ESEAP Conference 2024/Report/PeaceSeekers

The ESEAP Conference is a biennial international conference held by the Wikimedia Foundation. The ESEAP conference 2024 was held in Kota Kinabalu, Sabah, Malaysia on 10–12 May 2024, where Wikimedians from various countries in Southeast Asia, East Asia and Pacific regions participated.

⁠Things learned at the conference

Throughout the conference, I obtained various inputs regarding the Wikimedia-sphere in the ESEAP regions, especially regarding innovative works to fully harness the Wikimedia-sphere for the better of all. In summary:

Day 1
- Wikimedia Foundation reconstruction: Matters on the Preparatory Council and general development of the Movement Charter.
- Organization: Types of funds
- Projects: Let's Connect, Wikisource Loves Manuscripts, Wikimedia for Education
Day 2
- ESEAP matters: ESEAP Hub and focus brainstorming
- Wiki in the Nusantara region: Wikisumber projects, Wiki in Sandakan, social media usage
- Projects: Hatch-a-Wikimedian, future of Wikipedia Asia Month, Amis community, WikiBanua
Day 3
- ESEAP matters: ESEAP Hub
- Current issues: Wikimedia and AI, copyright matters in Asia (especially South Korea)
- Projects (or maybe more precisely here, tools): Automoderator, VideoCutTool

Things contributed or participated in the conference

"Mengusul Hala Tuju Kandungan Projek-Projek Wikimedia Bahasa Melayu", my presentation; go to the Commons page for full presentation slide.

Me (white beanie boi) during the ESEAP brainstorming session.

Presentation

On Day 2, I had done a presentation titled, where I suggested a framework of potential future focuses on Malay-language Wikimedia projects, including active, inactive and now-Incubator projects, in context of Wikimedia as a "potent tool to solve problems and gaps in the Malaysian society", as what I like to say.

Others

Some other stuff I contributed is:

Brainstorming here and there, especially during the ESEAP focus session, among others.
Discussions with people within ESEAP, especially from my sphere, WCUGM.
Attending various presentations and write notes on them (refer to See Also).

Plans after the conference (from what was learned or contributed in the conference)

In general, I would like to apply the works presented throughout the presentation for my local works (Malay-language Wikimedia projects).

Projects
- Let's Connect: I've actually went to one of their projects after ESEAP (regarding Wiktionary and Wikidata), and it's nice to have people around the world gathered and share our words; some of the words are already uploaded in the Malay Wiktionary.
- Wikimedia in Education: I'd for some time dwelve in matters of school curricula in Malay Wikipedia, so this would be a great plus.
Miscellaneous
- Content enhancement: Some of the pictures taken through the Mari-Mari Cultural Village visit has been already updated as visual content in various projects.
- I would like to create infographic "snippets" of presentations in ESEAP to be disseminated within ESEAP and publicly.

Lansaran, now available in ms:w:Tarian Lansaran.
Dompuran, now available in ms:wikt:dompuran.

I would like to start these projects on late June as my academic semester ends. There are so much to experiment for with this, and I can't thank enough to the presenters to share their such wonderful works. This is only some of the things I had done and think so far; as I read through my notes again, I'll probably come up with more ideas.

Suggestions

Perhaps, a poster session can be done just like in Wikimania, involving every ESEAP affiliation and potentially local groups. This can increase the sharing input from within the ESEAP region (especially the ones who may had difficulty of attending ESEAP or unable to present), and also gives an out-of-class academic experience for some participants (academic posters, presenting).

Comments

So far, the ESEAP conference in general is a good experience for me. I don't really have a lot of comment or suggestion, and instead, I would like to give thanks and congratulations for the committee that runs this conference, and the ESEAP committee to entrust me with the scholarship to attend this conference!