Newsletter/July2009
Summary: This month, we bring exciting news about our Wikimedia Foundation Grant, as well as news on our chapter Initiatives (get involved!) and our opt-out of Phorm. We also talk about Business Cards, a recent interview of our Secretary for use in university courses and Wikimania 2013 - which seems a long way off! We also include our regular features of chapter activities from around the globe, press coverage, and meetups!
In this month's newsletter:
- Wikimedia Foundation Grant
- Chapter Initiatives
- Phorm
- Business Cards
- Wikimania 2013
- Wikipedia in universities
- Other Chapters' Activities
- Press Coverage
- Meet-ups
Wikimedia Foundation Grant
Wikimedia UK is please to announce that our bid for a £5,000 grant towards the start-up of our chapter has been approved! This has a number of benefits to the chapter, including, but not limited to, funding for our Initiatives, and the possibility of applying for charitable status direct to the Charity Commission. Work has begun on filling out the necessary forms to apply direct to the Charity Commission, and details of our Initiatives are below!
Chapter Initiatives
With the approval of our grant, our Initiatives process has had quite a kick start! With money now available for our Initiatives (see the Bid page for a more detailed breakdown), the Board has agreed on three Initiatives that will be our targets for completion in March 2010, prior to our 2010 AGM. They are:
- London Loves Wikipedia - Encouraging museums and galleries to open their doors to our volunteers to generate content for Wikimedia projects!
- Schools Project - Generating a series of materials and workshops to encourage the proper use of / contributions to Wikimedia projects in schools and educational establishment.
- Workplace Learning Lunches - Bringing together a group of speakers from the membership who are willing to give "learning lunch" talks at businesses like the BBC.
Wikimedia UK now needs your help! We need members who are willing to get themselves involved in these Initiatives - whether it be through technical, speaking, motivational, or any other means you can think of. You can sign up at the Initiative pages, or on our Speakers list.
Phorm
Wikimedia UK has requested that the wikimedia.org.uk and wikimedia.co.uk domain names are excluded from the Phorm service. Phorm have replied with an acknowledgement of our request, which can be seen here. Wikimedia UK consider the scanning and profiling of your browsing bahaviour by a third party to be an infringement on your privacy - and thus we have opted out of the scheme.
Business Cards
Business Cards are planned to be available to any member who wishes to represent the chapter. If you are interested in purchasing some, please email Paul Williams, our Volunteers Director, at paul.williams@wikimedia.org.uk to express your interest. Prices will be decided based on the number of people expressing an interest, as costs change with number printed. The cards will be designed as per the Wikimedia standard, and will be generic cards - containing only Wikimedia UK information.
Wikimania 2013
Wikimedia UK is tentatively planning to include a bid for Wikimania to be hosted in Manchester in 2013. We have already had interest from the Manchester Tourist Board in hosting the annual conference. Thoughts, comments, and suggestions are welcome on the mailing list!
Wikipedia in universities
Our Secretary, Andrew Turvey, will soon feature in a course aimed at university lecturers on the use of technology in education. The course is expected to be used by over 1,000 lecturers in 100 universities around the world and covers the use of Wikipedia as a source, active learning through Wikipedia article creation and re-using Wikipedia content. We are expecting to receive the final copy in a couple of weeks.
Other Chapters' Activities
- Wikimedia Denmark, Wikimedia Portugal, and Wikimedia Ukraine have been created and approved by the Foundation.
- Wikimedia Hong Kong has elected its first Board of Directors.
- Wikimedia Deutschland has selected a new Executive Director to take over as of August 1st: Pavel Richter.
Press Coverage
- The Guardian covered the use of unattributed passages from Wikipedia articles in the upcoming book Free by Chris Anderson, editor-in-chief of Wired Magazine, uncovered by The Virginia Quartely Review
- The Times covered the case of a New York Times journalist whose kidnapping was hushed up by Wikipedia office actions so that his ransom price wasn't increased.
- The Telegraph and The Register reported that the Crown Prosecution Service is encouraging the use of Wikipedia by the UK police force.
- The National Portrait Gallery has threatened to sue a Wikipedian who uploaded images of their paintings to Commons. This has been covered by The Register, various blogs [1][2] and some newspapers including The Guardian.
- The Telegraph Communities Editor in his blog called on Wikipedia to "delete the deletionists" and replace the notability guideline with "usefulness".
Meet-ups
The 23rd London meetup was held on the 12th July, with a large turnout and lots of active conversations ranging from copyright law (including the National Portrait Gallery issue) to Wikipedia in schools to what to see as a tourist in Australia! London 24, will be on Sunday 9th August @ 13:00 in Penderel's Oak Pub, Holborn WC1.