Dear all,
While at Wikimania, we all had a small India - Nepal team meet up. Here is
a brief summary of what we discussed. All the Indian and Nepali Wikimedians
were enthusiastically gathered by Malayalee Wikipedian Viswa Prabha in the
ballroom at Wikimania.
Since it was an informal meet up, we had the opportunity to discuss
anything and everything! It was awesome to see Wikipedians of all ages,
from various places in India and Nepal, all coming together to discuss the
stuff they were doing! Actually, the first team meet happened on the plane
itself - somewhere above Russia I was told :-)
From mobile to Indic languages, GLAM, outreach in
states of India, OCR for
Indian languages to some ideas that could make
communication between
communities and entities easier as well as IEP, we truly learned the best
practices that have been tried and tested by fellow community members.
*OCR for Indic languages:*
Kul, Viswa Prabha, Dr Rajasekhar and Ganesh from the Nepali community had
discussions on whether OCR could be integrated and functional for Indic
language Wikiprojects since that would make the work a lot easier for many
editors. Viswa Prabha is currently working on something and his energy is
really infectious. :-)
Anyone interested can take lead for their communities as well. This would
also help the Malayalam education program in its next phase to get more
student editors on Wikisource.
*Reviving Offline/CD project:*
Harriet, who has been involved with OLPC was also present and asked
questions about the offline/CD initiative and whether the project had an
India specific section. It was suggested that although there is no scalable
tech solution to filter content appropriate for children depending on their
age groups, it could be done manually depending on the age group we're
looking at.
*Announcement page:*
By this time we all agreed that there are so many small and big projects
are happening across communities! Bishakha suggested there should be a more
central place to list out new announcements and more importantly contact
details of people who can help out with various activities. This could be
done on Meta ideally.
*
Using social media to keep vandals at bay!*
There was a brief discussion on how social media can be utilized more
effectively. Viswa Prabha weighed in saying how these social network
platforms could be avenues to deal with vandalism as well as diverse
discussions while keeping Wikipedia related discussions focused on talk
pages.
*GLAM national coordinator:*
Wikimania had a panel discussion on GLAM coordinators following which it
was also discussed whether India community or chapter should have such a
position in order to guide and coordinate and help out new folks who want
to start GLAM projects. Similarly, for WLM or such photo events, I do
recall there being a talk for valid press cards that could be given to SIGs
to help folks out in case of police trouble.
*
Outreach:*
Last but not the least, Yuvi suggested how hackathons could be an excellent
way of outreach (citing the Bangalore and Chennai examples). Nitika also
gave an update on the British Council Wikiclubs. User:Rangilo_Gujarati who
was also present there has volunteered to help with the British Council in
Pune.
It was heartbreaking to see that a lot of our fellow members could not make
it due to visa problems but hopefully, we'll have bigger meetups soon!
Attaching a photo of the meetup (photo curtsy: Rangilo_Gujarati) and a
special mention to Viswa Prabha for winning the Raffles!
Thank you,
Best,
Noopur
--
Noopur Raval