Wikimedia chapters/Reports/Wikimedia Österreich/August 2012

Ortsbildmesse

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Ortsbildmesse is an annual fair regarding the development of villages and towns in the federal province of Upper Austria. It is within the scope of our program to get in touch with local authorities and population to gain more information about the villages and towns for Wikipedia. Photographs and books containing historical or geographical information are provided by the local authorities and archives as well as by the inhabitants of that regions. Additionally the people get involved in editing Wikipedia.

The government of Upper Austria invited WMAT in December 2011 to take part of the fair on August 25 in the city of Perg, to present Wikimedia and Wikipedia. No commercial companies are allowed at the fair and it is thought to be an exchange of ideas, presenting the cultural and historic heritage of the villages and incorporated communities as well as the planned development for the future. A group of volunteer Wikimedians organized four events for that day:

  • an information booth of Wikipedia and Wikimedia
  • an exhibition of the awarded photographs of Europe and of Austria gathered during the 2011 Wiki Loves Monuments campaign on Wikimedia Commons
  • the opening of the 2012 season of Wiki Loves Monuments
  • workshops about editing Wikipedia, providing photographs to Wikimedia Commons under a free license and how to participate in the WLM photo competition

The events were organized in de.wikipedia http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Ober%C3%B6sterreich/Ortsbildmesse.

  • The information booth was on the main street of Perg and about 20.000 visitors could get information about Wikipedia and Wikimedia there.
  • About 15 volunteers visited the information desks of about 120 villages at the fair during the day, presenting outprints of the articles about their villages from Wikipedia and giving lists of lacking information and photographs in their area to them. They also were provided with brochures about Wikipedia and Wikimedia produced by WMAT during the first half of 2012. Representatives of those villages and towns could be contacted on that day personally without travelling through the coutry from one community to another. WMAT and Wikipedia received many questions and contributions from those villages later.
  • The award winning photographs of WLM were presented by a local gallery and will be shown there until the end of the year. The exhibition was opened by members of the government of Upper Austria and four members of the board of WMAT. The exhibition was the prototype for a touring exhibition of the award winning photographs of WLM 2012 planned next year.
  • The WLM season 2012 for Austria was opened by the Landeshauptmann-Stellvertreter (vice governor) of Upper Austria by shooting photographs of protected old buildings in Perg and uploading them under a free licence to Wikimedia Commons. The event was watched and published by local media.
  • The workshops were performed in a hall next to the main square of Perg by experienced Wikipedia volunteers and members of the board of WMAT
  • WMAT supported the volunteers providing travel costs and food as well as information material and t-shirts.

Wiki Takes Oberes Murtal

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The Project is supported by WMAT, for increasing the amount of images of the upper Mur-valley as a part of WLM. Therefore we asked the organizers for a budget plan, which had been approved for travel cost and accomodation.

Wikisource-Scanning-Project

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For the project, scanning old books of the Bundesdenkmalamt (Agency responsible for Austrian Monuments) we bought the Software PDF-XChange 5 and Abbyy Fine Reader. Links to the bookscanner-project in de.wikipedia:

Infrastructure

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  • WMAT bought Walky Talkies to improve communication at the Wikicon, Ortsbildmesse (fair for idea exchange concerning improving the villages) in Perg and other events in the future.
  • We bought the following merchandising-articles: T-shirts, notebooks, pencils, bags, several folders.
  • We also bought unremovable stickers for tagging our inventory.
  • We ordered equipment for the newly hired CEO: laptop, screens, dockingstation, mobile phone

Wiki loves memories

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The proposal of this new project is supportet by WMAT. It's aim is the scanning of old foto-slides with a focus on historical material.

Zedlerpreis (Zedler Award)

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The winners of the German Zedlerpreis will get an additional hot-air ballon ticket from us. Additional 4 Tickets are given from the Bundesdenkmalamt for WLM.

Biology-Meetup in Slovenia

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The editors and contributors to articles about biology in the German language Wikipedia organize a meetup every year. The first meeting took place in Vienna 2006 and since then alternated between Germany and Austria or its neighboring countries. In 2012 the village of Podgorje in Slovenia was chosen for the meeting, because a cooperation with Austrian entomologists, working there on the authority of the Slovenian government to explore the regional fauna, could be established. So the Wikipedians were able to accompany the entomologists during their field work and get photographs of animals and plants, rarely found otherwise. In the evenings ecological problems of the karst landscape in Slovenia and the protection of nature could be discussed. A strong connection to Wikipedia editors from Slovenia, attending the meeting, could be established. The meeting was held partly in German and partly in English. WMAT supported the meeting with a rental car for the travel and paying accomodation for the Wikipedians from Germany and Austria and one participant from the Slovenian Wikipedia. A report in German with some photographs can be seen here: http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Redaktion_Biologie/Treffen/Protokoll2012 See also: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Redaktion_Biologie_Treffen_2012 for some hundreds of photographs.

Photography-project

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The Austrian national league of soccer will provide several community members with an all season-accreditation for attendig all matches in Austria for photographing. We are working on a similar agreement with the Austrian Hockey-League.

Photo workshop in Nürnberg

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WMAT supports travels of Austrian attendees of this traditional workshop in Germany.