Talk:Volunteer jobs

Locally significant person v locally significant woman

Hi Yaris, thanks for your edit on the jobs list. I've left it in, but the reason Roberta suggested writing a biography of a locally significant woman was to help take on the gender gap that exists on Wikipedia. I hpe you can understand the motivation for the original idea. Stevie Benton (WMUK) (talk) 09:40, 3 November 2014 (GMT)

I understand. I think increasing the number of women with biographies is a fine motivation. But I thought the more inclusive wording would encourage people towards this end just as much, but also encourage other biographies. Yaris678 (talk) 10:48, 3 November 2014 (GMT)

Hi Yaris. Thanks for taking the time to add to this list. Unfortunately, sometimes inclusive wording can have the unintentional effect of reinforcing the status quo. If you ask someone to describe a chef (or a judge or an astronaut), most people will paint you a picture of a man; if you ask them to describe a cook (or a secretary or a primary school teacher), you'll get a woman. If we just ask for a biography, without mentioning gender, chances are that Wikipedia's systemic bias will be reinforced. There are likely to be more books on locally significant men available, and so it's easier to write an article on a man. My suggestion of deliberately choosing a woman was meant to shake that up a bit. Roberta Wedge (WMUK) (talk) 12:30, 4 November 2014 (GMT)

I've just added a couple of links from this list as a way to target, might be a better way of doing this though. en:User:99of9/100powerwomen powerful women list; en:User:Dsp13/Redlinks/Women redlinks; en:Wikipedia:WikiProject_Dictionary_of_National_Biography/Missing_women; or the generic en:Category:Biography_articles_needing_attention Sjgknight (talk) 12:58, 4 November 2014 (GMT)

Roberta makes a very valid point here. Simon, thanks for those links, really good idea. Stevie Benton (WMUK) (talk) 13:11, 4 November 2014 (GMT)

Thanks, Simon - good concrete links that I'll add to my own watchlist. Roberta Wedge (WMUK) (talk) 15:15, 4 November 2014 (GMT)

Great work Simon and Roberta. The list now covers different approaches to biography in a really good way. Yaris678 (talk) 22:17, 4 November 2014 (GMT)

Differentiating between stuff people do for the charity and other ways to contribute to free knowledge through the Wikimedia movement

I think it would help if we differentiated more clearly between jobs for the charity and other ways to contribute to free knowledge through the Wikimedia movement. We kind of have, in that they are in different sections, but I think we need to do more. One option would be to move the non-charity-specific stuff to another page. Another option would be some kind of wording or maybe even logos or something. I can't think how that would work, but I am open to suggestion.

Yaris678 (talk) 21:57, 30 November 2014 (GMT)

Definitely, also time-limited tasks (e.g. Wikimania bits) and "any time" tasks - be bold? :-) Ultimately it'd be nice to have an attractive landing page for this, and maybe collapsible boxes or something would work? On a related point, I was thinking about this leaflet File:Five ways.pdf and how the next iteration might be developed. Sjgknight (talk) 09:35, 1 December 2014 (GMT)

OK. Been bold. Yaris678 (talk) 13:10, 1 December 2014 (GMT)