Talk:Wiki Project Med/Archives/2015

Colors

Wikimedia Community logo

red green blue version

nice colors

logos being compared

I have some bias but I prefer the blue logo. CFCF, I saw that you just changed it. It hurts, a lot, but I understand the usefulness of considering alternatives. Blue Rasberry (talk) 20:42, 19 March 2015 (UTC)

I like the new one. We are using movement colors. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 21:36, 19 March 2015 (UTC)

As a board we should probably vote on it officially though. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 21:36, 19 March 2015 (UTC)

Documenting education outreach

Hello. Since about 2011 there has been a en:Wikipedia:Education Program. It does outreach to schools, including medical schools, and in the past members of Wiki Project Med have supported this class outreach. There has not been an official on-boarding process, but the precedent in practice has been that Wiki Project Med members have supported every medical class that has been identified anywhere. I wish to start logging all identified medical classes here in Wiki Project Med's space as an archive to review the history of outcomes of these projects. Please check what I am doing at Wiki Project Med/education outreach. Here are some points which may be worth considering:

• This page is accessible through Wiki_Project_Med#Education_outreach, so its intended audience would be people who navigate from there or people who have a direct link
• Please note the model of the project pages. I was thinking that as soon as any school does two events, then they could have a project page like this which serves as a directory of all of their projects. For UCSF, their event pages were not previously connected so I connected them in this project page based on descriptions from single event pages. For Icahn, I modeled their page after the UCSF one, which was not an established model. The advantage of the project page is that right now, courses cannot be categorized like any other Wikimedia page so a list of links to all course pages is the best way I know to collect all the classes. It is useful to find all classes at an institution or in a series so that outcomes can be reported for the series more easily.
• Classes which just happen once are listed as individual classes, and all information about single classes can be kept on those class pages
• So far as I know, there is no precedent in the education program to tie multiple classes in the same school into a unified record of activity, so I know of no precedent that I could have followed for this. Wikimedia chapter reporting could have been a model but I thought those pages are more complicated than is merited here.
• I stated association of both projects with Wiki Project Med. I think that there should be some kind of affiliation model. I know that these things are being developed. Probably some review is nice. I do not want to take undue liberty, but at the same time, I hope that every aspect of both of the projects currently listed meet the standards for educational affiliation which Wiki Project Med may or may not someday want to formalize. It would be my wish as a project participate to be able to anticipate "affiliation", whatever that means, between classes and Wiki Project Med in the future. Right now, the major benefit which I would like to associate with affiliation is good will to the class from Wiki Project Med members, support in bringing health editing issues from the class to a WikiProject Medicine (on English, probably, but in the future maybe anywhere), support for even having the class contribute to Wikipedia in accord with standards from the Wikipedia Education Program, and a willingness to hear special needs from the class if they come up.
• I personally am keen to support medical schools in participating in the Wikipedia Education Program as part of my routine work at the United States-based nonprofit organization :en:Consumer Reports]]. I and my organization think it is good for medical students to edit Wikipedia, and my employer is kind to encourage me to do outreach. My work benefits from Wiki Project Med support of classes in the Wikipedia Education Program.

None of this requires further development. If anyone has criticism of this model then speak up. Anyone can list and link to any classes they see on this Wiki Med course listing. Blue Rasberry (talk) 14:04, 20 March 2015 (UTC)

• I found out that in my own city someone was already doing documentation for a cohort of classes. See this model:

• en:Wikipedia:Wikipedia NYC College Educators Network/Classes Timeline

This seems to me to be a lot of work. I hope that automated categorization comes soon. It is supposed to be available for medicine and psychology as pilots by autumn 2015 from Wiki Ed Foundation. Blue Rasberry (talk) 15:03, 24 March 2015 (UTC)

Talk page redirects

This project has many subpages as can be seen at Special:PrefixIndex/Wiki_Project_Med/. Wikiproject Medicine at English Wikipedia also has many subpages, as can been seen at en:Special:PrefixIndex/Wikipedia:WikiProject Medicine/, and it manages them by having most or all of the talk pages of the sub pages redirect to the talk page of the main page.

I propose that the same happen here, and that all subpages in the English language redirect here to this talk page. Any comments? Blue Rasberry (talk) 15:28, 23 March 2015 (UTC)

I like the idea. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 01:16, 26 March 2015 (UTC)

Health Information for All

Wondering if we should put

"We support the global initiative Healthcare Information For All. We believe that every person and every health worker should have access to the healthcare information they need to protect their own health and the health of those for whom they are responsible."

On our page? We are currently a supporter of the organization. [1] Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 01:16, 26 March 2015 (UTC)

Yes, in that case that seems like a good idea to me.

Considering the issue of branding and noting affiliations more broadly, I also am wondering about branding. At Wiki Project Med/education outreach I just made some course pages for some classes, and am unsure of how to note affiliation. At all of the schools, presumably the schools should get some branding credit for hosting the class. I personally participated in the project at Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, and there, they were encouraged to note sponsorship from their school's organization overseeing student groups to emphasize that this was a student project, and not an official project supported by the entire school. Similarly, I expect that many Wikimedia classes might be supported only by their departments, like Amin's UCSF class might be supported by the psychiatry department but not the entire UCSF medical school.

Beyond this I am talking to en:American Medical Student Association members about collaboration, and wondering what kind of branding I should offer to AMSA. I expect that in a collaboration involving AMSA members then they would like their affiliation noted. Personally, I like the nonprofit values that AMSA has and their commitment to declining funding from the pharmaceutical industry.

I have my own bias in this in that when I support classes I would like to note support somehow from my employer, Consumer Reports. I am not sure what this should look like to readers, and also I am wondering what kind of categories or automated sorting systems that I can apply to collect outcome metrics about all students in all classes which I personally support with outreach.

There is still also the issue of getting Wiki Project Med support for outreach projects. I have never explicitly asked for it, but if it is available, I might like to affiliate all of my medical outreach work with Wiki Project Med, and to be a Wiki Project Med member whose work product is counted as an outcome of the existence of Wiki Project Med. In this kind of affiliation, I would like the benefits of affiliating my work with Wiki Project Med and getting some kind of approval that what I am doing meets Wiki Project Med standards, and in return I would offer Wiki Project Med credit for whatever I do and comply with Wiki Project Med standards.

This could be a starting point for discussion, and one possible policy to have until things get more complicated:

• Wiki Project Med approval is granted on a project-by-project basis, and there are no formal standards for getting it. It comes by request, and has no clear costs or benefits, but includes the privilege of posting a link to Wiki Project Med along with a back link which says "This project is in affiliation with Wiki Project Med."
• Concerning other branding, Wiki Project Med asks that if any additional partners begin to support a particular project and want their logo and brand put on a project page, then they ask for additional review. This is to give Wiki Project Med the opportunity to cease affiliation if that could mean some difficulty in associating with any controversial partner.

Thoughts? Blue Rasberry (talk) 17:05, 6 April 2015 (UTC)

Yes basically I include all the work I do as partially supported by WPMED. We as the board should however really put together a method were people propose ideas for WPMED support and we formally approve them. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 11:43, 7 April 2015 (UTC)

Models for noting partnerships on project pages

Currently there is no standard for noting partnerships on any Wikimedia community project page. Perhaps Wiki Project Med would be interested in piloting a model.

some models for presenting logos and links to project partners
The gallery tag, standard Thanks to the partners in this project. Wiki Project Med Foundation American Medical Student Association Wikimedia New York City Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai Consumer Reports I prefer this model because it is the easiest to use and because it looks nice. A drawback with this model is that organizations with long logos may not be easy to read. The multiple image box Wiki Project Med Foundation :en:American Medical Student Association Wikimedia New York City Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai Consumer Reports Thanks to the partners in this project. The images would need to be manipulated for placement and size. Probably for this box any image placement changes would have to be done by using a new image, instead of by manipulating placement instructions. This box always right-justifies the images and is in-line with text. The multiple image box, vertical Wiki Project Med Foundation :en:American Medical Student Association Wikimedia New York City Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai Consumer Reports Thanks to the partners in this project. This seems a little crowded. The gallery tag, packed Thanks to the partners in this project. Wiki Project Med Foundation American Medical Student Association Wikimedia New York City Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai Consumer Reports This is not rendering nicely here because this model depends on screen size and the native specifications for the image size to present the images. In this mode image width can not be controlled, so a change in width would have to be done by uploading a new version of the image. Probably there is too much configuration here to depend on new users to work this system. Documentation is at mw:Help:Images#Gallery_syntax.

Blue Rasberry (talk) 17:05, 6 April 2015 (UTC)

I like the first one. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 11:44, 7 April 2015 (UTC)

Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees elections 2015

This is a message from the 2015 Wikimedia Foundation Elections Committee. Translations are available.

Voting has begun for eligible voters in the 2015 elections for the Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees. Questions and discussion with the candidates for the Board will continue during the voting.

The Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees is the ultimate governing authority of the Wikimedia Foundation, a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization registered in the United States. The Wikimedia Foundation manages many diverse projects such as Wikipedia and Commons.

The voting phase lasts from 00:00 UTC May 17 to 23:59 UTC May 31. Click here to vote. More information on the candidates and the elections can be found on the 2015 Board election page on Meta-Wiki.

On behalf of the Elections Committee,
-Gregory Varnum (User:Varnent)
Volunteer Coordinator, 2015 Wikimedia Foundation Elections Committee

Posted by the MediaWiki message delivery 17:20, 17 May 2015 (UTC) • Translate • Get help

Wiki Project Med and List of articles every Wikipedia should have

Is there any plan to consolidate "Health and Medicine" list along the lines of the Wiki Project Medicine roster? For instance dump Alzheimer's from the Golden 1000 list and include depression, COPG ... (take your pick) instead. Regards - SmozBleda talk 00:23, 21 May 2015 (UTC)

I am busy putting together a list of 1000 medical articles. Basically working to improve the leads of important topics and then working with Translators Without Borders and other to get them into other languages.

Alzheimer's is a disease of top importance. Have replaced penicillin with COPD. Cholera should really be gastroenteritis. We will see if these changes stick.Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 09:42, 21 May 2015 (UTC)

Changes should have been made here. I made some alterations in the anatomy section as well, would like to make more. I feel it's very likely the changes will go through. CFCF (talk) 16:30, 21 May 2015 (UTC)

Updates

We are now a tax exempt in the United States, with many thanks to Ralph Coti.

Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 22:25, 26 May 2015 (UTC)

Excellent work. Congratulations to all. JFW (talk) 09:37, 28 May 2015 (UTC)

! Blue Rasberry (talk) 13:29, 28 May 2015 (UTC)

Wikimedia Conference 2015

The conference just ended. I'll write a summary over the next few days. -- Daniel Mietchen (talk) 14:29, 17 May 2015 (UTC)

Thanks User:Daniel Mietchen Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 00:21, 18 May 2015 (UTC)

Sorry that the report took longer — I had been waiting for a detailed report that I knew was being prepared by Pine. This is available now as a draft and scheduled to come out in next week's Signpost. He attended on behalf of another user group (Cascadia Wikimedians), so his perspective on the event was similar to mine in many aspects. For him, "the most significant developments and topics of discussion at the conference were":

• Lila's supportive approach to affiliates
• Strong interest in getting more support from WMF for user groups
• Concern about volunteer burnout
• Concern about online civility
• Interest in developing more and improved tools for program evaluation
• Frustration with administrative workloads for volunteers
• Interest among affiliates about networking with each other to achieve common goals

That basically fits with my perceptions, though I would order some of those points differently. To skim his report, I recommend searching for "thematic", "user group" or "affiliate", but the piece is well worth reading as a whole and rich in links to further details.

The conference was strongly geared towards chapters, and almost all sessions were framed in terms of "local" or "regional" activities rather than thematic ones, but if thematic issues surfaced, Wiki Project Med often served as the poster child, since many attendees seemed to be somewhat aware of our activities. If thematic perspectives did not come up on their own, I found myself pointing out again and again that many of the things that had been discussed in a particular session could be reframed by replacing "local" or "regional" with "thematic", or by adding a thematic spin to location-based activities like edit-a-thons.

Some of the most interesting sessions in my view:

• Lightning talks
• Regional cooperation
• What could local organizations bring to the movement?

These were complemented by a number of meetups, most of which unfortunately taking place in parallel, so I only managed to attend two:

• Wikimedia Conference 2015/Social events/WMCEE meetup, where it became clear that many of the WMCEE activities could be given a medical spin if someone were to take the lead on this; it was also suggested that activities co-organized in collaboration with thematic organizations could become part of a chapter's annual plan as part of their FDC grant proposals; both points resonated well in discussions with representatives from outside CEE
• Wikimedia user groups meetup, where it became clear that many user groups face similar problems, so that more intensive exchange would be useful; in particular, there were four user groups that have no geographic focus, and they are now linked via Wikimedia diaspora organisations; it was also discussed whether non-chapter affiliates could become part of the existing affiliates mailing list.

I managed to talk to representatives from almost all affiliates and encouraged them to keep thematic organizations like Wiki Project Med in mind when planning their activities, and had the opportunity to discuss the Translation task force with several of them, including the Taiwan and Nepali chapters. I was in turn encouraged by positive feedback from people at affiliates, WMF (including Lila), AffCom and FDC about our work.

One thing I discussed with many and where no good solution is in sight is what to do with cases like the Ebola task force, which had to operate in areas where there are no local affiliates, nor good WMF contacts. Related discussions, especially with the representatives from Nepal, triggered thoughts on how we might best establish some procedures and infrastructure to be better prepared to react to the next epidemic, earthquake or other disaster. This links well to a related interest of mine, which concerns open approaches in the framework of emergency responses, on which I am collecting thoughts here.

Overall, I think this Wikimedia Conference was a good opportunity to raise awareness of the potential and challenges of organizing Wikimedia activities around a theme rather than (or in addition to) a location, and it was more effective at that than the one I attended in 2013, when thematic orgs were a very new concept. We should definitely try to follow up on this when meeting with other affiliates and volunteers again, especially at Wikimania. For next year's Wikimedia Conference, it would be good to have non-chapter affiliates involved in the program and perhaps to have at least some sessions structured around themes rather than localities.

-- Daniel Mietchen (talk) 03:01, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Industry funding and ghostwriting of sources

In case anyone here would like to comment, I've opened a discussion about the above at en:Wikipedia talk:Identifying reliable sources (medicine)#Industry funding and ghostwriting of sources, with a view to adding something to the guideline. Sarah (SV) ^talk 22:06, 30 May 2015 (UTC)

Its hard to pick up but is a concerning practice. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 01:46, 31 May 2015 (UTC)

For what it's worth, the "GLAM Night Out" session at Wikimania 2012 featured an excellent panel discussion on this topic. Charles Ornstein of Propublica -- a publication that has done good work on stuff like this -- was particularly compelling. I don't think there was video or audio, but the page contains some info that might be of interest: http://wikimania2012.wikimedia.org/wiki/GLAM_Night_Out -Pete F (talk) 03:42, 31 May 2015 (UTC)

Name of this organization

I wanted to check in about the name of this organization. There has always been some confusion about this. The last public discussion about this was a few years ago at Talk:WikiProject_Med/Archives/2013#Please_choose_another_name.

To review -

• The legal registered name of this organization is WIKIPROJECT MED FOUNDATION, INC.
• This organization most commonly goes by "Wiki Project Med" or "Wiki Project Med Foundation"
• "Wikimedia Medicine" was the first proposed name for this organization, but was excluded because of a prohibition on using the trademarked term "Wikimedia" and legal regulations about using the term "medicine"
• "WikiProject Medicine" is the name for each separate community forum for discussing health content in the network of Wikimedia projects
• In the linked discussion above, "Wiki Med" is discouraged by the Wikimedia Foundation because they feel that "Wiki Med" seems like "Wikimedia"

I have raised the name issue in private correspondence in the past, advocating for thoughtfulness in choosing a single name with a single spelling so that the efforts of this group would have consistent branding and the consistent online use which would support good search engine indexing.

Just recently, participants in this project released a web app which is called "WikiMed Medical Encyclopedia". This might be a break from branding and might not be a good long-term name for this application.

I would like to call for confirmation of the primary name for this organization and for secondary names which might be used, if members feel like this organization needs multiple names. If anyone wants to propose a name change, this probably is not a good place to do that unless the person proposing a name change has already registered a domain. Blue Rasberry (talk) 14:46, 15 June 2015 (UTC)

Yes agree. We have gone through a few names. Now that we are an official user group we could request Wikimedia Med from the WMF.

The app is a product thus its name does not need to match that of this organization or the Wikiprojects. I was not directly involved with determining its current name but I assume we could request it changed if we have a better one in mind.

We also own the domain www.opentextbookofmedicine.com Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 22:34, 15 June 2015 (UTC)

My preference is still for "Wikimedia Medicine", and as an affiliate, this should now be doable. -- Daniel Mietchen (talk) 12:10, 10 July 2015 (UTC)

Replacement of President

To assume membership on the board of trustees of the Wikimedia Foundation I am required to step down from the board of Wiki Project Med Foundation. Therefore as of July 15th, 2015 I propose Jacob de Wolff assume the role of president replacing me. (the voting below is for member of the board)

Support

• Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 05:32, 10 July 2015 (UTC)
• RexxS (talk) 09:34, 10 July 2015 (UTC)
• Daniel Mietchen (talk) 12:08, 10 July 2015 (UTC)
• Vinicius Siqueira (talk) 03:26, 12 July 2015 (UTC)
• Peter.C (talk) 18:27, 12 July 2015 (UTC)
• Biosthmors (talk) 19:01, 12 July 2015 (UTC)

Abstain

• I don't think I can vote for myself, but I am aware of this vote and am happy to serve as president. JFW (talk) 18:32, 12 July 2015 (UTC)
• I am not a board member but I participate in the project activities. Jacob is a good choice. Blue Rasberry (talk) 15:35, 13 July 2015 (UTC)

Oppose

Discuss

Medicine.wiki

Hey, thought you all might be interested to know that Medicine.wiki is now active, should Wiki Project Med participants wish to contribute in some way. -Another Believer (talk) 19:36, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

Havn't seen it before. I like the license and the fact that it uses instantcommons.

It appears to be more than a year old. And there has only been one edit in the last 30 days to the site.

It is part of a family of wikis https://wiki.wiki/

I am of the opinion that it is best to keep all topics within a single wiki rather than split content into separate wikis. I see that as one of Wikipedia's successes. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 23:20, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

Regional US/Canada Wikimedia conference - Washington DC - 9-11 October

WALRUS - Wikipedians Active in Local Regions of the United States

Hello. I would like to invite you to WikiConference USA. This community gathering will be Friday-Sunday 9-11 October (with Columbus Day being Monday the 12th) in Washington DC at the National Archives and Records Administration.

Persons interested in participating may present a submission, request one of about 25 travel scholarships, or plan to attend. Thanks. Blue Rasberry (talk) 18:18, 5 August 2015 (UTC)

Unfortunately need a little more of a heads up :-( . Hopefully next year. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 01:44, 6 August 2015 (UTC)

Google curates medical information

http://insidesearch.blogspot.com/2015/09/now-google-can-help-with-updated-health.html --Nemo 18:18, 3 September 2015 (UTC)