Dear Lennart,

This is fantastic! I think it does a lot to prove just how useful a small,
regular, focused workshop model is. I'm very impressed by the amazing
things that you've accomplished this year! Congratulations!

-Emily

On Thu, Jan 1, 2015 at 5:19 PM, Sarah Stierch <[email protected]>
wrote:

> Thanks Lennart!
>
> A blog post would be awesome about this -I'm sure the program evaluation
> folks at WMF would love to see it on the Wikimedia blog. Having it as a
> blog would make it easier to share with a wider audience off this list.
>
> Great work that continues to be done in Sweden!! :)
>
> On Thu, Jan 1, 2015 at 3:09 PM, Lennart Guldbrandsson <
> [email protected]> wrote:
>
>> Hello,
>>
>> Since this is the start of the new year, let me just shortly let you know
>> (or remind you) about what one thing we've done in Sweden last year and a
>> little about what we've learned.
>>
>> We started in March in Gothenburg, the second largest city of Sweden, to
>> hold weekly editathons. The topic was formally "female main characters"
>> ("kvinnliga huvudpersoner"), but we essentially let people write about what
>> they wanted, and tried to gently steer them towards literature and/or
>> women. It could be female authors, or seminal works in womens' literature
>> such as "The Mad Woman in the Attic". We welcomed people of all sexes.
>>
>> Altogether we ran 35 editathons each running on a Tuesday from 13.00
>> onwards, editing in over 100 different articles, with about different 15
>> Wikipedians. The result was 11 articles reaching "recommended status"
>> (ranking just below Good articles) with more on their way. (We of course
>> want to improve on this for next year.) A full list of articles worked on,
>> sorted on how far they've come can be found on our project page:
>>
>>
>> https://sv.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Projekt_kvinnor/Kvinnliga_huvudpersoner_p%C3%A5_Wikipedia#Skapade_och_f.C3.B6rb.C3.A4ttrade_artiklar_.28s.C3.A5_h.C3.A4r_l.C3.A5ngt.29
>>
>> This initiative is one of the most publicised Wikipedia/Wikimedia events
>> in Sweden during the year with two national radio interviews, two podcast
>> interviews and several articles. There has been no negative reactions
>> (which I am beginning to understand needs specifying) as far as I am aware
>> of. We have presented this on flyers and on the large Book Fair in
>> Gothenburg, and have started to get a very good reputation. We are hoping
>> to see the same sort of regular editathon thing getting off the ground in
>> other cities in Sweden during 2015.
>>
>> So, what have we learned?
>>
>> * we could not have done this but for a small group of dedicated people
>> who showed up nearly every time. We were four persons (two female, two
>> male). "All volunteers" led to very little bureaucracy during the
>> editathons themselves and sometimes editathons running over by several
>> hours. Making sure that the editathons didn't depend on any one person was
>> an early priority.
>>
>> * we had access to a free space with wifi and a kitchen. Each time,
>> Wikimedia Sverige sponsored coffee/tea, sandwiches and fruit - and
>> gingersnaps and other seasonal treats. Don't underestimate the power of
>> "fika" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fika_%28coffee_break%29). All in
>> all, the cost of all 35 editathons was around 240-250 USD.
>>
>> * we have two lines of communication: both the project page, and our
>> Facebook group: https://www.facebook.com/events/213852525478532/, where
>> we could remind people to come and get them to invite others who aren't on
>> Wikipedia yet. Personal invitations works much better in the long run -
>> getting people to come back week after week.
>>
>> * the topic was very well chosen. Many are interested in literature and
>> the topic is underdeveloped on Wikipedia, so it's easy to explain the need
>> to outsiders. But it has also been good to allow some leeway and not
>> adhering strictly to any predetermined list of articles to edit. Sometimes
>> interesting topics crop up in conversation or a bad article was discovered
>> during fact checking and then we've encouraged people to edit that article.
>>
>> * some people have wished for the editathons to be held on other
>> days/other times. It may have contributed to the sometimes very low
>> attendance rates. We've tried to taken that into account, and are thinking
>> about how to manage regular weekend editathons. We are also considering
>> ways to get the people most interested in going to those editathons to also
>> run them (empowering them, in effect).
>>
>> * there are always going to be a few people who only come one time, just
>> to check what we're about. Especially after we put in weekly small ads (for
>> free). We took turns doing the introduction and making sure they made a few
>> edits, so that as many Wikipedians as possible had done it, and also to
>> make sure that the Wikipedians themselves could have time to edit. That's
>> also how we tried to do with the radio and pod cast interviews, to prevent
>> any one person "the representative Wikipedian".
>>
>> * you also shouldn't underestimate how much this is a way for stressed
>> Wikipedians with normally very little time to edit Wikipedia to set aside
>> time to do it.
>>
>> Finally, just FYI. During the winter holiday, when the editathons had a
>> few weeks off, demand for more meetings was so high that we organised a
>> Hangout remote editathon session just to relieve our feelings of abstinence
>> :-)
>>
>>
>> Best wishes,
>>
>> Lennart Guldbrandsson
>>
>> 070 - 207 80 05
>> http://www.elementx.se - arbete
>> Skriv som ett proffs <http://www.elementx.se/skriv-som-ett-proffs/> -
>> min senaste bok
>> http://www.mrchapel.wordpress.com - personlig blogg
>> Presentation <http://sv.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anv%c3%83%c2%a4ndare:Hannibal>
>> @aliasHannibal <http://twitter.com/AliasHannibal> - på Twitter
>>
>> "*Tänk dig en värld där varje människa på den här planeten får fri
>> tillgång till **världens samlade kunskap*
>> <http://sv.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portal:Huvudsida>*. Det är vårt mål.*"
>> Jimmy Wales
>>
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>
>
> --
>
> Sarah Stierch
>
> -----
>
> Diverse and engaging consulting for your organization.
>
> www.sarahstierch.com
>
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