This week Wikipedia is celebrating its tenth birthday. To mark this momentous occasion, people all over the world are gathering at events to celebrate Wikipedia, the fifth most popular website in the world with 410 million monthly readers (comScore, November 2010).
There are three key events in the UK this week:
- Thursday 13th January (12pm to 1pm): The man behind the project, Jimmy Wales, will be in Bristol speaking at an event hosted by Bristol University, HP Labs, Bristol Festival of Ideas, BBC Anchor Project and Bristol City Council. Jimmy will be talking about the key milestones over the last decade and discussing ‘what next’ for Wikipedia. Watch Jimmy’s talk live here on our Wikimedia UK blog this coming Thursday.
- Thursday 13th January (7pm to 9pm): Jimmy will be hosting a party in West London where a mixture of community members, press, donors, and some. We’ll keep you posted of ‘behind the scene’ pictures and party gossip via Twiiter. Follow @wikimediauk for more information.
- Friday 14th January and Saturday 15th January (9.30am to 5pm both days): An Edit-athon will be held at the British Library. The aim of the gathering is to improve the content on Wikipedia that is relevant to the British Library’s collections. Attendees will have access to the resources of the British Library and guided by the expertise of its curators. If you are interested, please sign up before Wednesday 12th January. An update from the event will be posted on here on our Wikimedia UK blog next week.
Visit http://ten.wikipedia.org/ to find events in your areas or visit http://ten.wikipedia.org/wiki/Organize to arrange a party.
Do keep us posted of your plans. You can email us on press@wikimedia.org.uk or tweet at us @wikimediauk. The hashtag for the celebrations is #wp10. We’d love to hear how you are celebrating Wikipedia’s 10th birthday…