

Please get in touch with our team to share any feedback on the playbook, your experiences with using and adapting the process, or your ideas for collaborations: govmov@wikimedia.de

Have fun experimenting with the playbook!

Some time ago I did the final work to move out the web performance tooling out of Amazon Web Services (AWS). It's been a long journey. Let me tell you how it all started.

But first, what is the performance tooling? It's tools that automate the web browsers, where we navigate to Wikipedia and measure the performance of Wikipedia pages. When we are measuring the performance we want as stable server and environment as possible. The more stable server where we deploy our tool, the smaller performance regressions we can pick up.

The AWS Background

In 2015 I deployed our first own hosted version of the Open Source web performance tool WebPageTest (T109666). At that time, WebPageTest was Windows only and we didn't want to host Windows machines in our own hosting so we started to use AWS. Hosting outside of our data center also made sense since we wanted to simulate performance testing as our users. Our users do not live in our data center. We started out with a couple of Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud servers and used Amazon object storage for hosting the HTML reports from the tool.

A couple of years later (2018 in T189184), the tool evolved and moved to Linux. I did a lot of testing to make Firefox work in the new setup. We continued to use AWS because it was easy to just spin up a couple of Linux servers.

We also started to host our own time series database outside of our own hosting, to make it easy to add metrics from servers running outside of our own hosting. Have you guessed where it ended up? On AWS because it was easy.

We continued to work on our performance testing and @Gilles and I started to try out front end performance testing using replay proxies (T176361). A replay proxy records the web traffic and replay it locally. That way you measure the front end performance without the disturbance of the internet. That worked out great and we also tried out different host providers to see where we would get the most stable metrics and at that point it was on AWS. With the replay proxy tests, we added a couple of more servers.

We also tried running tests on bare metal servers, however in retrospect, at that time I didn't have the correct skills to configure the servers correctly and AWS gave us better results so we continued to use AWS.

The AWS Problem

Why did we want to move out of AWS? The numbers were good compared to other cloud providers. However we still had problems. One thing that the Netflix team talked about how even if you deploy the same EC2 type, the performance can vary between 10-20% of the instance. You can read more about the variance at Brendan Greggs blog post. We also did try to measure the variance. We could see that we had different performance on the same EC2 type. That meant we needed to make sure that a test ran on a specific EC2 instance. If it ran on another one, we would have a change in our performance metrics.

We also have seen that performance changes over time and that we get different performance at different times T289516. That makes it harder to find small performance regressions.

The New Setup

A couple of years ago I re-evaluated running tests on bare metal servers and it worked out great this time. We can get stable metrics on bare metal servers . We can get the same performance all the time by tuning and configuring the server.

I started to move all of our testing out of AWS to use bare metal (T311981 and T345595). The price for the servers was also cheaper, so the move was a win/win. The new provider re-use old servers from other customers. Instead of buying new hardware we can reuse older ones that were bought for other purposes. That's better in an ecological aspect.

A couple of weeks ago I took the last step and moved our time series database to another host T362020 and instead of Amazon object storage we store the performance result on a disk on a server.

The new setup run on bare metal servers. That is cheaper and gives us more reliable performance metrics. For services that do not need that stability we use Cloud VPS.

The Result

By moving the test servers to a cheaper provider I could run more performance tests at a lower price. We increased the number of test servers with a lower total price. With more test servers, we can do more tests and more runs.

I used extra test runs to implement the Mann Whitney U test (T351929). By running more tests and using Mann Whitney we know if a performance regression is of statistical significance. That way we can make sure that we only alert on real regressions. That decreases the number of false alerts and time spent investigating regressions. I'll write more about how we use Mann Whitney U in my next blog post.

We took stance against the use of spyware in the EU and beyond. This pervasive technology poses significant threat to European fundamental values, such as democracy and rule of law, and risks severely infringing fundamental rights to privacy and data protection as well as freedom of expression. Alongside with other civil society and journalists’ organisations we called on the new EU Institutions and Member States to take swift action and ban the use of such a technology. We need to protect citizens, including Wikimedians, and their fundamental rights from undue interference and arbitrary behaviours. Here below you can read the statement with the specific calls for action.

We are a coalition of civil society organisations and journalists’ organisations committed to the protection of fundamental rights, transparency, and accountability in relation to spyware technologies. Spyware poses a significant threat to EU democratic values, public debate and healthy civic spaces by undermining critical pillars such as independent decision-making among lawmakers and the ability of journalists and activists to hold power accountable. Furthermore, as highlighted by the European Data Protection Supervisor, the level of intrusiveness of modern spyware tools undermines the essence of the fundamental right to privacy and data protection, which makes them illegal under Union law.

The European Parliament Committee of Inquiry to investigate the use of Pegasus and equivalent surveillance spyware (PEGA Committee) concluded in May 2023 that the majority of EU Member States had purchased spyware tools and that some of them have used spyware to unlawfully and arbitrarily surveil journalists, human rights defenders, and politicians within the EU, as reported by several civil society organisations.

We deeply regret that the EU Institutions have failed to provide effective solutions and a more comprehensive approach to the numerous reports of maladministration and abuse of power by Member States during the last legislative term.

Moreover, the recently adopted European Media Freedom Act (EMFA) sets a troubling precedent. Despite its commendable intentions, the law fails to fully protect journalists from spyware, lacking essential safeguards against their surveillance and creating sweeping legal grounds for its use against them in the EU. Consequently, both spyware victims and EU society as a whole still await an appropriate institutional response to this threat to fundamental rights.  

We, the undersigned organisations, believe that the new legislative term provides an opportunity for the incoming EU Institutions to take more decisive action and implement the EU acquis on this matter. The Commission, the Council and the Parliament must urgently take robust measures to curtail the abuse of spyware in the EU and uphold EU values by respecting and protecting fundamental rights, introducing effective accountability mechanisms and delivering remedies to victims of illegal spyware surveillance. Moreover, Member States are responsible for safeguarding the fundamental rights of all individuals under their jurisdiction.

We urge the incoming EU Institutions and EU Member States to adopt the following measures without delay: 

EU Commission

• Propose a new EU legal framework that addresses the challenges posed by spyware, which includes an EU-wide ban on the production, export, sale, import, acquisition, transfer, servicing and use of spyware, which disproportionately interfere with fundamental rights and for which no safeguards are adequate to prevent and redress harms to human rights. 
• Impose a moratorium in the EU until this new legal framework is put in place.
• Push for the implementation of a complete ban on the development and sale of commercial spyware by private companies.
• Make sure that existing legal framework is adequately implemented by the MS, by conducting a comprehensive and in-depth assessment of Member States’ compliance with the ePrivacy and Law Enforcement Directives and with the Dual-Use Regulation and launch infringement procedures against those whose trade and use of spyware breach those instruments. 
• Strengthen the export control regime by reviewing and amending the EU Dual-Use Regulation, notably by incorporating spyware into the definition of cyber-surveillance tools and including obligations guaranteeing these goods are not used for repression or human rights violations.
• Utilise the instruments available within the rule of law toolbox to monitor the use of spyware by Member States, including deploying the Rule of Law Framework, incorporating findings into the Annual Rule of Law Report, initiating infringement procedures where necessary and applying the Conditionality Regulation to suspend EU funds in cases where spyware use undermines the rule of law and in case of failing oversight mechanisms. 
• Mandate transparency in EU Member States government contracts and operations involving spyware, ensuring accountability for abuses.
• Propose a harmonised legal definition of national security and set guidelines for Member States to determine a genuine and serious threat to national security.
• Enforce a ban on the commercial trade of vulnerabilities for any purpose other than strengthening systems security and mandate the responsible disclosure of vulnerability research findings.
• Ensure that any future legislative proposal  potentially replacing the ePrivacy Regulation proposal provides for stronger  guarantees to protect the confidentiality of communications, notably by strengthening the right to protection of terminal equipment already afforded by the ePrivacy Directive.

Council of the EU

• Refrain from introducing wide national security exceptions into EU legislation, as such carve-outs create significant gaps in the applicability and enforcement of EU legal instruments and expose citizens to further fundamental rights violations. 
• Organise a debate on the use of spyware within the EU in the General Affairs Council and adopt relevant conclusions.

EU Member States

• Suspend all exports out of the EU on the sale and transfer of surveillance technology that have been authorised in breach of international human rights standards. 
• Refrain from derogating from their  fundamental rights obligations under the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights and the European Convention on Human Rights by claiming national security exemptions.
• Impose sanctions on vendors found to have infringed their due-diligence obligations under EU law.
• Commit to maintaining the higher or absolute  level of protection at national level, by not relying on the derogation under Article 4, Paragraph 5, of the EMFA concerning the possibility for Member States to deploy intrusive surveillance software. 
• Eliminate all existing obstacles preventing victims of spyware from accessing justice and appropriate remedies and ensure that all police and judicial investigations are dealt with promptly, effectively and transparently. 

EU Parliament

• Continue its work investigating, monitoring and proposing recommendations to curtail the abuses of surveillance spyware by Member States and continue calling for the full implementation of the recommendations of the PEGA committee. 
• Make use of all resources at its disposal to exercise its scrutiny powers over the EU Commission and Council and to hold them accountable for their inaction, insufficient actions or non-compliance with existing Union acquis.

We emphasise that all the decision-makers concerning the aforementioned recommendations, without exception, should make their decisions only after consulting publicly and transparently with relevant national and international stakeholders, including civil society organisations, human rights groups, and representative bodies of surveillance victims.

We, the undersigned organisations, representing a diverse cross-section of civil society and journalists’ organisations, stand united in demanding immediate action to respect and protect the rights of all individuals in the EU from the pervasive threat of spyware.

Members of the Coordination Group

Access Now

ARTICLE 19

Centre for Democracy & Technology Europe (CDT EU)

Civil Liberties Union for Europe (Liberties)

Data Rights

Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC)

Epicenter.works – for digital rights

European Digital Rights (EDRi)

European Federation of Journalists (EFJ)

The Hungarian Civil Liberties Union (HCLU)

Privacy International (PI)

Wikimedia Europe

Additional signatories

Aspiration

Digital Rights Ireland

Data Privacy Brasil

Centre for Peace Studies

Citizen D / Državljan D

Civil Rights Defenders

European Center for Not-for-Profit Law (ECNL)

Fundación Karisma (Colombia)

Homo Digitalis 

Italian Coalition for Civil Liberties and Rights (CILD)

IT-Pol Denmark

Ligue des droits humains (Belgium)

Panoptykon Foundation

Peace Institute (Slovenia)

Sflc.in (India)

Vrijschrift.org

Xnet, Institute for Democratic Digitalisation (Spain)

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