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[[File:Friend's Newsletter winter 2023.png|alt=Text reading: Wikimedia UK, winter 2023 newsletter, thank you for your support this year on a green, red, and orange background featuring flora and fauna illustrations from Wikimedia Commons|center|frame|Collage of images from Wikimedia Commons, filenames in the description of this page - [[:File:Giving Tuesday 2023.png]]]]
<nowiki>[[ Category:Friends' Newsletter ]]</nowiki>


== Welcome to the autumn/winter 2022 edition of the Friends’ Newsletter ==
== Welcome to the winter 2024 newsletter ==
As 2022 comes to a close I am looking back on the year with mixed feelings. The impact of Covid on people’s health and livelihoods across the globe continues to be a cause for concern; while people in the UK and elsewhere have been hit by the worst cost of living crisis in decades. 2022 has also been characterised by increasing political instability - both at home and abroad - and of course, the devastating invasion of Ukraine.
Season's Greetings and welcome to the last newsletter of 2024! As I'm wrapped up in the festivities of the season I'm once again impressed by the incredible portfolio of work from our volunteers and staff this year.


There is also much to be proud of, and thankful for. Thank you so much to all our volunteers, community leaders and partners for your contribution to open knowledge this year. Thanks also to those Wikimedia UK members who opened their doors to Ukrainian families fleeing the conflict in Ukraine. It’s a reminder of how interconnected we all are, and how important it is for everyone to have free access to reliable information.
In September we moved into our new office at the British Library. The vibrant environment of the Library has already fostered our staff's creativity and innovation, while being a strategic location to enable better connection with partners, volunteers, and the public.


I’m particularly grateful to everyone who has donated to Wikimedia UK this year, including those of you who supported our recent Giving Tuesday campaign. The cost of living crisis has hit charities hard, but with the support and contributions of both donors and volunteers we can reflect on a very productive year, and look forward to some exciting projects and programmes in 2023.
Earlier in the autumn we were delighted to welcome two new trustees to our board, following the election at our 2024 AGM. Andrew Russell brings substantial experience in public affairs while Monica Westin is a keen Wikimedian with a professional background in knowledge information.  


With very best wishes for the festive season!
Congratulations to Fran Allfrey, Wikimedia UK’s Wikimedian of the Year for 2024, along with GLAM-E Lab who received the Partnership of the Year award, and Perigrinate Avellana, our Up and Coming Wikimedian of the Year. You can read more about the awards and the nominees [[UK Wikimedian of the Year 2024|here]].


Lucy Crompton-Reid
Finally, you may have seen our ''[https://wikimedia.org.uk/home/education/ Education through Wikimedia]'' campaign to boost our work in secondary schools. Education is at the heart of our work as the national charity for open knowledge, and we believe that equipping the next generation with essential information literacy and digital skills is crucial for their success in an increasingly complex digital world. This is why we are launching a dedicated campaign aimed at secondary school students, focusing on developing these fundamental abilities.
[[File:Community Celebration 2024.png|thumb|Wikimedia UK community celebration]]


Chief Executive, Wikimedia UK
== Community Celebration 2024 ==
In November we hosted our 2024 Community Celebration. It was a chance for our community to gather online, share and celebrate the work that’s taken place over the last year and recognise that work through the UK Wikimedian of the Year awards and celebrate the winners of the Wiki Loves Earth competition.


== Train the Trainer ==
It was heartening seeing so many of our community at the celebration. There were around 40 community members, attending from all over the UK. With the event being online in the midst of Storm Bert raging, it meant that people who otherwise wouldn’t be able to attend were able to do so.
[[File:WMUK Train the Trainer Dec2022 2.jpg|alt=Photo of Train the Trainer group, December 2022|thumb|Train the Trainer group, December 2022]]
We organised our second round of Train the Trainer for 2022, with the first events taking place at the start of December over three sessions. Trainees first attended an online editathon as participant observers. Their task was to take part in the event, and develop an awareness of how it has been put together, what is being communicated, and why it's being done in that way. The next session was a hybrid one bringing virtual and in-person trainees together to debrief the online editathon section by section. The final session was open to both new and established volunteers where we explored the importance and methods of developing partnerships with organisations and communities. This session was also a networking opportunity for our volunteers. This year we welcomed 8 new trainers to our volunteer community. We will continue to support their work and are looking forward to hearing their brilliant ideas.


If you’re interested in becoming a Trainer, follow us on social media for announcements about future iterations of Train the Trainer.
We had a series of short talks which can be watched in this [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Hf31R8QPKQ&list=PL66MRMNlLyR694Vod7X2MWHCZhb-WSG-m&index=1 playlist].


== Online Safety Bill - update on advocacy activities ==
Jason Evans, Open Data Manager and National Wikimedian at the National Library of Wales told us about AI, Placenames and Time Machine experiments at the National Library of Wales.  
''Lucy to draft. Jimmy Wales' appearance on Kuenssberg last Sunday.''


== Our first ever climate residency ==
Dr Kirsty Ross from the University of St Andrews, who is also one of the co-founders of the IDEA network told us about how Scottish Brick History (SBH), Wikimedia UK, and researchers from the School of Computer Science at the University of St Andrews collaborated to get a unique dataset about Scotland’s brickworks onto Wikidata, and built web visualisations to showcase the work.
At Wikimedia UK, we believe that addressing Wikipedia’s gaps will better inform people about climate action. But as things stand, there are large gaps in information about climate change on Wikipedia, and the content we do have is heavily weighted in US and European data. What’s more, it’s clear with only a quick search that information about policy and technology is often out of date. These factors convey a greater sense of uncertainty around climate data than is warranted by recent developments.


Wikipedia is the ideal platform for unbiased, cited climate information, as it already has a global audience of billions. Which is why 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.
Lucy Moore, a Wikimedian based in Leeds, and who won UK Wikimedian of the year 2022 told us about her Wiki Year!
[[File:Tatjana Baleta profile pic.png|alt=Photo of Tatjana Baleta|thumb|Photo of Tatjana Baleta]]
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.
Nick Sheppard, Open Research Adviser based at the University of Leeds Libraries told us about his journey from his first tentative edit in 2017 (flagged as spam) to becoming a committed advocate for Wikimedia in Universities.


The first editathon will be held on the 26th of January, 3:30-6pm. All are welcome! Find out more and register here. Reach out to Tatjana at t.baleta@exeter.ac.uk with questions or ideas, or read the blog Tatjana wrote for us here.
Jonathan Deamer from Liverpool, who describes himself as a Wikimedia hobbyist, told us about attending his first Wikimania in Katowice in Poland this year. He shared with us his highlights from the event and how these have had a tangible impact on his daily editing.


== Climate and environment ==
Joanne Forster-Martin, a student at the University of Oxford, and who we met at our recent Train the Trainer weekend told us about the Wiki Women in Red project to uncover the hidden female figures of Jesus College, Oxford.  
Continuing on the theme of climate and environment, we’re delighted to report that our programmes in this newest strategic pillar continue to grow.


=== COP27 ===
Adam Harangzo, Wikipedian in Residence at the National Institute for Health and Care Research talked to us about his experience of working with researchers in an impactful way where they contribute to Wikipedia without directly editing it.
[[File:IIC and Wikimedia UK COP27 Egypt editathon.jpg|alt=Poster for COP27 Egypt editathon|thumb|COP27 Egypt editathon poster]]
[[File:View of the Kings Library, British Library.jpg|thumb|View of the Kings Library, British Library, by Mike Peel]]
After the success of 2021’s COP26 editathon, we repeated the event in partnership with the IIC – The International Institute for Conservation of Historic and Artistic Works – for COP27 in November. Climate change impacts our cultural heritage, with archeological sites destroyed before they can be studied [1,2,3,4,5]. And with our extensive experience of working with cultural institutions, the IIC seemed an excellent choice of partner for an editathon focusing on cultural heritage conservation sustainability, and the UN Sustainable Development Goals and Climate Action themes. 82 editors joined us for the 24 hour editathon, helping us add 32 citations from valuable sources and over 4290 words to Wikipedia articles.


=== SXNCH-2 ===
== Wikimedia UK moves into new offices at the British Library ==
The impact of climate change on cultural heritage sites was also part of a Wikipedia editing session we held at the SXNCH-2 conference in August. SXNCH is a globally engaged research group and growing network, based at the University of Oxford. A group of five editors improved articles on cultural heritage, including adding information about Rock-Hewn Churches in Ethiopia and Risco Caído in Spain (both UNESCO World Heritage Sites). 8 articles were improved, seven of them in English and one in Portuguese. The improved pages are read 3,100 times a day.
Wikimedia UK is excited to announce our relocation to new offices at the prestigious British Library. The new office space will provide a vibrant environment that fosters creativity and innovation, allowing our team to work flexibly and collaboratively with a wealth of resources and opportunities available at one of the world’s largest libraries. This strategic location will enable us to better connect with partners, volunteers, and the public. Staff will continue to work remotely and occasionally come into the office, ensuring we adapt to the evolving needs of our team and the communities we serve.
[[File:Morning Sun at Three Cliffs Bay, Gower.jpg|alt=The winning photo in Wales for Wiki Loves Earth, showing Three Cliffs Bay in Gower at sunrise|thumb|Morning Sun at Three Cliffs Bay, Gower, by by Mjw999. Winning photograph in the Welsh category. CC BY-SA 4.0]]


=== Wiki Loves Earth 2022 ===
Wikimedia UK Chief Executive Lucy Crompton-Reid, says: ''“We are looking forward to our new office space within the British Library after a year of being fully remote.”'' As the national charity for the global Wikimedia open knowledge movement, there are lots of areas of shared interest with the Library. Director of Science and Innovation, Maja Maricevic, adds ''“We are delighted to welcome Wikimedia UK. Over years we have regularly collaborated with Wikimedia UK and hosted Wikimedians-in-Residence, so are delighted with an opportunity with an even closer proximity to an organisation that we have the existing close links with and share the common vision to open access to knowledge.”''
he Wiki Loves Earth 2022 winners have been announced, with stunning photographs of the natural world from 40 countries. Locally, Wales and Ireland took part in the competition with 5041 images from Wales and 528 from Ireland. WLE was a quick snapshot of the rich diversity of our global biosphere: a record of flora, fauna and fungi, as they were in the summer of 2022. Future snapshots could be used to show the differences in the biosphere, and the impact of climate change. If Wikipedia could better illustrate this change, we could perhaps help negate the effect.


=== ClimatePolicyRadar ===
== New trustees at the Wikimedia UK AGM ==
Our partnership with ClimatePolicyRadar is in the scoping stage. ClimatePolicyRadar has developed a proof of concept for an effective machine learning model which identifies targets in the law and policy documents they hold, identifying phrases such as ‘we aim to reduce our carbon emissions by 90% by 2040’. The next step will be to work on getting this information onto Wikidata in a format that works.
Following a successful AGM we’re very pleased to share that '''Andrew Russell''' and '''Monica Westin''' have joined Wikimedia UK's board of trustees. We’re also delighted that '''Caroline Ball''' was re-elected for a second three year term. You can read their candidate statements [https://eu-west-1.protection.sophos.com/?d=wikimedia.org.uk&u=aHR0cHM6Ly93aWtpbWVkaWEub3JnLnVrL3dpa2kvMjAyNF9Bbm51YWxfR2VuZXJhbF9NZWV0aW5nL0NhbmRpZGF0ZV9TdGF0ZW1lbnRz&i=NjVhZmE0ZjY3MDExZmY1Y2Q3NDE3Yjc3&t=elRCdDZpbjBKZERlRXJtcmdSNEdYais5SDVWTWluOE9HV0pXV3lyYndMTT0=&h=2661eaa127054042af9ffe8ba157c4b0&s=AVNPUEhUT0NFTkNSWVBUSVZaFAaacHBa1XXlgRscq_crzoGlUi68xQtfbYwMm-_cdbNaheb163x6NaWPPdLeY2s here] if you’d like to find out more about them.


== Connected Heritage ==
On Saturday we also said thank you, but hopefully not goodbye, to outgoing trustees '''Julian Manieson''' and '''Rod Ward'''.


=== The Mixed Museum ===
Many thanks to all those who attended the AGM, or who submitted a proxy vote.
The GSI residency isn’t the only first of its kind this quarter. We’ve partnered with The Mixed Museum to launch a mini Wikimedian in Residence, which came about through the Connected Heritage webinars. The mini-residency tests a new format of seconding a staff member, Leah Emery, to the museum for just one day a week. 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.
[[File:Brixton Library Black History Month editathon presentation.jpg|alt=A photograph of Stuart Prior delivering a presentation to a room of volunteer editors at Brixton Library|thumb|Programme Coordinator, Stuart Prior, delivering Wiki editing training at the Brixton Library Black History Month meetup]]


=== The Scottish Jewish Heritage Centre ===
== Brixton Library Black History Month editathon ==
The Scottish Jewish Heritage Centre in Glasgow is hosting their first editathon on the 16th February. This week-long event is about improving the representation of Scottish Jewish heritage, history, and culture on Wikipedia and Wikimedia Commons. This event is for everyone involved with the Scottish Jewish Heritage Centre, the Scottish Jewish Archives Centre, and anyone interested in Scotland’s Jewish heritage. Participants will learn Wikipedia basics and make their first edits. The session is free and no prior Wiki experience is required. Reserve a spot here.
Brixton Library’s monthly Wikipedia meetups show participants how to contribute to the encyclopaedia. For the October meetup, the event focused on learning about and contributing to the recording of Black history. We wrote about and enhanced articles about Black people, history and society. Participants used the session to explore Brixton Library’s Black Interest book collections, the library service’s online subscriptions to packages like the British Newspaper Archive and Who’s Who and much more. We also looked at Wikimedia Commons and how you can use photographs and images.


=== Reimagining Lincolnshire ===
== 100 Days 100 Edits for climate (GSI) ==
Some of our partners through Connected Heritage held thematic editing events for Black History Month in October with the support of the team. We were pleased with the results of the editathon with Reimagining Lincolnshire, which focused on Black history in Lincolnshire and was supported by the University of Lincoln librarians, who helped participants find sources.
The University of Exeter’s resident for climate and the environment, Tatjana Baleta, recruited 31 researchers from 11 different institutions to cumulatively propose 100 edits to 35 articles over 100 days. As of the 10th of November 2024, these articles have been viewed over ~662,000 times.


=== UCL Liberating our collections scheme ===
''"Through this 100-day campaign, I upped my normal Wikipedia editing, highlighted how unprecedented CO₂ levels are over millions of years, and dispelled two common myths about global warming: that humans are only "mainly" responsible, and that further warming stops when emissions stabilize, rather than when they reach net zero.”''
In September, the Connected Heritage project collaborated with library staff at University College London to run an event as part of the UCL Liberating our collections scheme. Instigated by Rozz Evans, Head of Collection Strategy, the event focused on providing editing skills for staff at the university library. The scheme aims to address a lack of representation of diverse voices in the library’s collection. The training session allowed staff to use the experience of under-represented topics built up over the last few years and to take this practice into Wikipedia.


== The National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) ==
– Dr Femke Njisse, University of Exeter (edited Grid storage and Climate change)
Wikipedia is one of the first places where people look for accessible medical information. The medical articles in the English-language Wikipedia are consulted more than 100 million times each month. Therefore, from the perspectives of health and social care, it is key that the information they find there is reliable, easy-to-understand and reflects our current knowledge. From the point of view of a research funder, improving Wikipedia is a robust way to disseminate health information rapidly and globally to an audience who would otherwise be difficult to reach. Furthermore, it helps to let numerous medical students and health professionals who regularly consult the encyclopaedia know about the latest evidence.


It’s for these reasons that in December 2021 we partnered with the NIHR and the Centre for Engagement and Dissemination to employ a Wikimedian in Residence, Adam Harangozo, to explore the use of Wikipedia for disseminating NIHR-funded research evidence.
''“Promoting widespread scientific literacy is a key issue in addressing anthropogenic climate change, environmental degradation and injustice. Platforms like Wikipedia provide an excellent opportunity to disseminate scientific information to an extended audience, where this information is otherwise often only accessible by academics in the global north. I hope that my contribution to the campaign can help bring greater clarity to a topic (i.e. biochar) that is often discussed in the context of climate change mitigation.”''


Throughout the first year of the residency, Adam has adopted a three tiered approach:
– Dr Oscar Kennedy-Blundell, University of Exeter (edited Biochar)
[[File:The Devils Pulpit.tif|thumb|The Devils Pulpit in Scotland, by Gaverlaa, This image won the 2<sup>nd</sup> prize in the national contest of '''Scotland''' in '''[[commons:Wiki Loves Earth 2024|Wiki Loves Earth 2024]]''']]


# We offer a webinar to interested groups where we introduce what Wikipedia is, why it is a powerful tool for dissemination and discuss any questions or concerns.
== Wiki Loves Earth winners ==
# Following up from the webinars, we hold Wikipedia editing workshops for interested participants. These events focus on a specific topic with the goal to improve and expand the corresponding Wikipedia article with NIHR-funded research. During the workshops participants work on writing text missing from Wikipedia and the editing is done by the Wikipedian.
Wiki Loves Earth is an annual photography competition themed around the natural world. This year Ireland, Scotland and Wales took part in the competition. Over 5000 photos were submitted of nature from across these three countries, helping to illustrate Wikimedia with the flora and fauna that is so at risk from climate change and human development. The winners have now been announced, see them for [[commons:Commons:Wiki_Loves_Earth_2024_in_Scotland/Winners|Scotland]], [[commons:Commons:Wiki_Loves_Earth_2024/Winners#Wales|Wales]], and [https://wikimedia.ie/2024/09/13/announcing-the-winners-of-wiki-loves-earth-2024/ Ireland.] The natural world changes from season to season, but climate change poses a threat to our environment and its durability. Extreme temperatures, drought, or rainfall all disturb the balance that has cultivated these environments and biodiversity. The photos submitted to the competition capture the state of our natural world at a point in time, and remind us what we stand to lose.
# For those interested in learning how to edit Wikipedia and use it longer-term we offer individual or small group workshops.


We’re pleased to share that Adam has been able to inspire researchers and staff to use Wikipedia for dissemination of their knowledge. Beyond the initiatives in the first year, the residency will aim to involve new communities who are close to NIHR to start editing, such as medical research charities, patient groups, and university students. Adam would also like to expand the project to non-English speakers through working with global health researchers and CEI on writing and translating articles. Adam would also like to introduce Wikipedia’s sister project, Wikidata, to researchers. Wikidata is an collaborative open data knowledge base that offers a powerful, computer-readable and multilingual infrastructure for sharing data about clinical trials, research programmes and publications. It would allow NIHR to present its work through transparent and easily accessible data and connect it to other databases.
== Climate Change & Health Wikipedia Workshop ==
In November two of our Wikimedians in Residence held joint workshops between the University of Exeter and the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR). Tatjana Baleta is the resident for climate at the GSI hub at Exeter University, and the health effects of climate change overlap significantly with Adam Harangozo’s residency on medical research at the NIHR.


== Wrapping up the residency at the Science Museum ==
Wikipedia is often the first and only place where most people go for health information. What readers find there matters. Contributing to Wikipedia offers a great opportunity to use an effective platform to mobilise evidence-based information, research and expert knowledge in an accessible way for a wider audience all around the world.
The Wikimedian in Residence at the Science Museum, Hope Miyoba, completed her term after an excellent partnership that saw the SMG evaluate its commitment to open knowledge, and resulted in many collaborations with different organisations, many of which are volunteer-led. The programme adapted to challenges posed by the environment, and continually assessed and re-assessed the success of different approaches to focus on those that offered the best possible outcome. The residency successfully delivered the majority of its aims to facilitate new events, contribute knowledge from SMG’s collection to Wikipedia, and reach new audiences through collaboration.


''GET STATS AND ARTICLE LINKS.''
Researchers with expertise in climate change and health were invited to attend one of the three workshops in November. The workshops drafted an article – titled Climate change and health in the UK – on this important topic at the intersection of the climate crisis and health research.


== Education ==
== Wiki Loves Monuments 2024 ==
Our work in the education sector remains a reliable source of getting valuable information from university staff and students onto the Wikimedia projects, and for equipping them with the skills necessary to continue advocating for open knowledge. The following examples are not an exhaustive list of all the schools we’re working with, which in this quarter included the Diversity and Inclusion group at the University of Oxford, the University of Kent’s MA History course, the University of Dundee, the University of St. Andrews, Exeter University and Queen Mary University.
Over 5000 photos of monuments, architecture and protected buildings were submitted to the 2024 Wiki Loves Monuments from Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. Wiki Loves Monuments is best known for being the world’s largest photo contest. It highlights humanity’s cultural heritage through the buildings, structures, and other assets that have gained importance due to their artistic, historic, political, technical, or architectural significance. You can see the entries for [[commons:Category:Images_from_Wiki_Loves_Monuments_2024_in_Scotland|Scotland]], [[commons:Category:Images_from_Wiki_Loves_Monuments_2024_in_Wales|Wales]] and [[commons:Category:Images_from_Wiki_Loves_Monuments_2024_in_Northern_Ireland|Northern Ireland]].
[[File:The discovery of witches, Matthew Hopkins.jpg|thumb|Matthew Hopkins’ Discovery of Witches (1647), Held by The British Library]]


=== SOAS University of London ===
== The history of witch trials in Newcastle and Scotland ==
One of our Programme Coordinators, Dr Richard Nevell, trained students in the ‘2022 Politics of Resistance in the Middle East’ module at SOAS University of London to upload their knowledge to Wikipedia. The aim of this module is to inform and enthuse students about the politics of resistance in the Middle East, and their first assignment equipped them with the skills to share that information and enthusiasm with Wikipedia's vast audience. Students were encouraged to think critically about this very process of knowledge production, its political potentials, and their own role within it. Over 27.3K words and 290 references were added to Wikipedia articles as a result of this course.
In 2023, one of our volunteers, Sophie Whitfield, led a Wikipedia workshop for students on  the Digital Cultures and Media course at Newcastle University. This year, WMUK again collaborated with the course leaders to give the students an opportunity to learn about Wikipedia.


=== Menter Iaith Môn ===
The plan was to have the class of twenty students collaboratively write a Wikipedia page about an overlooked part of Newcastle’s history: the 1650 witch trials. Overlooked for Wikipedia at least, [https://twmuseumsandarchives.medium.com/the-newcastle-witch-trials-62fc652cdef Tyne and Wear Archives & Museums] have excellent resources on the trials and the events were the subject of a [https://candleandbell.com/newcastle-witches-podcast podcast.] But there are no local memorials to the accused, and Wikipedia hardly mentions events in Newcastle.
Our partnership with Menter Iaith Môn – an organisation to promote the Welsh language across Wales – has always been a point of pride in fostering underrepresented languages on the Wikimedia projects. The team at Menter Môn has been busy in schools across Wales, and shared what they’ve been up to in 2022.


With Welsh place names at risk of being lost, changed or forgotten, this Wiki project aims to preserve Welsh names while also celebrating the language, culture, and heritage. At the start of the scheme, we asked via social media if areas on the Island were often referred to by the English name rather than the Welsh name. There were several responses, and through this we were able to map which areas would benefit from having a bench to highlight the Welsh name to the residents and visitors of the area.
The trials took place in 1649 and 1650, and resulted in the execution of sixteen people. As with many other similar persecutions, the majority were women.


Benches have been painted by local artists in the following locations:
The Digital Cultures and Media course introduces students to a range of different platforms and media: social sites, mapping, video creation, and of course Wikipedia. They are taught to be adaptive and explore. With a class of this size, we organised them into groups so that they could work on different elements of the article. Some worked on the imagery, others on the list of the accused and what happened to them, while another group detailed the context within which the trials took place.


* Rhosneigr (many use English names for the beaches in the area)
Two hours raced by, and in the final thirty minutes there was an avalanche of writing. As students saved their edits the skeletal page suddenly took shape - populated by the names of people who had lived and died in Newcastle more than 370 years ago.
* Porth Swtan (Church Bay)
* Llangefni (Nant y Pandy - Dingle)
* Porthaethwy (Menai Bridge)
* Pentraeth (Red Wharf Bay)
* Caergybi / Holyhead (Wants to raise awareness with the pupils at the school)


When the benches were completed, we placed plaques on them with a link to the Welsh articles on the Welsh Wikipedia. After obtaining permission from the Community Councils of the different areas to have the benches painted, we organised art and Wikipedia sessions in the Secondary Schools. A session was held with Year 9 students at Ysgol Uwchradd Bodedern and Ysgol Gyfun Llangefni. The teaching was facilitated by a project coordinator and the classes were focused on topics such as digital licensing, collaborative working, evaluating data and editing. After collecting ideas in the schools, the artists Tomos Jones and Ffion Roberts-Drakley set about putting the ideas into action by painting the benches. The benches will simulate what was discussed in the sessions at school, and of course include the important Welsh place names.
The history of witch trials has also been a project at the University of Edinburgh, with version 2 of the ''[https://witches.is.ed.ac.uk/ Map of Accused Witches in Scotland]'' – created using Wikidata – launching at the Edinburgh Futures Institute on 23rd October 2024. E. Whitehead has completed an expanded Glossary of terms to help explain and contextualise the Scottish witch trials. R. Imrie has completed the Nuxt.js upgrade and added filters for the accusations (demonic pacts, property damage, ritual objects used, meeting places etc.) the accused were subjected to along with all the temporal data so the Scottish witch hunts can now be explored in place and time through Wikidata.


We spent an afternoon with Year 12 students at Ysgol Syr Thomas Jones, Ysgol Llangefni and Ysgol Uwchradd Bodedern in November and December creating and enriching articles, adding the meaning and historical context of the island's Welsh place names on the Welsh Wiki. We focused on subjects such as digital licensing, collaborative working, data evaluation and editing. We created an article from scratch and worked on another two.
== IDEA network ==
The University of St Andrew’s [https://theideanetwork.wp.st-andrews.ac.uk/ IDEA network] (Inclusion, Diversity, Equity and Accessibility in Open Knowledge Network) was launched during lockdown. We’ve been working with them for years to make the Wikimedia projects more inclusive, diverse, equitable and accessible locations for open knowledge.


=== University of Edinburgh ===
Some recent highlights include:
The resident at the University of Edinburgh, Ewan McAndrew, has been training four '''Korean Studies masters students''' in how information on Korean culture is created, curated and improved on both the English and Korean Wikipedias. One student contributed a 2000 word new article on ‘Comfort women in the arts’, highlighting an important feminist movement.


Ewan’s also been working on a new edition of the '''education case study booklet''', the last of which showed excellent examples of how the Wikimedia projects can be implemented in universities.
* [https://eu-west-1.protection.sophos.com/?d=st-andrews.ac.uk&u=aHR0cHM6Ly90aGVpZGVhbmV0d29yay53cC5zdC1hbmRyZXdzLmFjLnVrLzIwMjQvMTAvMTIvZGlnaXRhbC1pbmNsdXNpb24td2lraWNvbm5lY3QtMm5kLWludGFrZS1hbm5vdW5jZW1lbnQtJWYwJTlmJTkzJWEyLw==&i=NjVhZmE0ZjY3MDExZmY1Y2Q3NDE3YmE2&t=WkVQNTQxL0lkRXBVbi9CZFhFbTVLUGtoakxNd3g5QTdXOU1zMGZzb2JMaz0=&h=d7f9b3811681459ca66d519430646d0a&s=AVNPUEhUT0NFTkNSWVBUSVbHWJeG47eUEa4cyL61CbXm66L8ziY8ITXWL9dY4Kpf7Q Digital Inclusion WikiConnect] – staff and students are working on content relating to digital literacy and digital poverty.
* [https://eu-west-1.protection.sophos.com/?d=st-andrews.ac.uk&u=aHR0cHM6Ly90aGVpZGVhbmV0d29yay53cC5zdC1hbmRyZXdzLmFjLnVrLzIwMjQvMDkvMTYvaWRlYS1uZXR3b3JrLWxhdW5jaGVzLXRoZS1yb2xlLW9mLXVuaXZlcnNpdGllcy1pbi10aGUtZXRoaWNhbC1kaWdpdGFsLW5hdGlvbi1wcm9qZWN0Lw==&i=NjVhZmE0ZjY3MDExZmY1Y2Q3NDE3YmE2&t=bncweEg5dUFSUFcyTEZGQ25ISW11T1NpYU9MbXY1V0k5UHZUL1N4Q0tURT0=&h=d7f9b3811681459ca66d519430646d0a&s=AVNPUEhUT0NFTkNSWVBUSVbHWJeG47eUEa4cyL61CbXm66L8ziY8ITXWL9dY4Kpf7Q Ethical Digital Nation event series] – exploring how universities can play a pivotal role in addressing digital challenges through collaborative research, training programs, and the development of socio-technical solutions.


The '''Women in Red editathons''' at the university also continue, which have added new pages on accused Scottish witches and included a special event for Ada Lovelace Day in October, in which students added new articles on notable Scottish women chemists.
== Wikimedia in Interfaith Education ==
Interfaith Explorers is a set of resources to support primary and secondary education about religions. As well as classroom resources, it has guidance for teachers on encouraging respectful discussions about faiths and cultures. It is listed by the UK Government's "Educate Against Hate" portal.


Building on the already internationally recognised '''Accused Witches of Scotland map''', Ewan made two new visualisations using Flourish to pull the data from the map into an animated timeline. The first for the locations of the residents who were accused of witchcraft between 1563 to 1736, and another for the locations of their alleged sightings of the devil, produced from records of their ‘confessions’.
The site recently completed a major update in which Wikimedia content played a crucial part. Short text extracts adapted from Simple English Wikipedia and English Wikipedia were combined with colourful, diverse images from Wikimedia Commons to add nearly 200 pages of new content about religions and how they are practised. The result is an [https://www.interfaithexplorers.com/resources/ interconnected web] of child-safe educational material, with automated translation into a dozen other languages.


Overall, the partnership with the university continues to produce many valuable programmes thanks to Ewan’s excellent work, not least of which is '''The Edinburgh Award for Digital Volunteering''' with Wikipedia, which will run until March 2023 and rewards students for sharing their knowledge.
Dr Martin Poulter is Wikimedian In Residence at the Khalili Foundation, which maintains Interfaith Explorers. He adapted the wiki content with the help of expert reviewers. Interfaith Explorers are looking for teachers, religious institutions, and educational charities to join the community that will further develop the resource further, including covering non-Abrahamic religions. [https://www.interfaithexplorers.com/contact-us/ Get in touch.]


== The British Library ==
== Memory of the World ==
The resident at the British Library, Lucy Hinnie, has created a ''case studies page'', which provides insight into some of the excellent programmes produced from the partnership. The residency also has a few events coming up, which are open to sign ups:
Dr Martin Poulter is now focusing increasingly on the [https://www.unesco.org/en/memory-world Memory of the World] project. The Khalili Foundation is supporting and fully funding work to improve the visibility of UNESCO Memory of the World inscriptions on the Wikimedia platforms, in parallel with UNESCO's database which is being re-developed. This will bring some of the world's most precious documentary heritage to the widest possible audience. We will be coordinating with the team at UNESCO to improve Wikimedia as they improve the official online database.


A Wikithon on '''Black British history''' will take place on Wednesday 25th January 2023, Black Creatives and the Archive: Surveillance and the State, co-hosted by TNA, the University of Leeds, and the British Library. The topics covered will include:
Within the project, Indonesian Wikipedia has given a Featured Article award to [[:en:id:Hajj:_Journey_to_the_Heart_of_Islam|their translation]] of the Hajj: Journey to the Heart of Islam article. This resulted from a long review process involving four users, and is a rare honour; Indonesian Wikipedia only has 394 Featured Articles out of 700,000 total articles. This is the fourth Featured Article award achieved by this project: two in English, one in Urdu and now one in Indonesian.
[[File:Celtic Knot 2024 Reginold Tower.png|thumb]]


* What does a timeline of twentieth century Black British history look like? Where does it start and who gets to decide?
== Celtic Knot 2024 ==
* What traditions have shaped Black British culture and where can we find Black archives?
In late September, Wikimedians from as far away as Malaysia gathered in Waterford in Ireland to share stories of success, challenges, and to learn from others, all with a focus on minoritised languages. WMUK collaborated with Wikimedia Community Ireland (WCI) to organise and run the event. The Celtic Knot Conference is a space for different communities to connect and support each other in their efforts to improve their languages’ representation online, and WMUK have been involved in the conference since its inception in 2017. 2024 was the first in-person Celtic Knot since 2019, and across the three-day conference, 150 people attended in-person or online, with 35 different language communities represented. Each of the three days had a different theme in the programme: the past, the present, and the future of language communities. The programme was topical, with the launch of WCI’s WikiWomen Erasmus+ Project and talks on translation tools and the impact of large language models. Large language models present challenges and opportunities to Wikipedia, especially smaller language communities, so it was an important topic to discuss. The conference enthused those present, sharing stories of success that inspired others, from editing campaigns such as #wici365 on the Welsh Wicipedia and using digital TV channels to recruit editors.
* How does our access to these histories shape our understanding of Black history in Britain?
* How has the surveillance state shaped and informed access to Black British history in the archive?
* How do genre, class and race contribute to absences in the archive, and how can we combat this?


The workshop aims to expand and amplify knowledge produced by and about Black creatives in the twentieth century. The event is an active editing workshop, with training on creating and editing wiki pages in order to communicate the hidden gaps of Black history in British culture of the twentieth century and the impact of surveillance. Participants will also be invited to explore resources that can enable better citation justice for BIPOC knowledge producers, and greater access to archive collections documenting Black British histories. Documents will be on display from The National Archives for participants to view. With expert support from Wikimedians and researchers alike, this is an unmissable opportunity to improve Wikipedia for the better. (SIGN UP LINKS TBC)
== University of Edinburgh ==
[[File:Carpenter portrait of Ada Lovelace - detail.png|thumb|Detail of Margaret Sarah Carpenter's portrait of Ada Lovelace]]


The '''Living With Machines: Exploring the Margins editathon''' will take place on the 7th January at 1PM. Research for the Living with Machines exhibition at Leeds City Museum showed that some significant figures from Leeds history are under-represented on Wikipedia. This Wiki workshop aims to expand and amplify knowledge about these areas, with a particular focus on women and working class figures. Participants require no previous Wiki experience but are expected to bring their own laptops for this event. We're particularly interested in improving content around:
==== Women in Red workshops ====
A number of  'Women in Red' workshops took place at the University - in September, to coincide with WIki Loves Monuments, the event was themed as [[:en:Wikipedia:University_of_Edinburgh/Events_and_Workshops/Scottish_Castles_and_Witchcraft|Scottish Castles and Witch Lore.]] New wiki pages were created about Scottish castles and heritage locations were created. These include [[:en:Bass_Castle|Bass Castle]], [[:en:Logie_House_Garden|Logie House Garden]], and [[:en:Poldrate_Mill|Poldrate Mill.]] As part of this event, the University also hosted an exhibition of material about Scottish castles and witchcraft that the university's special collections hold. Read the [https://thinking.is.ed.ac.uk/wir/witch-lore-and-scottish-castles-september-editathon/ blog article] by Ellie Whitehead. In October the workshop was tied with [[:en:Wikipedia:University_of_Edinburgh/Events_and_Workshops/Ada_Lovelace_Day_2024|Ada Lovelace Day event]] celebrating Women in STEM (with a Robotics/AI theme).


* Women who owned workshops, mills and so on;
==== History of Witchcraft in Edinburgh walking tour ====
* Working class people who pushed for better working conditions and the employers who worked with them;
E. McAndrew and E. Whitehead made use of Wikipedia and Wikidata to develop an [http://curiousedinburgh.org/history-of-witchcraft-in-edinburgh/ 18 Stop walking tour] of locations in central Edinburgh related to the Scottish witch hunts and recorded 18 short Youtube clips presented by Prof. Julian Goodare and BBC broadcaster Louise Yeoman to accompany each stop.
* Significant companies and buildings around Leeds, especially the ecosystem of skilled workers and small companies that supported mechanisation in Leeds, from the 1700s to the present day;
* Historians who worked on working class lives and collective action
* Weavers, such as those who signed the weavers' petition and provided evidence for Parliamentary Select Committees.  
* Working class writers of autobiographies and memoirs
* Women workers in the Preston Strikes (and others)
* Men's and women's football players on factory teams (e.g. munitionettes during WWI)
* Artworks and images that depict factories: who painted them and why?


''Annual report for research development - get pdf.''
==== Edinburgh Award 2024/2025 – Digital Volunteering with Wikipedia ====
29 students have registered for the 4th iteration of the extracurricular Edinburgh Award for academic year 2024/2025. Each student is to choose 3 graduate attributes to develop over the 55-80 hours from mid October 2024 to end of March 2025 and a topic area of Wikipedia to significantly improve topic coverage in.


== Khalili Collections ==
==== Global Health Challenges Programme Online ====
Masters students working online from geographically remote locations all over the world have been trained how to edit Wikipedia. The students are working in groups to significantly improve topic coverage of natural and manmade disasters in short stub articles as part of a 5-6 week assignment. So far they’ve added almost 40k words to Wikipedia.


=== January editathons to diversify Wikipedia’s artistic content ===
== Finding sources through Wikipedia’s citations ==
As part of the World Festival of Cultural Diversity, the Khalili Foundation is supporting two in-person editathon events in January to diversify Wikipedia’s representation of visual art. Wikipedia includes an enormous amount of freely available knowledge about art, but to a large extent it describes visual art in terms of the Western canon, even in non-European languages. We can redress this balance by writing about art works and artists from other traditions and cultures. Participants are invited to bring artistic topics to work on or, if not, we have “target lists” of artists and their masterpieces from many different cultures. These events will include basic training in wiki-editing and an experienced Wikipedian will be on hand to help make lasting improvements to the topics.The London event is hosted by the Wellcome Collection on Euston Road and the Oxford event is in partnership with the Khalili Research Centre and hosted at Wolfson College. Spaces at these events are limited and can be booked free online through EventBrite:
We had an online Wikipedia workshop focused on adding Digital Object Identifiers (DOIs) to Wikipedia. Those DOIs point towards publications in the Archaeology Data Service. It helps Wikipedia's readers and editors as it makes the sources used in articles easier to find, and it helps the ADS because more people are visiting their site.


Wednesday January 11th, the Wellcome Collection, London
As it was a very specific kind of editing, the how-to element of the event was short, but because it involved changing references which aren't standardised there were a few tricky cases (especially if incorrect dates were used).


Tuesday January 24th, Wolfson College, Oxford
At the start there was something like 2,000 articles on the English Wikipedia. In three hours, we made a good dent in the [https://outreachdashboard.wmflabs.org/courses/Archaeology_Data_Service/Help_the_ADS_improve_DOIs_on_Wikipedia/home worklist] with more than 140 articles edited.
 
=== Arabic Wikipedia ===
Besides these events, resident at the Khalili Foundation, Dr Martin Poulter, has been strengthening the project’s presence on Arabic Wikipedia. There are seven Featured Images on Arabic Wikipedia, including an addition in September of a 13th century work that shows a scientific explanation of eclipses and of the phases of the Moon. It appeared on the front page of Arabic Wikipedia on 17th September, getting more than 76,000 views. Martin was invited to the WikiArabia conference in Dubai, where he distributed a handout about the Khalili Collections and their on-wiki representations. Alongside this, Martin is also building project pages for a global visual arts task force; a kind of Women In Red for art and artists outside the Western canon. Using the list compiled by the Ahmed & Poulter research, the resident identified 129 biographies of visual artists from outside Western culture which were not tagged with WikiProject Visual Arts, and added them to the WikiProject.
 
=== Research aimed at tackling cultural bias on Wikipedia ===
In November, Wikimedia UK was awarded funding from Culham St Gabriel’s Trust, to support the continuation of our research aimed at tackling cultural bias on Wikipedia. Building on our previous work with Waqās Ahmed and Dr Martin Poulter from the Khalili Collections, the focus of this research is to identify and highlight knowledge bias relating to underrepresented religions and religious culture. This is a very exciting opportunity for Wikimedia UK, as the findings of this work will be published and shared with the global editing community, to help close these knowledge gaps and improve both the quantity and quality of information on the world’s religious beliefs and traditions.
 
== National Galleries of Scotland and the Fruitmarket ==
The National Galleries of Scotland teamed up with the Fruitmarket to run an editathon in the NGS’s Modern Two building, which was the Fruitmaket’s first in person event since we started running editathons with them in January 2021. The event focused on improving the pages on '''contemporary Scottish artists of colour'''. The event began with a behind the scenes tour of the Modern Two print rooms with librarian Kerry Watson, discussing the gallery’s drive to diversify its print collection and what is involved in the acquisition process. This led into Wikipedia training introduced by artist and cultural practitioner Tanatsei Gambura and run by Dr Sara Thomas, our Scotland Programme Coordinator, who have both been working with the Fruitmarket since 2021 on a project aimed at improving the representation of creative people of colour on Wikipedia. During past editathons, the Fruitmarket has been working on addressing the passive and active erasure of the creative work of people of colour – historical and current – in our community. This event sought to bring together this ongoing work with the acquisitions currently being undertaken by the National Galleries of Scotland.
 
Another of the National Galleries of Scotland projects to diversify Wikipedia, one that focused on the '''gender and racial diversity of artists represented on Wikipedia''', was picked up by the The Scotsman newspaper, which did an article on the project. The editathons aim to improve the gender parity and racial diversity of artist biographies on Wikipedia by adding more articles about the women of colour that have artwork in the NGS’s collections. The editathons built upon work done by volunteers at the NGS in the summer.
 
== Scots Wikipedia ==
''The Scots wiki writing drives continue, with events to''
 
''Scots wiki writing drives from September and November, next one in the new year looking at stubs that need their Scots fixing.''
 
== UK's consideration of a text and data mining copyright exemption ==
 
=== Lucy to draft. ===
''Link to recording of Lucy’s conversation with the DEI team at the Foundation?''
 
== Vocal Eyes ==
VocalEyes is a crowdsourcing project to collect information on how accessible heritage websites are for the blind and partially sighted. The project completed its audit to track the changes in the state of access on museum and heritage websites since 2018, when their last report was made. Unfortunately, the report found that there have been no major improvements in information for blind and visually impaired, D/deaf, hard of hearing, and neurodivergent visitors in those four years. We’re partnering with VocalEyes to get the information onto Wikidata to highlight the importance of online access information for the UK museum and heritage sector to a wider audience. Hopefully with more dissemination of the information in the report, we can start to implement real changes in the cultural sector’s online presence.


== Join us ==
== Join us ==
We’re very grateful to and proud of the network we’ve built around our chapter. You can support the governance of the charity by becoming a [[Membership|member]], or support our projects through a [[Donate|donation]], or [[volunteer]] on some of the projects above.
Come give us a follow on social media, we just launched our [https://bsky.app/profile/wikimediauk.bsky.social Bluesky] account, and we're also on [https://wikis.world/@wikimediauk Mastodon,] [https://twitter.com/wikimediauk Twitter,] [https://www.facebook.com/WikimediaUK Facebook,] [https://www.instagram.com/wikimediauk/ Instagram] and [https://www.linkedin.com/company/496119/admin/feed/posts/ LinkedIn.] We’re very grateful to and proud of the network we’ve built around our chapter. You can support the governance of the charity by becoming a [[Membership|member]], which will allow you to vote on our board elections at the 2024 AGM on the 21st September. You can also support our projects through a [https://wikimedia.access.charity/donate/donate donation,] or [https://wikimedia.org.uk/get-involved/ volunteer] on some of the projects above. Our blog has more details on some of the activities mentioned in the newsletter.
 
We’re on social media if you’d like to connect with us there, we always appreciate new followers and sharers of our news; Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn. You can also follow our blog, which has more details on some of the activities mentioned in the newsletter.


<nowiki>[[ Category:Friends' Newsletter ]]</nowiki>
<nowiki>[[ Category:Friends' Newsletter ]]</nowiki>

Latest revision as of 14:08, 19 December 2024

Text reading: Wikimedia UK, winter 2023 newsletter, thank you for your support this year on a green, red, and orange background featuring flora and fauna illustrations from Wikimedia Commons
Collage of images from Wikimedia Commons, filenames in the description of this page - File:Giving Tuesday 2023.png

Welcome to the winter 2024 newsletter

Season's Greetings and welcome to the last newsletter of 2024! As I'm wrapped up in the festivities of the season I'm once again impressed by the incredible portfolio of work from our volunteers and staff this year.

In September we moved into our new office at the British Library. The vibrant environment of the Library has already fostered our staff's creativity and innovation, while being a strategic location to enable better connection with partners, volunteers, and the public.

Earlier in the autumn we were delighted to welcome two new trustees to our board, following the election at our 2024 AGM. Andrew Russell brings substantial experience in public affairs while Monica Westin is a keen Wikimedian with a professional background in knowledge information.

Congratulations to Fran Allfrey, Wikimedia UK’s Wikimedian of the Year for 2024, along with GLAM-E Lab who received the Partnership of the Year award, and Perigrinate Avellana, our Up and Coming Wikimedian of the Year. You can read more about the awards and the nominees here.

Finally, you may have seen our Education through Wikimedia campaign to boost our work in secondary schools. Education is at the heart of our work as the national charity for open knowledge, and we believe that equipping the next generation with essential information literacy and digital skills is crucial for their success in an increasingly complex digital world. This is why we are launching a dedicated campaign aimed at secondary school students, focusing on developing these fundamental abilities.

Wikimedia UK community celebration

Community Celebration 2024

In November we hosted our 2024 Community Celebration. It was a chance for our community to gather online, share and celebrate the work that’s taken place over the last year and recognise that work through the UK Wikimedian of the Year awards and celebrate the winners of the Wiki Loves Earth competition.

It was heartening seeing so many of our community at the celebration. There were around 40 community members, attending from all over the UK. With the event being online in the midst of Storm Bert raging, it meant that people who otherwise wouldn’t be able to attend were able to do so.

We had a series of short talks which can be watched in this playlist.

Jason Evans, Open Data Manager and National Wikimedian at the National Library of Wales told us about AI, Placenames and Time Machine experiments at the National Library of Wales.

Dr Kirsty Ross from the University of St Andrews, who is also one of the co-founders of the IDEA network told us about how Scottish Brick History (SBH), Wikimedia UK, and researchers from the School of Computer Science at the University of St Andrews collaborated to get a unique dataset about Scotland’s brickworks onto Wikidata, and built web visualisations to showcase the work.

Lucy Moore, a Wikimedian based in Leeds, and who won UK Wikimedian of the year 2022 told us about her Wiki Year!

Nick Sheppard, Open Research Adviser based at the University of Leeds Libraries told us about his journey from his first tentative edit in 2017 (flagged as spam) to becoming a committed advocate for Wikimedia in Universities.

Jonathan Deamer from Liverpool, who describes himself as a Wikimedia hobbyist, told us about attending his first Wikimania in Katowice in Poland this year. He shared with us his highlights from the event and how these have had a tangible impact on his daily editing.

Joanne Forster-Martin, a student at the University of Oxford, and who we met at our recent Train the Trainer weekend told us about the Wiki Women in Red project to uncover the hidden female figures of Jesus College, Oxford.

Adam Harangzo, Wikipedian in Residence at the National Institute for Health and Care Research talked to us about his experience of working with researchers in an impactful way where they contribute to Wikipedia without directly editing it.

View of the Kings Library, British Library, by Mike Peel

Wikimedia UK moves into new offices at the British Library

Wikimedia UK is excited to announce our relocation to new offices at the prestigious British Library. The new office space will provide a vibrant environment that fosters creativity and innovation, allowing our team to work flexibly and collaboratively with a wealth of resources and opportunities available at one of the world’s largest libraries. This strategic location will enable us to better connect with partners, volunteers, and the public. Staff will continue to work remotely and occasionally come into the office, ensuring we adapt to the evolving needs of our team and the communities we serve.

Wikimedia UK Chief Executive Lucy Crompton-Reid, says: “We are looking forward to our new office space within the British Library after a year of being fully remote.” As the national charity for the global Wikimedia open knowledge movement, there are lots of areas of shared interest with the Library. Director of Science and Innovation, Maja Maricevic, adds “We are delighted to welcome Wikimedia UK. Over years we have regularly collaborated with Wikimedia UK and hosted Wikimedians-in-Residence, so are delighted with an opportunity with an even closer proximity to an organisation that we have the existing close links with and share the common vision to open access to knowledge.”

New trustees at the Wikimedia UK AGM

Following a successful AGM we’re very pleased to share that Andrew Russell and Monica Westin have joined Wikimedia UK's board of trustees. We’re also delighted that Caroline Ball was re-elected for a second three year term. You can read their candidate statements here if you’d like to find out more about them.

On Saturday we also said thank you, but hopefully not goodbye, to outgoing trustees Julian Manieson and Rod Ward.

Many thanks to all those who attended the AGM, or who submitted a proxy vote.

A photograph of Stuart Prior delivering a presentation to a room of volunteer editors at Brixton Library
Programme Coordinator, Stuart Prior, delivering Wiki editing training at the Brixton Library Black History Month meetup

Brixton Library Black History Month editathon

Brixton Library’s monthly Wikipedia meetups show participants how to contribute to the encyclopaedia. For the October meetup, the event focused on learning about and contributing to the recording of Black history. We wrote about and enhanced articles about Black people, history and society. Participants used the session to explore Brixton Library’s Black Interest book collections, the library service’s online subscriptions to packages like the British Newspaper Archive and Who’s Who and much more. We also looked at Wikimedia Commons and how you can use photographs and images.

100 Days 100 Edits for climate (GSI)

The University of Exeter’s resident for climate and the environment, Tatjana Baleta, recruited 31 researchers from 11 different institutions to cumulatively propose 100 edits to 35 articles over 100 days. As of the 10th of November 2024, these articles have been viewed over ~662,000 times.

"Through this 100-day campaign, I upped my normal Wikipedia editing, highlighted how unprecedented CO₂ levels are over millions of years, and dispelled two common myths about global warming: that humans are only "mainly" responsible, and that further warming stops when emissions stabilize, rather than when they reach net zero.”

– Dr Femke Njisse, University of Exeter (edited Grid storage and Climate change)

“Promoting widespread scientific literacy is a key issue in addressing anthropogenic climate change, environmental degradation and injustice. Platforms like Wikipedia provide an excellent opportunity to disseminate scientific information to an extended audience, where this information is otherwise often only accessible by academics in the global north. I hope that my contribution to the campaign can help bring greater clarity to a topic (i.e. biochar) that is often discussed in the context of climate change mitigation.”

– Dr Oscar Kennedy-Blundell, University of Exeter (edited Biochar)

The Devils Pulpit in Scotland, by Gaverlaa, This image won the 2nd prize in the national contest of Scotland in Wiki Loves Earth 2024

Wiki Loves Earth winners

Wiki Loves Earth is an annual photography competition themed around the natural world. This year Ireland, Scotland and Wales took part in the competition. Over 5000 photos were submitted of nature from across these three countries, helping to illustrate Wikimedia with the flora and fauna that is so at risk from climate change and human development. The winners have now been announced, see them for Scotland, Wales, and Ireland. The natural world changes from season to season, but climate change poses a threat to our environment and its durability. Extreme temperatures, drought, or rainfall all disturb the balance that has cultivated these environments and biodiversity. The photos submitted to the competition capture the state of our natural world at a point in time, and remind us what we stand to lose.

Climate Change & Health Wikipedia Workshop

In November two of our Wikimedians in Residence held joint workshops between the University of Exeter and the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR). Tatjana Baleta is the resident for climate at the GSI hub at Exeter University, and the health effects of climate change overlap significantly with Adam Harangozo’s residency on medical research at the NIHR.

Wikipedia is often the first and only place where most people go for health information. What readers find there matters. Contributing to Wikipedia offers a great opportunity to use an effective platform to mobilise evidence-based information, research and expert knowledge in an accessible way for a wider audience all around the world.

Researchers with expertise in climate change and health were invited to attend one of the three workshops in November. The workshops drafted an article – titled Climate change and health in the UK – on this important topic at the intersection of the climate crisis and health research.

Wiki Loves Monuments 2024

Over 5000 photos of monuments, architecture and protected buildings were submitted to the 2024 Wiki Loves Monuments from Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. Wiki Loves Monuments is best known for being the world’s largest photo contest. It highlights humanity’s cultural heritage through the buildings, structures, and other assets that have gained importance due to their artistic, historic, political, technical, or architectural significance. You can see the entries for Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.

Matthew Hopkins’ Discovery of Witches (1647), Held by The British Library

The history of witch trials in Newcastle and Scotland

In 2023, one of our volunteers, Sophie Whitfield, led a Wikipedia workshop for students on  the Digital Cultures and Media course at Newcastle University. This year, WMUK again collaborated with the course leaders to give the students an opportunity to learn about Wikipedia.

The plan was to have the class of twenty students collaboratively write a Wikipedia page about an overlooked part of Newcastle’s history: the 1650 witch trials. Overlooked for Wikipedia at least, Tyne and Wear Archives & Museums have excellent resources on the trials and the events were the subject of a podcast. But there are no local memorials to the accused, and Wikipedia hardly mentions events in Newcastle.

The trials took place in 1649 and 1650, and resulted in the execution of sixteen people. As with many other similar persecutions, the majority were women.

The Digital Cultures and Media course introduces students to a range of different platforms and media: social sites, mapping, video creation, and of course Wikipedia. They are taught to be adaptive and explore. With a class of this size, we organised them into groups so that they could work on different elements of the article. Some worked on the imagery, others on the list of the accused and what happened to them, while another group detailed the context within which the trials took place.

Two hours raced by, and in the final thirty minutes there was an avalanche of writing. As students saved their edits the skeletal page suddenly took shape - populated by the names of people who had lived and died in Newcastle more than 370 years ago.

The history of witch trials has also been a project at the University of Edinburgh, with version 2 of the Map of Accused Witches in Scotland – created using Wikidata – launching at the Edinburgh Futures Institute on 23rd October 2024. E. Whitehead has completed an expanded Glossary of terms to help explain and contextualise the Scottish witch trials. R. Imrie has completed the Nuxt.js upgrade and added filters for the accusations (demonic pacts, property damage, ritual objects used, meeting places etc.) the accused were subjected to along with all the temporal data so the Scottish witch hunts can now be explored in place and time through Wikidata.

IDEA network

The University of St Andrew’s IDEA network (Inclusion, Diversity, Equity and Accessibility in Open Knowledge Network) was launched during lockdown. We’ve been working with them for years to make the Wikimedia projects more inclusive, diverse, equitable and accessible locations for open knowledge.

Some recent highlights include:

  • Digital Inclusion WikiConnect – staff and students are working on content relating to digital literacy and digital poverty.
  • Ethical Digital Nation event series – exploring how universities can play a pivotal role in addressing digital challenges through collaborative research, training programs, and the development of socio-technical solutions.

Wikimedia in Interfaith Education

Interfaith Explorers is a set of resources to support primary and secondary education about religions. As well as classroom resources, it has guidance for teachers on encouraging respectful discussions about faiths and cultures. It is listed by the UK Government's "Educate Against Hate" portal.

The site recently completed a major update in which Wikimedia content played a crucial part. Short text extracts adapted from Simple English Wikipedia and English Wikipedia were combined with colourful, diverse images from Wikimedia Commons to add nearly 200 pages of new content about religions and how they are practised. The result is an interconnected web of child-safe educational material, with automated translation into a dozen other languages.

Dr Martin Poulter is Wikimedian In Residence at the Khalili Foundation, which maintains Interfaith Explorers. He adapted the wiki content with the help of expert reviewers. Interfaith Explorers are looking for teachers, religious institutions, and educational charities to join the community that will further develop the resource further, including covering non-Abrahamic religions. Get in touch.

Memory of the World

Dr Martin Poulter is now focusing increasingly on the Memory of the World project. The Khalili Foundation is supporting and fully funding work to improve the visibility of UNESCO Memory of the World inscriptions on the Wikimedia platforms, in parallel with UNESCO's database which is being re-developed. This will bring some of the world's most precious documentary heritage to the widest possible audience. We will be coordinating with the team at UNESCO to improve Wikimedia as they improve the official online database.

Within the project, Indonesian Wikipedia has given a Featured Article award to their translation of the Hajj: Journey to the Heart of Islam article. This resulted from a long review process involving four users, and is a rare honour; Indonesian Wikipedia only has 394 Featured Articles out of 700,000 total articles. This is the fourth Featured Article award achieved by this project: two in English, one in Urdu and now one in Indonesian.

Celtic Knot 2024 Reginold Tower.png

Celtic Knot 2024

In late September, Wikimedians from as far away as Malaysia gathered in Waterford in Ireland to share stories of success, challenges, and to learn from others, all with a focus on minoritised languages. WMUK collaborated with Wikimedia Community Ireland (WCI) to organise and run the event. The Celtic Knot Conference is a space for different communities to connect and support each other in their efforts to improve their languages’ representation online, and WMUK have been involved in the conference since its inception in 2017. 2024 was the first in-person Celtic Knot since 2019, and across the three-day conference, 150 people attended in-person or online, with 35 different language communities represented. Each of the three days had a different theme in the programme: the past, the present, and the future of language communities. The programme was topical, with the launch of WCI’s WikiWomen Erasmus+ Project and talks on translation tools and the impact of large language models. Large language models present challenges and opportunities to Wikipedia, especially smaller language communities, so it was an important topic to discuss. The conference enthused those present, sharing stories of success that inspired others, from editing campaigns such as #wici365 on the Welsh Wicipedia and using digital TV channels to recruit editors.

University of Edinburgh

Detail of Margaret Sarah Carpenter's portrait of Ada Lovelace

Women in Red workshops

A number of  'Women in Red' workshops took place at the University - in September, to coincide with WIki Loves Monuments, the event was themed as Scottish Castles and Witch Lore. New wiki pages were created about Scottish castles and heritage locations were created. These include Bass Castle, Logie House Garden, and Poldrate Mill. As part of this event, the University also hosted an exhibition of material about Scottish castles and witchcraft that the university's special collections hold. Read the blog article by Ellie Whitehead. In October the workshop was tied with Ada Lovelace Day event celebrating Women in STEM (with a Robotics/AI theme).

History of Witchcraft in Edinburgh walking tour

E. McAndrew and E. Whitehead made use of Wikipedia and Wikidata to develop an 18 Stop walking tour of locations in central Edinburgh related to the Scottish witch hunts and recorded 18 short Youtube clips presented by Prof. Julian Goodare and BBC broadcaster Louise Yeoman to accompany each stop.

Edinburgh Award 2024/2025 – Digital Volunteering with Wikipedia

29 students have registered for the 4th iteration of the extracurricular Edinburgh Award for academic year 2024/2025. Each student is to choose 3 graduate attributes to develop over the 55-80 hours from mid October 2024 to end of March 2025 and a topic area of Wikipedia to significantly improve topic coverage in.

Global Health Challenges Programme Online

Masters students working online from geographically remote locations all over the world have been trained how to edit Wikipedia. The students are working in groups to significantly improve topic coverage of natural and manmade disasters in short stub articles as part of a 5-6 week assignment. So far they’ve added almost 40k words to Wikipedia.

Finding sources through Wikipedia’s citations

We had an online Wikipedia workshop focused on adding Digital Object Identifiers (DOIs) to Wikipedia. Those DOIs point towards publications in the Archaeology Data Service. It helps Wikipedia's readers and editors as it makes the sources used in articles easier to find, and it helps the ADS because more people are visiting their site.

As it was a very specific kind of editing, the how-to element of the event was short, but because it involved changing references which aren't standardised there were a few tricky cases (especially if incorrect dates were used).

At the start there was something like 2,000 articles on the English Wikipedia. In three hours, we made a good dent in the worklist with more than 140 articles edited.

Join us

Come give us a follow on social media, we just launched our Bluesky account, and we're also on Mastodon, Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn. We’re very grateful to and proud of the network we’ve built around our chapter. You can support the governance of the charity by becoming a member, which will allow you to vote on our board elections at the 2024 AGM on the 21st September. You can also support our projects through a donation, or volunteer on some of the projects above. Our blog has more details on some of the activities mentioned in the newsletter.

[[ Category:Friends' Newsletter ]]

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