[Wikimediaindia-l] Wikimedia India Program Trust

[Hisham]

Hi Folks,
I'm writing to share an update with you on certain developments of relevance to 
the Wikimedia movement in India. 

Announcement of Wikimedia India Program Trust
For some time, efforts have gone into creating an organization that would 
provide an appropriate structure to support Wikimedia program activities in 
India.  Aspects such as the current regulatory framework (regarding funding, 
taxation, etc.) as well as the legal protection for the India team have been 
considered to determine this structure. In this context, a host of options 
(e.g. subsidiary, branch, Section 25) were evaluated and a determination was 
made towards an independent non-profit public trust. Legal advice has been 
taken at every stage in this decision. 

A new entity, the “Wikimedia India Program Trust”, has now been formed and 
registered (in Delhi.) This will be the organization that will eventually drive 
India programs and house the team in India.

Why an Independent Public Trust?
The Trust will provide an effective vehicle within India to marshal resources 
to support programs and partner with local institutions. The objective of the 
Trust is to promote the objectives of the Wikimedia movement and work closely 
with the Wikimedia community on various projects with an India focus. It is 
important to understand that the Trust will not have any editorial control over 
content on any of the Wikimedia projects. The Trust is a not for profit 
organization.

Introduction of Trustees
Trustees have been identified based upon their support for Wikimedia movement's 
principles and plans in addition to having reputations for good governance and 
management.

Sunil Abraham and Rahul Matthan have been requested to be the initial Trustees. 
 Both are friends of Wikipedia and have extensive experience.

Sunil is Executive Director of the Centre for Internet & Society (CIS), is a 
long term advocate of free software and IP reform and has been supporting the 
Wikimedia community and movement for some time now.

Rahul is a partner and heads the technology practice at Trilegal. He brings 
deep expertise and relationships that will be valuable for the Trust.

These initial Trustees will serve for a term of three years at the maximum.  
All additional or subsequent Trustees will serve on rotation in accordance with 
a trustee selection plan that will be prepared.

Trustees will not be compensated for their services.

Governance, Funding, Financial Standards & Communications of the Trust
The Trust will be governed by Trustees who will provide oversight and guidance 
regarding the operations and governance of the Trust.

Since the Trust is an independent organization, it will require funding for its 
operations which is in compliance with the legal and regulatory framework in 
India. It will seek funding from private donors within India as well as 
external sources.

The Trust has the support of the Wikimedia Foundation which is a United States 
based non-profit foundation. However, in India all non-profit organizations 
need to be in existence for 3 years before they can receive funding from 
sources outside India. In the interim, they can apply for prior-permission 
under the FCRA regulations to help expedite the process. As a result, the Trust 
will shortly be applying for approval to receive funds from the Wikimedia 
Foundation in the future.

As a Trust, we are required to have an independent external auditor. We have 
appointed KPMG. KPMG is experienced in auditing non-profit companies and are 
also auditors for the Wikimedia Foundation.

Annually, the Trust will publicly disclose it's independently audited financial 
statements.

The Trust will publish a monthly newsletter outlining its current activities 
and future plans. This will commence in December 2011.

Operations of the Trust
The trust deed under which the Trust must operate clearly states that the 
purpose of the Trust is to independently promote the growth of volunteer 
activities within India in support of effective and unrestricted dissemination 
of free knowledge to the public.

I will serve as the Executive Director of the Trust. Once it is possible, 
additional employees will be brought on to the Trust

The Trust will eventually have an office in Delhi.

In the interim, I have personally secured temporary office space to facilitate 
establishing the Trust and its mission. It is located at Top Floor, G-15, Hauz 
Khas, New Delhi - 110 016. It's a couple of minutes walk away from IIT Flyover 
and Hauz Khas Metro. Do drop in! It's a small but cozy place and we'd love to 
have you over!

Conclusion
We continue to make progress in setting up program activities to support the 
growth of Wikimedia in India. We have a long way to go, but are glad that we 
are starting to build a solid foundation.

The following link is for FAQs on this (and related) topics: 
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/FAQ_India_Programs/FAQ_Wikimedia_India_Program_Trust

As always, do reach out if you 

Re: [Wikimediaindia-l] Noteworthy Wikimedian Recognition

[CherianTinu Abraham]

Hi Ravi,
I really appreciate your views on the new initiative.  I
thought I may also share on how I view the whole process,... these comments
are my personal views and not necessarily as an Executive Committee Member
of the Wikimedia India chapter.

You had already seen that Wikimania/ Wikimedia Foundation started
"Wikipedian of the Year" this year.

Having said that, this is an humble effort to recognize at least a few of
our really outstanding contributors of the Wikimedia Movement in India.

When we thought about this initiative , we wanted to make sure the process
is very OPEN and TRANSPARENT, although we were fully aware of the very
short time we have in hand before the Wiki-conference. We wanted it to be
selected by a Jury that is highly respected and qualified. We wanted to it
be announced to all in advance so that everybody gets a fair chance. We are
fully aware that there are some good candidates on the chapter EC, jury and
foundation staff. But again, wouldn't it be more transparent and ethical if
we could free the jury on any kind of conflict of interest ?

The result of this doesn't mean that anyone who didn't get the annual
"Noteworthy Wikimedian Recognition" is any less good.
Who knows there are more than one Noteworthy Wikimedians to be recognized ?
Make the selection difficult for the jury !  May be Jury will be forced to
recognize at least a handful of Wikipedians !  :)

There are many reasons of attempting this :
How many of you know all the remarkable contributors in other languages ?
Do you know all the outstanding contributors in your own language Wikipedia
since its creation?

I may know some, you may know some.. Let everybody know them !

Nominate others, recognize their efforts, if you know that they have made
some outstanding contributions to the Movement !

Since this is the first time, the contributions are considered from
2001-2010, because we didn't want of ignore all those who have contributed
from the start of the project. Next year , probably it might be a fixed
time frame like Jan - Dec 2011.

Thank you for listing some of the great contributors of Tamil Wikipedia.
Honestly, I didn't know most of them. And possibly many on the list too ..
That is exactly the intention of this effort. This is just such an effort
to find the real gems of the Wikipedia and recognize them !

Please note that *this is NOT a competition* and the best you can do is  to
nominate all of them.

Being a sysop. b'crat or steward is NOT an achievement or consideration for
noteworthy Wikipedian. The contributions as an individual Wikipedian is
important. It is not even edit counts or even number of articles. Not
everyone is a great article writer, but have contributed in 1001 ways,
 copy editing, vandal fighting, removing copy vio, uploading
images, organizing events , meet-ups and academies, evangelizing Wikimedia
to others, the ways to contribute are countless.

And should we not recognize anyone because we are not sure they are the
only best ? No.
So should we just ignore the contributions of everyone ? No.
Even Nobel Prize is based on nominations . We don't even know if we have
missed lots of deserving people for the Nobel nominations. But still, are
we not giving Nobel Prizes every year?

We may not be able to find all those who have made great contributions,
but at-least we could find some and recognize them. Trust me, it will be a
great motivation and encouraging for them. And an inspiration for lot
others !

Do notice that we had intentionally named it as "Noteworthy Wikimedian" and
not "Best Wikimedian" !

So what could you and everyone do ? Find them, nominate and recognize them.

Just a gentle reminder that the last date of nomination is Nov 13.
http://wiki.wikimedia.in/NWR_2011

Regards
Tinu Cherian


On Thu, Nov 10, 2011 at 6:11 PM, Ravishankar  wrote:

> Arjuna,
>
> I am not very excited with this idea of a jury for picking noteworthy
> Wikimedians.
>
> 1. Many noteworthy Wikimedians are serving in Jury, conference
> activities, chapter and WMF. Omitting them from the recognition will
> not give a real picture to the public.
>
> 2. Having a jury to pick this seems so Un-Wikipediac. Only in extreme
> cases, we have a jury in Wikimedia projects. Usually, the nomination
> and approval is done by the community itself.
>
> 3.There are tens of noteworthy Wikimedians for each Wikipedia. An
> example for Tamil Wikipedia alone at
>
> http://tawp.in/r/1eyn
>
> I can't nominate just one or two as every one's contribution is
> valuable and unique. Not good to have a competition sort of thing and
> upset a lot of people.
>
> 3. What is the point of a citation / certificate in this digital age?
> What is the purpose achieved after the event is over?
>
> I would recommend requesting each language community and project to
> suggest noteworthy contributions with a mini profile and make a audio
> / visual out of it. These people can be interviewed and the content
> can be used in the conference v

Re: [Wikimediaindia-l] Indian Language wikipedia Statistics – 2011 September

[Subhashish Panigrahi]

Thanks a lot Shiju for the detailed report. It is good to see the growth of
Bhojpuri/Bihari language, I have not gone through the quality of articles.
But with a smaller community this kind of growth is impressive.

rgds
Subha

On 10 November 2011 14:41, Shiju Alex  wrote:

> Dear Wikimedians,
>
> I have compiled the statistical report of Indian language wikipedias for
> the month of 2011 September. e detaileis available here:
> http://shijualex.wordpress.com/2011/11/10/indian-language-wikipedia-statistics-2011-september/
>
>
> Shiju
>
>
>
> ___
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>


-- 
*
  ସୁ ଭା ସି ସ ପା ଣି ଗା ହି
**
S u b h a s i s a P a n i g a h i
**
   ଓଡ଼ିଆ ଉଇକିପିଡ଼ିଆ
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[Wikimediaindia-l] traffic statistics

[Gerard Meijssen]

Hoi,
When you look at the traffic statistics for India, Malayalam and Marathi
are doing spectacularly well. Does anyone know why this is ?
Thanks,
  Gerard

http://stats.wikimedia.org/EN_India/TablesPageViewsMonthlyCombined.htm
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Re: [Wikimediaindia-l] Noteworthy Wikimedian Recognition

[Ravishankar]

Arjuna,

I am not very excited with this idea of a jury for picking noteworthy
Wikimedians.

1. Many noteworthy Wikimedians are serving in Jury, conference
activities, chapter and WMF. Omitting them from the recognition will
not give a real picture to the public.

2. Having a jury to pick this seems so Un-Wikipediac. Only in extreme
cases, we have a jury in Wikimedia projects. Usually, the nomination
and approval is done by the community itself.

3.There are tens of noteworthy Wikimedians for each Wikipedia. An
example for Tamil Wikipedia alone at

http://tawp.in/r/1eyn

I can't nominate just one or two as every one's contribution is
valuable and unique. Not good to have a competition sort of thing and
upset a lot of people.

3. What is the point of a citation / certificate in this digital age?
What is the purpose achieved after the event is over?

I would recommend requesting each language community and project to
suggest noteworthy contributions with a mini profile and make a audio
/ visual out of it. These people can be interviewed and the content
can be used in the conference venue and future outreach activities.
This will be a powerful way to motivate and recognize a lot of people.

Ravi

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[Wikimediaindia-l] [Press] : The Hindustan Times : "Wikipedia plumbs for more Marathi articles"

[CherianTinu Abraham]

*The Hindustan Times : "Wikipedia plumbs for more Marathi articles"*
http://epaper.hindustantimes.com/PUBLICATIONS/HT/HM/2011/11/10/ArticleHtmls/Wikipedia-plumbs-for-more-Marathi-articles-10112011004008.shtml?Mode=1

*Lack of digital archiving, limited Indian references and difficulty in
accessing the Devnagari script are the main reasons for the lack of
contributions made to the Marathi Wikipedia page, said Pranav Curumsey,
chairperson of WikiConference 2011, at a press conference on Wednesday.*
*“While the English Wikipedia page has more than four million articles, the
Marathi page has barely 35,000 articles,“ said Mandar Kulkarni, editor of
Marathi Wikipedia.*
*
*
*The WikiConference 2011, organised by the Mumbai Wikipedia community and
the Wikimedia Chapter (India), will be held from November 18 to 20 at the
Mumbai University Convocation Hall.*
*
*
*The conference will have a Marathi track, including paper presentations
and a group discussion on encouraging Wikipedia users to contribute to the
Marathi page of the webbased encyclopedia project. The three-day conference
will have Jimmy Wales, founder and chairman of the Wikimedia Foundation,
will address attendees during the three-day conference. “Out of the 700
seats, only 50 are vacant at the moment,“ said Hisham Mundol, consultant,
Wikimedia Foundation, India.*
*
*
*The conference will have paper presentations on topics such as Wiki for
the Blind, WikiBhasha: Our Experiences with Multilingual Content and Legal
aspects of Wiki culture.*
*
*
*“We will also have a panel discussion on Wiki Women Web: Bridging the
Gender Gap, which will encourage more women to write and edit articles on
our page,“ said Curumsey. “Even at the conference, only 14 % of the total
registrations include women. We need to change this mindset,“ he added.*


*Important Note* : The publisher ( The Hindustan Times ) of the above news
article owns the copyrights of the article / content. Request to kindly not
reproduce or circulate the content further. The information is only shared
only with an internal community who have been featured on this article.
 All copyrights are duly acknowledged.
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[Wikimediaindia-l] [Press] : IANS / Deccan Herald / The Week ... : "Mumbai to host first WikiConference in India"

[CherianTinu Abraham]

*IANS/ Indo Asian News Service  : "Mumbai to host first WikiConference in
India"*
Deccan Herald
http://www.deccanherald.com/content/203594/mumbai-host-first-wikiconference-india.html
The Week :
http://week.manoramaonline.com/cgi-bin/MMOnline.dll/portal/ep/theWeekContent.do?contentId=10400717&programId=1073754912&tabId=13
Two Circles :
http://twocircles.net/2011nov09/mumbai_host_first_wikiconference_india.html
Northern Voices :
http://nvonews.com/2011/11/09/wikipedia-conference-comes-to-india-set-for-nov-18/

Yahoo! News :
http://in.news.yahoo.com/mumbai-host-first-wikiconference-india-115959239.html

Sulekha.com :
http://newshopper.sulekha.com/mumbai-to-host-first-wikiconference-in-india_news_1367253.htm

Indiacurrentaffairs.org :
http://indiacurrentaffairs.org/mumbai-to-host-first-wikiconference-in-india/

Webindia123.com
http://news.webindia123.com/news/Articles/India/2009/1868620.html
Hamaraphotos
http://hamaraphotos.com/news/art/mumbai-to-host-first-wikiconference-in-india.html

Onionlive.com http://onionlive.com/2011/11/09/first-wikiconference-in-india/

*Aiming to tap the Indian community, the first WikiConference by the
Wikimedia Foundation in this country will be hosted in Mumbai Nov 18, an
official said.*
*
*
*The three-day conference, hosted by the Mumbai Wikipedia Community and the
Wikimedia Chapter, India, will see founder Jimmy Wales opening the
conference that will have a a distinct Indian flavour and deal primarily
with issues relating to India on Wikipedia.*
*
*
*The Nov18-20 conference will be held at the Mumbai University Campus in
the Fort area of south Mumbai.*
*
*
*"We look forward to organising the conference on an annual basis to bring
together Indian Wikipedians from over 20 Indian language projects," said
Pranav Curumsey, chariperson of the organising committee.*
*
*
*"Aimed to share learnings and best practices, the event will help bring
together contributors in building Knowledge Society through free and open
education projects," said Hisham Mundol, National programmes consultant the
for Wikimedia Foundation.*
*
*
*Thousands of Wikipedians from all over the country will pour in for
sessions on topics such as "Usage of Ajax and Jquery in Wiki", "WikiBhasha:
Our Experiences with Multilingual Content", "WikiWomenWeb: Bridging the
Gender Gap" and "Legal Aspects of Wiki Culture".*
*
*
*A live "Editathon" session and a "Hackathon" where aspects of editing a
Wikipedia article will be taught will be an added feature of the conference.
*
*
*
*The conference will serve as platform for all Indian Wikipedians to meet
and share their views, discuss challenges and exchange useful tips and best
practices. The foundation has received over 7,000 requests for scholarships
and participations and over 550 papers have been submitted to be presented
at the conference.*
*
*
*Part of the conference will be dedicated to Marathi Wikipedia, where the
issues faced by users will be highlighted.*


Regards
Tinu Cherian
pr...@wikimedia.in
http://wiki.wikimedia.in/In_the_news
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[Wikimediaindia-l] Indian Language wikipedia Statistics – 2011 September

[Shiju Alex]

Dear Wikimedians,

I have compiled the statistical report of Indian language wikipedias for
the month of 2011 September. It is available here:
http://shijualex.wordpress.com/2011/11/10/indian-language-wikipedia-statistics-2011-september/


Shiju
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Re: [Wikimediaindia-l] Noteworthy Wikimedian Recognition

[RadhaKrishna Arvapally]

I could not find the nomination form in the link given below.
can any one help me?


-RK




On Wed, Nov 9, 2011 at 7:45 AM, Arjuna Rao Chavala wrote:

> Dear Wikimedians,
>
> The traction for Wikimedia projects and content in Indian languages (and
> Indian content in English) has been growing over the last decade thanks to
> the passion and tireless contributions of  several Wikimedians. We are
> getting set for WikiConference India 2011 which is around the corner.  The
> Wikimedia Chapter Executive Committee (EC) and the Conference organising
> team thought it is appropriate to  recognize the most noteworthy
> contributors to Indian language projects and Indian content in English
> during the conference.
>
> Arun Ramarathnam and Naveen Francis from the EC are leading this
> initiative. The  process for the recognition has been prepared and a well
> diversified  Jury is identified. Details of the process and the Jury are
> enclosed for your perusal.
>
> I would like to appeal to all of you to spare few minutes to think of
> fellow wikimedians who made a significant difference over the first decade
> of Wikimedia movement and nominate them for the recognition.
>
> Further communication on the wiki based nomination form would follow from
> the Jury. Please spread this communication  across other relevant lists and
>  participate enthusiastically and help make this initiative, the first
> collective effort to appreciate stellar contributions from the community a
> success.
>
>
> Cheers
>
> Arjuna Rao Chavala
>
> President, Wikimedia India
>
> ***
>
>
> Noteworthy Wikimedian Recognition
>
> The Recognition
>
> Wikimedia projects have been active in India for a few years and the
> journey has been exciting (Wikimedia Chapter First Annual 
> report,
> Gautam John's 
> articleand 
> Wikimedia
> Foundation 
> article).
> This has been made possible by the contributions of hundreds of Wikimedians
> across various Wikimedia projects. WikiConference India 2011 is the first
> conference and largest congregation of Wikimedians in India across
> Wikimedia projects. The Wikimedia India chapter Executive committee
> believes it would be befitting to use this opportunity to recognize
> noteworthy contributions of some of the best contributors to our projects.
>
> The objective of this recognition is to appreciate Wikimedians
> (contributing to India focused projects) from across Wikimedia projects and
> languages for their contributions.
>
> The nomination process
>
>- Any Wikimedian can nominate any other wikimedian of their choice for
>the recognition (preferred). Self nominations are also allowed.
>
>
>- Nominees for the Recognition should have made significant
>contributions to Wikimedia India projects or the movement. Contributions
>include  content,  Outreach and contributions in any other form.
>- Nominations should be  through  a filled Nomination form on the Wikimedia
>India wiki .
>- Incomplete nominations will not be considered.
>- The jury's decision would be final.
>
>
>
> Eligibility Criterion
>
> Any wikimedian other than current Members of the Wikimedia India
>  Executive committee, members of the Jury,  Wiki Conference India Office
> bearers, staff/contractors of the Wikimedia foundation  or anyone paid
> directly for their time/effort by Wikimedia organisations  are eligible for
> these recognitions.
>
> The Jury
>
> Jury constitution
> The chapter has constituted a Jury with members from the Chapter Executive
> committee, Wikimedia Foundation India office, Conference organisers and
> Community and other key stakeholders.
>
> Jury composition
>
>1. Achal Prabhala
>2. Arun Ramarathnam
>3. Ashwin Baindur
>4. Bishaka Datta
>5. Hisham Mundol
>6. Jayanta Nath
>7. Naveen Francis
>8. Pradeep Mohandas
>9. Shiju Alex
>
>
>
> Jury's role and responsibility
> The role of the jury will be to select Wikimedians for the recognition
> from the nominations made.
>
> Key dates
>
>- Announcement of call for nominations  to community: 9th Nov 2011,
>Wednesday.
>- Last date for nomination submission:13th Nov 2011, Sunday
>- Finalisation of Jury decision:17th Nov 2011, Thursday
>
>
>
> The  Recognition ceremony
>
> The Chapter Executive committee will conduct a formal recognition ceremony
> in the WikiConference 2011 to recognise the winners. The winners would be
> given a certificate/citation.
> ***
>
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>


-- 
Thanks & Regards,
A.Radha Krishna
http://en.wikipedia.org/wi

[Wikimediaindia-l] [Press]: Oneindia.in : "Mumbai to witness 1st Wikipedia conference on Nov 18"

[CherianTinu Abraham]

*Oneindia.in : "Mumbai to witness 1st Wikipedia conference on Nov 18"*
English :
http://news.oneindia.in/2011/11/09/mumbai-to-witness-1st-wikipedia-conference-on-nov-18.html

Tamil :
http://tamil.oneindia.in/news/2011/11/10/mumbai-to-witness-1st-wikipedia-conference-on-nov-18-aid0090.html

*The online encyclopaedia - Wikipedia, which has opened its first ever
officein India, is going to hold its first ever national conference in the
country. The three-day-long conference will be held in Mumbai from Nov 18.*
*
*
*The founder of Wikipedia, Jimmy Wales also will attend the first ever
WikiConference in India which will be organised at the Convocation Hall,
University of Mumbai, Fort Campus.*
*
*
*Stating about the mega event, President of Wikimedia chapter, Arjuna Rao
Chavala said, "We look forward to organising the conference on an annual
basis to bring together Indian Wikipedians from 20+ Indian language
projects to share learnings and best practices. The event will help
catalyze contributors in building Knowledge Society through free and open
education projects."*
*
*
*Supporting Mr Chavala's views, Pranav Curumsey, Chairperson, Organizing
Committee, WikiConference India stated, "It gives us great pleasure to be
hosting such a phenomenal conference in India. The conference aims to
promote the vision of the founder Mr. Wales, ‘Imagine a world in which
every single person on the planet is given free access to the sum of all
human knowledge.’ It is very encouraging to see ad-free participation
showing a keen interest in attending this conference confirming our belief
that India is free knowledge ready."*
*
*
*Here it can be recalled that the first Wikipedia office in India has been
set up at the national capital (New Delhi) with the aim to attract more
online readers through local languages. It has been reported that Wikipedia
has set up its first ever office outside the USA.*

Regards
Tinu Cherian
pr...@wikimedia.in
http://wiki.wikimedia.in/In_the_news

*Important Note : *The publisher ( OneIndia.in /  Greynium Information
Technologies Pvt. Ltd. ) of the above news article owns the copyrights of
the article / content. Request to not kindly reproduce or circulate the
content further. The information is only shared only with an internal
community who have been featured on this article.  All copyrights are duly
acknowledged.
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[Wikimediaindia-l] [Press} : AFP: "Wikipedia eyes India for language growth"

[CherianTinu Abraham]

*AFP: "Wikipedia eyes India for language growth"*
http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5j6M8i-wPgsg3vT7wjlHyEokOPltQ?docId=CNG.e77e4a807cd98d224ecb7444f69b8e62.321

MUMBAI — Wikipedia on Wednesday said it was banking on growth in the mobile
phone sector and increased Internet access to boost content in Indian
languages ranging from Hindi to Telugu.
The online encyclopaedia currently has versions in more than 20 languages
spoken in India, but the number of pages compared with English, and
considering the size of India's 1.2 billion population, is small.

"Today, we have 50-100 million Internet users and 700-800 million mobile
users (in India)," *Hisham Mundol*, India programmes consultant for the
non-profit Wikimedia Foundation, told a news conference in Mumbai.

"There's going to be a lot more people who will be more comfortable in
their mother tongues than English, so it (developing language pages) is
hugely important."

The founder of the user-generated website, *Jimmy Wales*, predicted last
year there could be at least 100,000 new articles in the top 10 Indian
languages by 2015.

Mundol said applications were required to boost access to the site via
smartphones as well as older handsets without broadband wireless access.

The Internet and Mobile Association of India on Tuesday said that there
were 112 million Internet users by September and the country was adding
five to seven million new users every month.
The industry body predicted that the number of users could leap to about
600 million in the next five years -- if government plans to widen Internet
infrastructure come to fruition.
India had 866 million mobile phone subscribers as of August 31 this year,
according to the latest government data.

The Wikimedia Foundation's India operation is the organisation's first
office outside the United States and was created to tap into the country's
open Internet culture.
A three-day national conference for existing and potential contributors is
being held in Mumbai from November 18.


Regards
Tinu Cherian
pr...@wikimedia.in
http://wiki.wikimedia.in/In_the_news

*Important Note* : The publisher ( AFP ) of the above news article owns the
copyrights of the article / content. Request to not kindly reproduce or
circulate the content further. The information is only shared only with an
internal community who have been featured on this article.  All copyrights
are duly acknowledged.
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[Wikimediaindia-l] [Press] : Times of India : "WikiConference comes to town"

[CherianTinu Abraham]

* Times of India : WikiConference comes to town*
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/mumbai/WikiConference-comes-to-town/articleshow/10675120.cms

*More than 600 people from across the country who regularly write and edit
Wikipedia entries will come together for the first 'WikiConference India',
to be held on the Mumbai University campus at Fort. The three-day event
will commence on November 18. *
*
*
*The conference, which is set to become an annual affair, is aimed at
providing a common platform for all Indian Wikimedians to discuss
challenges and exchange tipsand other information related to the Wiki
project. "We are also looking at encouraging more users to contribute in
their mothertongue so that we can build and improve 22 Indic-language
projects, including the Marathi, Hindi and Gujarati Wikipedias," said Hisham
Mundol, consultant and head, India Programs Division, Wikimedia . "Of the 1
lakh people who contribute, only around 3,000 are Indian. We want to
encourage more people to write articles about the country," he adds. *
*
*
*Co-founder of Wikipedia and chairman emeritus of the Wikimedia
foundation Jimmy
Wales will kick-start the event with a keynote address. This will be
followed by users presenting on Wiki-related topics, including a
visuallyimpaired user's experience of using the service and a talk that
encourages women to contribute more, considering that only 13% of
Wikipedians are women. *
*
*
*"This will be the first time users from different parts of the country,
contributing to different language Wikis, will be able to discuss tips and
problems they face while writing and editing articles," says Pranav Curumsey,
chairperson, organizing committee, WikiConference India.*

Regards
Tinu Cherian
pr...@wikimedia.in
http://wiki.wikimedia.in/In_the_news

*Important Note : *The publisher ( Times of India ) of the above news
article owns the copyrights of the article / content. Request to not kindly
reproduce or circulate the content further. The information is only shared
only with an internal community who have been featured on this article.
 All copyrights are duly acknowledged.
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[Wikimediaindia-l] Chapter Update : November-2011 Community Email

[Naveen Francis]

Secretary Election

Naveen Francis is elected as Secretary, following the resignation of Gautam
John.
 Outreach and Wiki Acadamies

14 people participated in Wiki Academy organised as part of Tathva at NIT
Calicut on Sep 24, 2011. The attendance was less than expected, as there
were several parallel sessions happening at the same time. Arjuna Rao
Chavala welcomed the participants and provided a overview of Wikipedia and
Wikimedia Chapter. Netha and Viswam covered wikipedia literacy and
essentials. Manoj and Abhishek helped the participants during hands on
session. Pranav Ashok, 3rd year CS student at NIT-Calicut ably took care of
the logistics and organisation of the event. Full
report

There have been several enquiries for conducting similar events from
different parts of the country following active promotion Wikipedia
Academies through various social media. Chapter is following up with the
proposers to firm up the schedules. Readers are requested to volunteer in
identifying additional co-hosts for Wiki Academies and help in conducting
the same.

Thanks Arjuna Rao Chavala, Abhishek, Manoj K Mohan, Netha Hussain and
Viswanathan Prabhakaran for organizing the Wiki Academy @ NIT Calicut.
First IRC Session

Chapter organised the first IRC session with community on Oct 29. The
discussion focused on organising Wiki Academies across India in the coming
months. Transcriptis
available.
City and Language SIG

Chapter would like to have strong City and Language SIG. Currently very few
members have identified themselves with a city/ language SIG by
participating in the voting process for Chairpersons. All the active people
on City and Language SIG are requested to conduct few events and take up
membership drive to strengthen the groups.

We look forward to your continued support

Best,

On behalf of Wikimedia Chapter
Thanks,
Naveen Francis
Secretary, Wikimedia India Chapter
[image: File:Wikimedia India logo.svg] 
reachout


Imagine a world in which every single human being can freely share in the
sum of all knowledge.*That’s our commitment.*
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[Wikimediaindia-l] WikiConference India 2011/Statistics

[Mandar Kulkarni]

 Dear All,

I checked below link on wiki-meta page 
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/WikiConference_India_2011/Statistics, but the 
statistics shown in this link looks to be much old.

The latest statistics is available at 
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/List_of_Wikipedias. 

Just for e.g. 1st link shows 37,03,613 articles in English where the real time 
data shows number as 37,90,952. This is applicable for all languages.

Can someone place the right link so that we will get the real time data on 
meta-wiki page.

With Regards,

Mandar V. Kulkarni___
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[Wikimediaindia-l] [PRESS RELEASE] "Mumbai To Host First Ever National WikiConference In India"

[CherianTinu Abraham]

*PRESS RELEASE:*

*Mumbai To Host The First Ever National WikiConference In India***

*Jimmy Wales to deliver the Keynote on November 18 at University
Convocation Hall*

*
Mumbai, India, November 9*: The *Mumbai Wikipedia Community* and the *Wikimedia
Chapter*, India are hosting the first ever WikiConference in Mumbai, India! And
to grace the occasion we will see none other than, the founder, open-source
evangelist and Chairman Emeritus of Wikimedia foundation – *Jimmy Wales*.
The Conference will have a distinct Indian flavour and deal primarily with
issues relating to India on Wikipedia, English and Indic language Wikipedia
projects in the country, possible partnerships and collaborations and the
WikiCommunity editing on these issues, whether in India or abroad.

The event will be a three day extravaganza, to be held from *November 18th *to
the* 20th, 2011 *and the venue for this prestigious event is no less in
stature when it comes to knowledge – *the Convocation Hall, University of
Mumbai, Fort Campus* with the apt iconic Rajabhai tower as its backdrop.


*Arjuna Rao Chavala, President, Wikimedia chapter* said "We look forward to
organising the conference on an annual basis to bring together Indian
Wikipedians from 20+ Indian language projects to share learnings and best
practices. The event will help catalyze contributors in building Knowledge
Society through free and open education projects."


Speaking on the occasion, Mr. *Pranav Curumsey, Chairperson, Organizing
Committee, WikiConference India* said, “It gives us great pleasure to be
hosting such a phenomenal conference in India. The conference aims to
promote the vision of the founder Mr. Wales, ‘Imagine a world in which
every single person on the planet is given free access to the sum of all
human knowledge.’ It is very encouraging to see ad-free participation
showing a keen interest in attending this conference confirming our belief
that India is free knowledge ready.”


The event will see thousands of Wikipedians from all over the country
pouring in for sessions covering topics such as ‘Usage of Ajax and Jquery
in Wiki’ in Technology to ‘WikiBhasha : Our Experiences with Multilingual
Content’ in Enterprise  to ‘WikiWomenWeb: Bridging the Gender Gap’ to ‘
Legal Aspects of Wiki Culture’.  There is also a live ‘Editathon’ session
made possible with Wifi facility within the campus grounds. Another
interesting addition is the ‘Hackathon’ that will be simultaneously held at
the Maharashtra Chamber of Commerce, Industry & Agriculture (MACCIA), Kala
Ghoda.


*Mr. Moksh Juneja*, *Secretary, Organising Committee, WikiConference
India*added, “The conference aims to serve as an annual platform for
all Indian
Wikipedians to meet and share their views, discuss challenges and exchange
useful tips and best practices. We have been overwhelmed with the ad-free
participation across India where we received 7000 plus entries for
scholarships and 550 plus papers were submitted to be presented at the
WikiConference India.”


Contributing to the success of WikiConference India are our esteemed
sponsors are Google, YouTube, Omidyar Network, Microsoft Research,
Yebhi.com, Ang India Technologies, Sarkarinaukri.com & Kalnirnay.
WikiConference India has received positive support from their partners
Kores, Avignyata Inc., e-RegNow.com, Panache, DSN & Text100 PR.

For further information & to register, please visit-
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/WikiConference_India_2011


Prominent Speakers at WikiConference:

· Jimmy Wales, Founder & Chairman, *WikiMedia Foundation*

· Badri Sheshadri, Co-Founder & Ex MD, *Cric-info* and MD, *New
Horizon Media Pvt. Ltd*.

· Barry Newstead, *Chief Global Development Officer, Wikimedia
Foundation*

· Prof. (Dr.) Krishna Kumar, Chairman, *Gitanjali Multilingual
Literary Circle*, UK

· Anand Kumar, *Super 30 IIT Coaching Programme*

*
*

*About  Wikimedia:*

The Wikimedia Foundation, Inc. is a nonprofit organization dedicated to
encouraging the growth, development and distribution of free, multilingual
content, and to providing the full content of these wiki-based projects to
the public free of charge. The Wikimedia Foundation operates some of the
largest collaboratively edited reference projects in the world, including
Wikipedia, a top-ten internet property, and Wikinews, as well as the
website, Meta-Wiki. The Wikimedia Foundation is governed by Board of
Trustees. Since January 2008, the Wikimedia Foundation has its office in
San Francisco, USA. The most famous project from the foundation, Wikipedia
, provides free encyclopaedias in most world languages is the 5th most
visited site in the world with over 12 billion articles being read every
month. Official information about the Foundation may be found on its
website: wikimediafoundation.org.

*About Wikimedia India Chapter:*

Wikimedia India was formally approved in June 2010 and India became the
29th Wikimedia Chapter. The Wikimedia India chapter was