Re: [Wikimedia-SF] Wikipedia Workshop at Moscone Center December 16.

14 November 2008 Hi Cary, The ASCB (American Society for Cell Biology) Wikipedia workshop will take place on December 16th, from 12:30-2:30pm at the Moscone Center. Because of security issues, and also because the organizers are really nice, the volunteers should show up at the Moscone Center at 11am, so that the organizers can take us all out to a nice lunch and escort us personally to the workshop. I think the organizers are sincerely interested in Wikipedia and Wikipedians, and see great possibilities where science and Wikipedia intersect. Anyway, it's a 3 1/2 hour gig in all (11am-2:30pm), although I think volunteers could leave the workshop early if they needed to. The organizers invited User:TimVickers and me to run the workshop. Basically, the organizers would like us all to help their scientists put their research up on Wikipedia as referenced articles with newly uploaded images. The scientists will bring the references, images and knowledge; all we need to do is help them squeeze all that into a good wiki-article. Tim and I will probably speak for 30 minutes, introducing Wikipedia and wiki-markup, and then let the scientists start writing from 1pm-2:30pm. We'll do everything in our power to make it easy for the scientists, who are reportedly smart people. ;) But there's bound to be snafus and confusions and misapprehensions, which the personal touch of a few good volunteers could smooth over. Volunteers won't need their laptops, just good cheer and a willingness to help out some befuddled scientists. It's a great opportunity to build bridges with the scientific community, and put a human face on Wikipedia. If the workshop works as well as I hope, we'll get more invites from other scientific bodies, which in turn means more great scientific articles and contributors, which in turn means...you get the picture. We're also recruiting volunteers to help out online. Hoping for a good turnout from both communities, Bill