Reports/2012/November

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Below is the Wikimedia UK monthly report for the period 1 to 30 November 2012. If you want to keep up with the chapter's activities as they happen, please subscribe to our blog, join a UK mailing list, and/or follow us on Twitter. If you have any questions or comments, please drop us a line on this report's talk page.

Program activities

Community

GLAM activities

Royal Birmingham Society of Artists

Drawing of Worcester Beacons, Colwall Oaks by Henry Harris Lines, from the RBSA permanent collection
The first QRpedia code at the RBSA, on a bust of David Cox

On 4 November a backstage pass with editathon was held at the Royal Birmingham Society of Artists gallery, facilitated by Andy Mabbett (User:Pigsonthewing), who has previously trained the gallery's staff and volunteers to edit Wikipedia. A small team of experienced and new Wikipedians were given access to the the society's small, but richly populated archives and wrote articles about a number of notable past Members and Associates of the Society and took photographs of objects and ephemera. At the end of the day, a number of QRpedia codes were deployed around the gallery. The gallery also donated a CD-ROM containing the digitised contents of the sketch book of Henry Harris Lines, which await uploading to Wikimedia Commons.

Staffordshire Archives and Heritage Service Wikipedian in Residence

Picture of a pre-1968 Staffordshire police helmet, in the collection of Staffordshire County Museum, and donated by them to Wikimedia Commons

Since 13 November, Andy Mabbett has been Wikipedian in Residence at Staffordshire Archives and Heritage Service, which manages Staffordshire County Museum, the Shire Hall Gallery in Stafford, and Staffordshire & Stoke on Trent Archives Service at the William Salt Library. The diverse list of articles improved by as a result of the collaboration already include Tolpuddle Martyrs, the film Blanche Fury starring Stewart Granger, the Inspector Morse novel The Wench is Dead, and the George Bernard Shaw play Shakes versus Shav!

Other activities

Expert outreach

Technology

Other activities

Other activities

  • 5th-9th - Andre Gray ran a series of four workshops in Edinburgh for the University of Edinburgh, the National Library of Scotland, and EDINA.
  • 6th - Stevie Benton met with Matt Jukes of the Medical Research Council to discuss Wikipedians in Residence.
  • 19th - Robin Owain met with Rheinallt Foster-Jones (The People's Collection) and Tom Pert (Mapping Officer, for the Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Wales) at Llanberis. Piloting 100 CC-BY-SA images etc.
  • 19th - Andy Mabbett ran a session on Wikipedia and its relevance for local government at the HyperLocalWM unconference. He also wrote a piece advocating open licensing, for the unconference's own newspaper!
  • 20th - Stevie visited the town of Stamford, Lincolnshire, to learn more about their project to improve local content.
  • 20th - Andrew Gray and Richard Symonds met with the Imperial War Museum to discuss Wikipedians in Residence
  • 21st - Andy travelled to High Wycombe to pilot new method of Wikipedia (and OpenStreetMap) training, Tupperware Party style!

Microgrants

Information about microgrants that are currently running, and how to submit a microgrant application of your own, are at Microgrants/Applications.

UK press coverage (and coverage of UK projects & activities)

  • 20th - Andy Mabbett spoke about Wikipedia in an interview with Jamillah Knowles, for BBC Radio 5 Live’s ‘Outriders’. The thankfully pre-recorded interview was broadcast at 3am, but is also available as a podcast.

Upcoming activities in December

For events in January 2013 and onwards, please see Events.

Administrative activities

Finances

  • The current state of each of our budgets is outlined in a Google Spreadsheet. This details spend to date, and a rough estimate of future spending. This spreadsheet is too complex to be placed directly on a wiki. Our yearly spend is heavily 'end-loaded', partially due to the rapid growth of Wikimedia UK.
  • Q3's Management Accounts (covering August, September, October) are at File:Wikimedia UK Management Accounts Q3 2012.pdf. These are also available in spreadsheet format for those interested - contact richard.symondsatwikimedia.org.uk

Board activities

News from the Chief Exec

For information on Jon's activities this month, see News from the Office.


Communications

The key area of importance in communications this month was a series of articles published in The Times about the influence and activities of some PR agencies on Wikipedia. The stories were fairly significant in that they highlighted the widespread manipulation of Wikipedia by agencies on behalf of their clients. One of the stories even made the front page. Given that the journalists from The Times were open and transparent about their research and interviewed Jimmy Wales to present a Wikipedian view, the story was sympathetic to the Wikimedia movement. The story gained relatively little traction across other outlets, although The Telegraph and The Observer both ran online pieces.

Below are links to press coverage related to Wikimedia UK in November.

Fundraising and Membership

Fundraising

This month, we received £xx in one-off donations, with xx individual donations. The average donation amount was £xx - xx% of these donors have had Gift Aid Declarations made and matched with their records. If anyone would like a full (but anonymised) csv file with more information, please get in touch with katherine.bavageatwikimedia.org.uk and let her know your requirements.

As for direct debit donations, there were xxxx successful direct debits this month, bringing in a total of £xx.xx

Membership

Up to 30th November 2012:

  • xx new (membership commenced in preceding three months) and current members
  • xx 'grace' members (membership within six months after date membership should be renewed)
This adds up to xx members who are eligible to vote
  • xx Expired members

A membership survey was distributed on 30th October 2012 , the results were made public as part of the reports to the Board meeting of 17th November 2012. You can view them here (pdf)


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