Adam Harangozó stepped into the role in December 2025, combining sharing openly licensed content, training and preparing learning resources, with bibliometrics tools to help researchers make their work more visible. The project will last for two years and aims to support LSE and the wider international social science community in developing open knowledge and sharing insights and expertise through the Wikimedia projects. Adam has previously worked as a Wikimedian in Residence for the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR) and the Blinken Open Society Archives (based in Budapest).

At Wikimedia UK, we are very excited to be working with both LSE and Adam. This is the fourth residency active at a UK university – joining Edinburgh, Exeter, and Leeds – and the first to focus specifically on social science.

As well as joining LSE’s community, Adam joins Wikimedia UK’s community of Wikimedians in Residence who learn from and support each other. LSE’s ‘Research for the World’ strategy aligns closely with WMUK’s aims, setting out how LSE seeks to “generate the knowledge and insight the world needs to build a more sustainable, prosperous and equitable future.”

The post Introducing the new Wikimedian In Residence at LSE appeared first on Wikimedia UK.

10 years ago I turned up for my first day at work as a Wikipedian in Residence at the National Library of Wales. I had a 12 month contract and instructions to hold 3 Wikipedia Edit-a-thons, share some images openly to Wikimedia Commons and monitor the impact. 

A decade later and I’m still here! I’ve transitioned from Wikipedian in Residence to National Wikimedian, to Open Data Manager, with Wikimedia projects still firmly at the heart of what I do at the Library. We have shared over 150,000 images to the Commons with 1.5 Billion views. I’ve held 97 workshops and edit-a-thons, delivered 10 grant funded projects and overseen the creation of thousands of new Wikipedia articles, mostly in Welsh. In this time the role has evolved dramatically but the core principles of openness, engagement and innovation have remained unchanged. 

Reaching this milestone is an opportunity to reflect on the achievements and challenges of the last 10 years, and to think about what the next decade might look like in a rapidly changing digital landscape.

On a personal level the role has certainly helped shape me professionally and as a person. I’ve become a passionate advocate for open access, for the Welsh language and for open knowledge. When I took up the role, my skills lay mainly in research but I’ve learned a huge amount about community building, about impact and evaluation and my technical skills have increased dramatically. I’ve taught myself how to bulk upload to Commons and Wikidata, how to write a SPARQL query and even how to run python scripts and bots, which is incredibly empowering. But the area I love most is strategy. It’s taken a while, but I’ve learned to think strategically about my work; how tasks and projects help build towards broader goals and how to maximize impact, or public benefit, through my activities.

I think it’s important to acknowledge that none of this would have been possible without the continued support of management at the National Library. In my time here I’ve seen many brilliant residencies come and go and the Library’s commitment to this work, long term, is something not often seen in the GLAM sector. I’ve also been given the freedom to try things out, to explore leads that sometimes go nowhere and to implement new ideas. About 6 months into the residency I remember being introduced to Wikidata for the first time at Wikimedia UK’s old London Office. I immediately saw huge potential for describing and linking cultural heritage data and was given the time to explore this further. As a result we became an early adopter of Wikidata in the GLAM sector, hired the world’s first, and only (to my knowledge) Wikidata Visiting Scholar. The library has contributed millions of edits to Wikidata, expanding linked open data about Wales and its people. Time and time again I’ve been given the freedom to design my own projects and to travel to share skills and learn from the global community. I’m certain that a more rigid, micro managed approach would have seen the work and the funding dwindle away early on.

In terms of why the library has continued to fund this work, there are a number of reasons. Firstly impacts such as massive image views on Wikipedia, public engagement and support for the Welsh language align with the institution’s core values. Around 5 years ago we started counting views of Wikipedia pages containing our images as a key performance indicator, reporting quarterly to the Welsh Government. I’ve built relationships with many other institutions through our Wiki work, from universities and GLAMs to governing bodies. In year two we also formed a close relationship with the Welsh Government around their work to support Welsh language technology and education. And all this has led to a number of grant funded projects and collaborations in the digital scholarship space – effectively subsidising the cost of my role, whilst building partnerships, communities and improving Welsh knowledge online.

To some extent the longevity of my residency is probably also down to the ever evolving scope of my work. I’ve always tried to observe how people want and expect to be able to access knowledge and adapt my work to ensure the library is supporting the creation and maintenance of knowledge in that space. 

Early in the residency the focus was very much on Wikipedia. That is where people go for information, so that is where we should be; training new editors, sharing our collections and our knowledge. Many of our early projects focused on these goals. We ran a project on Welsh Pop Music, creating Welsh language articles about Welsh singers and bands. We even convinced a Welsh record label to share short clips of songs, and album artworks to Wikimedia Commons. Another project which I’m particularly proud of focused on creating health related content in Welsh. Welsh Wikipedia lacked key articles about diseases, treatments and mental health topics. I remember a conversation with a first language Welsh speaker who had suffered with depression and anxiety telling me that she was volunteering to write relevant content so that others didn’t have to read about their diagnosis in their second language. For me that was a powerful reminder of why supporting Wikipedia in smaller languages is so important.

In 2018, we hosted the second Celtic Knot Conference at the Library. Supported by Wikimedia UK and originally aimed at engaging small Celtic languages on Wikipedia, the conference has grown in scope to a global Wiki conference for small and minority languages, with participants from all over the world.

Education has also been a focus over the years. Young people in particular rely on the internet to learn. Early in the project educators were often wary of having anything to do with Wikipedia, but we’ve seen a real transformation, with most now embracing Wikipedia, accepting that students are going to use it anyway, and engaging with it to help them understand how it works and how to use it responsibly. In 2019, with funding from the Education Department we developed the “WikiAddysg” (Wiki Education) project, aimed at improving Welsh Wikipedia content related to the secondary school History syllabus in Wales. We consulted with teachers, secured open access to Welsh learning resources from a number of organisations and hired a former history teacher to help us adapt the content for Wikipedia. We even commissioned short educational videos to compliment the articles. For many years we’ve also supported Menter Iaith Môn’s Wikipedian, who has been running Wiki events in schools in Anglesey, North Wales. Wikimedia UK has been super supportive in securing a foothold for Wikipedia in Welsh education and I’m full of hope that this area of work will continue to grow.

We continue to support Wikipedia with regular edit-a-thons, tailored volunteer training and research into automated methods of creating Welsh language articles. However, over time our focus has shifted to encompass data. Over the last decade, the value of open data for research, learning and commerce has been increasingly acknowledged. It allows for siloed datasets to be interlinked, it allows communities to collaborate to improve and enrich knowledge as data and helps power new and innovative tools for knowledge exchange. And this was before the AI boom, where we are increasingly aware that computer models are only as good as the data which powers them.

I think it’s fair to say that Wikidata has become the largest collection of open cultural heritage data the world has ever seen. You can look up an artist, a poet or scribe and see links to their archives in institutions all over the world, or see an artist’s life work in one place. Linked Open Data is now seen as the gold data standard by many – a modern data infrastructure for cultural heritage data with common standards and structure. Like many public sector institutions we have faced constant cuts to our budget, and platforms like Wikidata and Wikibase have been a way for us to begin the process of modernising our data, of linking it to other datasets in Wales and beyond with minimal investment and in an inclusive, open and collaborative way.

Last year, we launched our Welsh Name Authority Wikibase, which already links over 100,000 Welsh people and places across collections and institutions. We’ve also worked closely with the Welsh Language Commissioner since 2023, aligning their data to Wikidata and other Welsh heritage data. Wikidata lets us do this bilingually, so we can make our datasets available in Welsh for the first time. We’ve already seen the value in investing in this Open Data. The Welsh Government, the BBC, The Welsh Biography Online and Mapio Cymru (Welsh OpenStreetMap) have all used our data. We helped improve a popular daily Welsh language quiz app that uses Wikidata to create a huge bank of questions, and what3words launched a Welsh language edition thanks in part to Welsh language Wikidata labels. 

Just last year, the Welsh Language Commissioner launched a new website for their database of standardized Welsh place names, and thanks to the alignment with Wikidata they’ve been able to include images and sound clips from Commons and links to Wikipedia articles, creating a rich user experience. I’m particularly fond of this collaboration as an example of community and institution working together. The idea of combining authoritative data with crowdsourced data not only leads to better tools and services but fosters an inclusive space where everyone can be empowered to contribute their voice, their knowledge and their passions.

There have, of course, been challenges and frustrations along the way. Many fixed term residents finish their posting without having affected fundamental changes within their host organisation, and that’s not to say that these residencies were a failure, just a reminder that the wheels of change move very slowly in many GLAM organisations, and ours is no different. Before I was appointed the library had made a bold policy move (bold at the time) by relinquishing any claim to digital reproductions out of copyright works, and it was this decision which allowed me to get right to uploading content to Commons. But shifting the organisational culture to an “open by default” mentality is an ongoing and occasionally circular conversation. Much of the reluctance to be more Open, in the library and other organisations I’ve worked with boils down to budgetary pressures, a lack of confidence in making big changes to long established systems and sometimes just a difference in interpretation of licensing and copyright law. I’m confident though that things are moving in the right direction, highlighted by our recent release of over 120,000 photographs to Commons, documenting Welsh life in the 1950s and 60s.

The Wikiverse can also be a tricky place to navigate at times. Tools for uploading images and monitoring impact tend to break from time to time, and when they are replaced with new ones the learning process starts all over again. Most of these tools only exist at all thanks to dedicated volunteers, and it would be great to see more support from the Wikimedia Foundation in creating a stable toolset for partner organisations. Once again though it feels like things are now moving in the right direction.

Of course, the biggest challenge facing Wikimedia UK and the wider Wiki movement is how to respond to the rise of Generative AI. It’s also a topic taking up more and more of my time. How good will it get? And how soon? How can we correct mistakes and tackle inherent bias? How do we ensure smaller languages are not left behind? These are just a few of the questions I’ve been asking myself. So as I look to the future I’m left thinking that perhaps the golden age of Wikipedia as a destination has passed. But that doesn’t mean it’s any less important, especially in smaller languages. If, as a society, we continue to value the vision of free knowledge for all, the Wiki projects will continue to be the most effective way of achieving this, and the most effective way of feeding new knowledge into the digital space.

I don’t think anyone really knows how the next ten years will play out but I hope we can continue to build on the momentum towards an Open society and to use new technologies for good; for sharing knowledge more widely in all languages, for reducing bias and for linking our knowledge together across institutions, sectors and cultures. For as long as Wikimedia and its volunteers represent these values I’m confident that Wikimedians in Residence will continue to further the cause, driving digital transformation in their host institutions which benefit society as a whole.

The post A decade of collaboration between Wikimedia UK and the National Library of Wales: Building a sustainable future for Welsh culture online appeared first on Wikimedia UK.

Since 2022, the NIHR has been piloting the use of Wikipedia as an innovative platform to share research results. In just over a year, working with researchers, patient and public contributors and NIHR staff, we have updated and expanded 400 Wikipedia articles with findings from NIHR-funded research.

The updated Wikipedia content now includes up to 300 citations to NIHR Evidence, and 200 citations to NIHR journals, plus other references to NIHR-funded studies. Following our edits, these articles have garnered an impressive 75 million views.

The Wikipedia project is now gaining momentum across the NIHR. What started as a pilot will turn into a permanent strand of our dissemination strategy. We expect this to lead to increased evidence uptake in policy and practice, and help to make knowledge more open.

Table: Some of the articles we have edited on Wikipedia and the number of times they have been viewed since our additions

Why should researchers use Wikipedia?

Wikipedia is an online encyclopaedia that is free to use and simple to edit. Contrary to popular belief, its editing policies and army of editors ensure that it is a reliable source of health information. It is also one of the most visited health resources on the internet. In 2019, Wikipedia’s medical content had more than 2 billion page views.

Referencing NIHR research on Wikipedia makes our research more accessible. It reaches a wide audience that includes laypeople and healthcare professionals alike. Studies have suggested that 50 – 70% of doctors consult Wikipedia for healthcare information. It was also found to be one of the most used resources by medical students.

Concerns and preconceptions about the reliability of Wikipedia need to be acknowledged. Yet, in my time at the NIHR, I’ve seen these worries fade away when I explain how Wikipedia works, and its checks and balances for accuracy. Most people are pleasantly surprised at how important Wikipedia is for health information, and how user-friendly it is.

Collaborative Wikipedia editing workshops

There is an appetite for harnessing Wikipedia’s potential. Several NIHR research teams and centres are now interested in integrating Wikipedia editing into their dissemination strategy. Some include it as part of their funding application.

Our thematic editing workshops for researchers, patients and members of the public have been impactful.

Other than access to the internet, there are no technical requirements. Prior knowledge of Wikipedia editing is unnecessary. Technical aspects are taken care of by the Wikipedian so participants can focus on enriching content.

During these workshops, 10-20 participants collaborate and aim to improve the quality of a single Wikipedia page corresponding to their research area.

For example, multiple long-term conditions are an area of strategic focus for the NIHR. But the Wikipedia page on multiple long-term conditions was short and outdated. It lacked evidence from the past 10 years. Following a workshop, the article now includes detailed evidence from NIHR-funded studies. It describes how terminology has changed, the impact of multiple long-term conditions on quality of life, and other updates.

In another workshop, we collaborated with the NIHR’s Mental Health Policy Research Unit. Together, we updated the article on the remote delivery of psychiatric care, known also as telepsychiatry. This expanded article now reflects their research on the practice and impact of telepsychiatry during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Graph: Improved content draws in more readers: Increased monthly traffic of the Multiple Long Term Conditions article following our workshop

Exploring new horizons

We have built a strong foundation for Wikipedia editing at the NIHR, with new opportunities for researchers to share and refine information on vital research. Many more topics could be covered in editing workshops, and previously edited articles can be updated as new evidence is published.

Social care, patient and public involvement, health equity, and global health are areas with untapped potential for Wikipedia editing.

We have started to deliver global health Wikipedia workshops, which will help share global health research with a lay audience, reaching additional people, potentially local audiences too as articles could be translated into other languages as well.

We are exploring how to nurture the next generation of health and care professionals and researchers. We are talking to health librarians and university departments, and suggesting that Wikipedia editing could be an assignment for medical students.

Discover more about the Wikipedia project

Wikipedia offers plenty of opportunities to share research widely. We can bring together a diverse community of researchers and patients to work on sharing health and care knowledge effectively. This will help ensure that more people can access the NIHR’s research, and perhaps also transcend language barriers.

As Wikipedian-in-residence, I’m looking forward to new developments in knowledge sharing, and continued growth in access to information.

To learn more about the NIHR Wikipedia project, contact Adam Harangozo.

The post How Wikipedia can help to disseminate research: an innovative NIHR project appeared first on Wikimedia UK.

On Sunday 26th November we were delighted to host our 2023 Community Meeting. It was a chance for our community to gather online, share the work that’s taken place over the last year, recognise that work through the UK Wikimedian of the Year awards, and find out more ways to get involved. 

We were welcomed by our Chief Executive Lucy Crompton-Reid, and then we launched into a series of Lightning Talks.

Lightning Talks

Dr Sarah Rogers, from the Royal College of Nursing’s History of Nursing Forum, told us about the Nurses in Red project.

Alexander – Patient Zero – told us about his journey with Wikipedia, from a young editor to one of the most active 10,000 editors on English Wikipedia.

Richard Davies told us about the work he’s been doing in the Wikipedia and Wikimedia Commons coverage of the Welsh town of Wrecsam (Wrexham).

Becky Male told us about her work on the Hunger Strike Medal article, and how this led to a surprising discovery about the collection of Suffragette Pennies at the Glasgow Women’s Library.

Jonathan – WereSpielChequers – told us about the process of becoming an admin on English Wikipedia, and how the project needs more admins.

And Gill Ryan told us about the project that she ran in partnership with Perth Library this year on the Women of Perth.

In memoriam

In the last few years, we’ve sadly lost a few members of the UK Wikimedia community, and so we took some time to recognise the contributions that Lisa Lodwick, Jo Pugh, Richard Haslam, Les Barker and Richard Lawson made to the movement. They will be very much missed. 

UK Wikimedian of the Year Awards

Next we announced the winners of the UK Wikimedian of the Year Awards. For the full details of who won the awards, the fantastic work they’re doing, and who received an honourable mention, you can see this blog.

UK Wikimedian of the Year: Nick Sheppard

Partnership of the Year: Royal College of Nursing’s History of Nursing Forum – Nurses in Red

Up and Coming Wikimedian: Heidi Berg 

Opportunity Fair

And finally we closed with something new for us; the Opportunity Fair. Here we had a selection of projects with which we’d invite our community to get involved, as well as a range of ways that Wikimedia UK can support the community.

Protests & Suffragettes are looking for translators of articles they’ve been creating and improving about Scottish Suffrage/ttes, as well as help improving those articles – more information on their project page, or contact sara.thomas@wikimedia.org.uk.

Nadege Forde-Vidal, Historian & Community Project Developer at Sankofa London Schools is also looking for assistance, in the shape of after-school workshop leaders: www.sankofalondonschools.co.uk / nadege@sankofalondonschools.co.uk 

The National Library of Scotland uploaded a large number of Scottish Chapbooks to Wikimedia Commons / Wikisource during lockdown, with staff proofreading that work. There are still a number of these to be proofread and transcribed, and they can be found here. If you’d like to know more about how to become involved, or are interested in learning more about Wikisource, please contact sara.thomas@wikimedia.org.uk.

Dr Richard Nevell, Programme Manager, talked about Wiki Loves Monuments and Wiki Loves Earth – we’re in need of assistance with Wikidata for Wiki Loves Earth, and a campaign organiser or organisers for Wiki Loves Monuments – if you’d like to know more please contact richard.nevell@wikimedia.org.uk.

Dr Lucy Hinnie told us about Let’s Connect, a peer learning group for any Wikimedian who is part of an organised group – there are regular events and a whole host of resources, and they can be found through their meta page. Lucy’s slides are here.

Karla Marte, our Programme Evaluation Coordinator, explained our Project and Volunteer Grants, and how they can support individual volunteers – there’s more information about this on our website where you can see examples of past grants, and there’s also an online application form.

Last but not least, our board member Rod Ward told us a little about the Community Development Committee, a new Board subcommittee, whose purpose is to advise the board on community and volunteer issues generally, and to consider any community-related matters that may be delegated to the Committee by the board.

Join us

If you’d like to hear about future UK community events and how you can get involved please sign up for our newsletter, or join our membership to help govern the charity.

The post WMUK 2023 Community Meeting – videos and opportunities appeared first on Wikimedia UK.

Since early 2023 I have been working with the Royal Albert Memorial Museum (RAMM) and GLAM-E Lab in Exeter as their Wikimedian in Residence. These so-called ‘mini’ residencies are a key part of the Connected Heritage project: you can read all about Leah Emary’s experience as Wikimedian in Residence at the Mixed Museum here.

About RAMM and GLAM-E

The RAMM is the largest museum and art gallery in Exeter. It was founded in 1868 and holds over one million items. It was Museum of the Year in 2012. I have been working with Research Assistant Dr Francesca Farmer: Francesca is based within the GLAM-E Lab, part of The Centre for Science, Culture and the Law (SCuLE) at the University of Exeter. We have received support and guidance from Dr Andrea Wallace, Co-Director of the GLAM-E Lab. GLAM-E is ‘a joint initiative between the Centre for Science, Culture and the Law at the University of Exeter and the Engelberg Center on Innovation Law & Policy at NYU Law to work with smaller and less well-resourced UK and US cultural institutions and community organizations to build open access capacity and expertise’.

So what have we been doing? Our aim at the outset was for the Residency to scale up current open knowledge practice at RAMM. Dr Richard Nevell, Project Manager, had worked with Dr Wallace previously on the Cast In Stone project, and it was from this collaboration that ideas grew.

Supporting Image Uploads

As part of the Lab’s ongoing work with postgraduate students, earlier this year we supported the upload of a selection of images from the University of Exeter Special Collections. 

They are images from Christopher Saxton‘s 16th century atlas of England and Wales, and are of incredible quality. If you enjoy cartography and/or having a peek at old names for places, these will definitely be of interest to you. You can see the full selection here. If you live in England, you may even be able to spot where you live now.

By integrating these images more widely across Wiki platforms, we have been able to drive more traffic towards Special Collections, and increase viewer numbers.

Upskilling Volunteers

From April 2023, we worked with a group of digital volunteers at the Museum, providing a three-week introductory course to Wikipedia and Wikimedia Commons. Volunteers ranged from school leavers to those of retirement age, and had a vast array of experience and interests. Over the course of three weeks, we covered the basics of editing, common questions about Wiki and cultural heritage, and how to plan and formulate impactful edits. This course culminated in an online editing event in May 2023.

We were so taken with the material that we uncovered during this editing session, particularly the work of local historians on Devon Women in Public and Professional Life, 1900–1950: Votes, Voices and Vocations (available via Open Access here) that we have arranged another, larger-scale event in September: Devon in Red!

Devon in Red

Devon in Red is a public facing Wikithon in which authors of Devon Women in Public and Professional Life, 1900–1950: Votes, Voices and Vocations will speak to local volunteers and interested members of the public about their experience of researching this book, with an aim of adding even more information about these exceptional women to Wiki. Many of the women featured in this book do not have their own Wiki pages, and provide fascinating insight into Exeter’s history. 

If you are local to Exeter, you can register for the event here. Please note that some small bursaries are available to enable attendance for those who would otherwise be unable to attend. Please contact us at connectedheritage@wikimedia.org.uk for further information.

Establishing a Legacy

As we move towards the end of the project and the residency, I am working closely with RAMM to develop and circulate materials for volunteers and staff in the future to take charge of their own Wiki training, and to embed digital practice in the Museum going forward. Working with RAMM on this project has been a great pleasure and I am confident that exciting things are on the horizon for both RAMM and GLAM-E in terms of Wiki activity and collection access.

The post Residency at the Royal Albert Memorial Museum appeared first on Wikimedia UK.

By Tatjana Baleta, Wikimedia Visiting Fellow at Global Systems Institute, University of Exeter

I am a South African conservationist and science communicator with an interest in the power of knowledge to drive change. As the Wikimedia Visiting Fellow at the GSI, I will be working with researchers and the Wikimedia community to make climate change knowledge more accessible, expand and strengthen the quality of climate change information available on open knowledge platforms and to combat dis- and misinformation.

My fascination with the natural world led me pursue a BSc in Ecology & Evolution and Genetics and a BMedSc(Hons) in Cell Biology. With a growing understanding of the global environmental crisis, I then completed an MPhil in Conservation Leadership.

I have worked internationally in research and communications on marine species monitoring, marine litter monitoring, marine protected area design research, conservation technology, species prioritisation and conservation-decision making.

As an avid science communicator, I am passionate about sharing my love for the natural world, and particularly about using that communication to instigate positive change.

I’m really excited to dive into this opportunity to explore open knowledge systems and contribute to climate change resource accessibility.

Keen to brainstorm? Let’s connect! Contact me at t.baleta@exeter.ac.uk.

The post Welcome Tatjana Baleta, Wikimedia Visiting Fellow for climate appeared first on Wikimedia UK.

At Wikimedia UK, we believe that addressing Wikipedia’s gaps will better inform people about climate action. Wikipedia is the ideal platform for unbiased, cited climate information, as it already has a global audience of billions. It exists in over 300 languages and has an established, dedicated volunteer editing community of nearly 300,000 editors and contributors. The 59 million articles these editors create and maintain are accessed by over 1.5 billion unique devices every single month. We bought Climate and Environment into our 2022-25 Strategic themes to ensure a core focus on addressing the gaps. Consequently, we’re delighted to announce we have launched our first-ever climate residency in partnership with the University of Exeter.

Tatjana Baleta has been recruited as Wikimedia Visiting Fellow at the University of Exeter, within the Global Systems Institute (GSI) academic community. Embedded within this centre of excellence for climate research, Tatjana will work alongside several world-leading climate scientists, including those at the UK Met Office with whom the GSI has a strategic partnership. She will also be amongst researchers from other disciplines who are looking into climate impacts, climate justice, biodiversity and energy.

Tatjana is a conservationist and science communicator with an interest in the power of knowledge to drive change. She has a BSc in Ecology & Evolution and Genetics and a BMedSc(Hons) in Cell Biology. With a growing understanding of the global environmental crisis, she also completed an MPhil in Conservation Leadership, which she then applied to her conservation career. Tatjana is passionate about sharing her love for the natural world, and particularly about using that communication to instigate positive change.

Dr Andy Richards, Manager at GSI said of the partnership “We are very excited to be working with Wikimedia UK and the Wikimedia community, and hosting Tatjana as the first ever Wikimedia Visiting Fellow focused on climate change. We are passionate about providing unbiased and open information and making it as widely accessible as possible. Wikipedia is a powerful resource to do this.”

Well-known Wikipedian and climate change researcher Dr Femke Nijsse outlined how important Tatjana’s work is: “Wikipedia plays a key role in overcoming polarisation, but this is only possible when its content is of high quality. Involving academics means that errors and biases can be spotted and resolved more rapidly.”

If you’d like to get in touch with Tatjana, you can reach her at t.baleta@exeter.ac.uk.

The post New partnership delivers Wikimedia UK’s first-ever residency for climate appeared first on Wikimedia UK.

1. To work with Director Chamion Caballero and others affiliated with the museum to incorporate material from their collections into the Wikimedia Projects.
2. To understand existing practices at the museum and incorporate Wikipedia editing, Wikimedia Commons uploads, and Wikidata where possible.
3. To identify gaps on Wikipedia around the history of racial mixing in Britain and use the museum’s scholarship, research and expertise to fill them. 
4. To train and upskill museum staff, volunteers, interns and freelancers in how to edit Wikimedia projects.

This partnership is especially exciting for Wikimedia UK, because it addresses an important and under-represented topic on the Wikimedia projects.

The Mixed Museum, with only one full-time staff member, relies heavily on partnerships to conduct its exciting and innovative work. In addition to co-curating exhibitions with academics and artists, the museum currently hosts a folk musician as the organisation’s first Artist in Residence. Director Chamion Caballero says that partnership work is critical to small organisations like The Mixed Museum, not only for producing new and creative content, but also for building robust support networks that help increase the capacity to connect, learn, share and grow. She notes that for the museum, ‘our partnerships have helped all involved to reach wider audiences, as well as access ideas, skills and funding that would be much more difficult to achieve alone.’

The residency builds upon the work of two interns earlier this year, who improved Wikipedia articles based on research for the Mixed Race Irish Families in Britain, 1700-2000 exhibition. You can find out more about that project here. 

Host a resident

Are you interested in hosting a mini-residency at your heritage or cultural organisation? Come see what Connected Heritage is all about at our free, hour long webinar on Thursday 13th October at 12:30pm.

Book a 121

If you know you’re a good fit and would like to talk about hosting an editathon or undertaking a Wiki project at your organisation, book a half hour online meeting with the team.

Get stuck in

If you would like to try your hand at editing, we would welcome you to our potluck wikithon on 30th September 2022 at 10am.

Stay in touch

Follow us on Twitter:

@wikimediauk

@wiki_hinnie

@LeahEmary

Sign up to our mailing list

The post A new mini Wikimedian in Residence at The Mixed Museum appeared first on Wikimedia UK.

Adam Harangozo, who started in post on Monday 6th December, has been editing Wikimedia projects for more than 10 years and includes in his experience a residency at the Blinken Open Society Archives and various projects across cultural and community settings.

Of the role and opportunity with the National Institute for Health Research, Adam said “I’m very excited about my new role as Wikimedian in residence not only because of my firm belief in the values represented by Wikimedia but because it is really important that large institutions like NIHR recognise Wikipedia and contribute with their research and knowledge. I think scientific institutions need to reflect on what they have to do differently, how to make research more visible and accessible. Opening up to Wikipedia, working together on shared platforms with non-professionals definitely has to be part of this process. I’m more than inspired that I can help guide NIHR in this and I hope that we can make contributions that really matter and bring systematic benefits to both the Wikimedia community and the institution itself. Please do feel free to contact me with any ideas, suggestions, and questions during my residency.”

A study between 2021 and 2017 into the impact of Wikimedians in Residence showed how new audiences were reached and partner organisations were “better able to share their knowledge” through having a Wikimedian in Residence. This initial 6 month pilot will focus on the work through NIHR’s Centre for Engagement and Dissemination launched in early 2020 to “make health and care research representative, relevant and ready for use.” 

Wikimedia UK’s Director of Programmes and Evaluation Daria Cybulska highlighted why this pilot and the partnership are critical to how we access health information “A lot of people visit Wikipedia as their first port of call for health information, so it’s important that this content is available, up to date, and written in an accessible way. This residency, through access to the extensive expertise of NIHR’s staff and researchers, will improve the content of Wikimedia pages in the area of health and wellbeing. As a pilot project, we will also explore further opportunities for collaboration.”

Over the next few weeks we will share updates and opportunities to get involved with Adam’s work. 

The post National Institute for Health Research launches Wikimedian in Residence in collaboration with Wikimedia UK appeared first on Wikimedia UK.

If you were asked to name artworks or artists, how many would be non-Western? You might visit the free encyclopedia Wikipedia to support your search; after all 1.7 billion visitors per month do just this. However, new research highlights that even with Wikipedia’s approach –  ensuring anyone can edit and add content – there is still a bias towards Western artworks and artists. 

Artist and scholar Waqas Ahmed and veteran Wikipedian Dr. Martin Poulter were well-placed to investigate Wikipedia’s perspective on the visual arts. For example, they observed with the English language version of Wikipedia, “its ‘List of sculptors’ is 99% Western, ‘List of painters by nationality’ is around 75% European and its ‘List of contemporary visual artists’ is 80% European”. They probed whether this was just a problem with those articles, or just with the English language Wikipedia. “There appears to be a systemic cultural bias against non-Western visual art and artists across all Wikipedia platforms and in various languages”, Ahmed says. “We hope that this research will remind people that the Western artistic canon is but one of many worldwide – each deserving respect and appreciation on its own terms.” 

With a commitment to identifying and overcoming barriers to diversity online, Wikimedia UK, the national charity for the Wikimedia open knowledge movement, funded the research. Director of Programmes and Evaluation Daria Cybulska says “The vision of the Wikimedia movement has always been ‘a world in which every single human being can freely share in the sum of all knowledge.’ In recent years, we began more critically examining what that means, and what are the repercussions of existing biases and gaps in content on Wikipedia. Some biases on Wikipedia are better known than others – and this research shines a new light on cultural biases, and what can be done about them.”

The researchers measured the coverage of visual arts across the hundreds of different language versions of Wikipedia. They compared 100 artists from the Western canon to 100 significant artists from other cultures. Poulter pointed out that “Even equal coverage of the Western artists and the artists from all of the rest of the world would still be a pro-Western bias, because Europe is just one sixth of the world.” The research found that on average Wikipedia coverage was seven times greater for artists in the Western canon than for their non-Western counterparts.

One example compared the coverage of The Sistine Chapel in the Vatican and the Sultan Ahmed Mosque (Blue Mosque) in Istanbul. Both places of worship receive approximately 5 million visitors each per year, and have enormous cultural and artistic importance. Whilst both Michelangelo and Syed Kasim Gubari are considered geniuses within their respective cultures, Michelangelo’s Wikipedia articles total over 440 times greater length than Gubari and the Blue Mosque Ceiling does not have a single entry across the Wikimedia projects.

Past research has identified geographical biases and a gender gap on Wikipedia, where a small (but growing) minority of biographies are about women. This new research demonstrates and measures a specifically cultural bias. Ahmed and Poulter suggest we can all play our part through extending the coverage of art and artists outside the Western canon. For individual wiki contributors, this can involve creating, translating, or extending articles. Cultural institutions can help by sharing their knowledge and images.

As the research states “societal biases have a long and well-documented history, rooted in systems of hegemony and oppression like imperialism.” These biases inevitably shape narratives online and are reinforced through echo chambers. The first step to creating an online world which truly reflects global cultures and histories is the awareness that we are far from there – yet.

The research paper is currently undergoing peer review but can be freely accessed as a pre-print through preprints.org.

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