GLAM/Newsletter/October 2014/Contents/Finland report
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Edit-a-thon Course "Bring Culture to Wikipedia"
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In October, Wikimedia Finland started a new form of GLAM collaboration, an edit-a-thon course called Bring Culture to Wikipedia. The course, co-organised by Wikimedia Finland, Helsinki Summer University and six GLAM organisations, consists of six edit-a-thon gatherings hosted by the GLAMs.
The aim of the course is to bring more cultural heritage to Wikipedia and at the same time introduce new editors to Wikipedia. Our earlier GLAM projects have taught us that learning editing skills is an important motivation for many edit-a-thon participants. Each of the course gatherings includes a short Wikipedia lesson given by experienced Wikipedian and lecturer Juha Kämäräinen. Newcomers also get help from other Wikipedians. The organisations provide the participants a look behind the scenes; they show their archives and present their field of expertise in different ways.
The cooperating organisations are The Finnish Broadcasting Company Yle Archives, The Finnish Museum of Photography, The Finnish National Gallery, Helsinki Art Museum, Helsinki City Library and The Society of Swedish Literature in Finland. The GLAMs have been active in planning and preparing the course. The course model, including a shared project page, makes participation for the GLAMs easier than producing an individual edit-a-thon of their own. They get peer support from each other and a participant base through the Summer University. In addition to registered students, a delightful amount of staff members from the organisations have participated the edit-a-thons. To many, this has been the first encounter with Wiki editing.
As a result of the collaboration, many of the partner organisations have made or plan to make content uploads. Some of them were ready to be used in the edit-a-thons (such as the images of the Finnish Broadcasting Company Yle Archives), others are on the way. In September, before the course began, Wikimedia Finland invited the senior developer of GLAMWiki Toolset, Dan Entous, to hold a workshop for the representatives of GLAMs and staff of Wikimedia Finland. The workshop was first of its kind outside Netherlands.
The course continues until 13th November.
Read a blog post on the course.
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