GLAM/Newsletter/February 2015/Contents/UK report

This Month in GLAM – Volume V, Issue II, February 2015

UK report

Continued Catalan Collaboration; Steam Sounds; Glasgow GLAMs; Edinburgh Editathons

By Jonathan Cardy (WereSpielChequers), Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing), Edward Hands (Edwardx) & Ally Crockford (ACrockford)

Royal Society of Chemistry

Andy Mabbett's residency at the Royal Society of Chemistry is ongoing.

Andy was quoted in in Atmetric.com's announcement that they now index citations of research papers in Wikipedia. He spoke to young members of the society, at the University of Bristol - the meeting was also open to the public.

The Catalan chemists Andy collaborated with last year have as a result set up a project with the Institute of Chemical Research in Catalonia. Andy has written a blog post with details.

See the project diary and the blog (aimed at non-Wikipedians) for other news.

Thinktank

Andy Mabbett is also Wikimedian in Residence at Thinktank Museum in Birmingham. During February, he trained sixteen curators, other staff, and volunteers, to edit Wikipedia. Several new articles were created.

Andy attended the museum early one morning, before opening, and with the kind help of the resident engineer, recorded several of the collection's working steam engines:

The Murray Engine is said to be the third-oldest working engine in the world.

For a more complete list of activities, see the Thinktank project diary.

Free Books for Wikipedians

Two of our partners the PCF and w:Penguin Books have supplied us with free reference books for Wikipedians to use to improve Wikipedia. Here are some examples of improvements that this has enabled our editors to do:

The PCF's lavishly illustrated Oil Paintings in Public Ownership, London: West has enabled us to add details of painting by notable artists in the collections of Boston Manor (with an image of one of the oils added from Commons), Fulham Palace and 7 Hammersmith Terrace.
Two Girls Dressing a Kitten by Candlelight has been written by Philafrenzy

We still have several Pelican Ebooks available from Penguin for Wikepedians (sorry but for commercial reasons this offer is not open to US residents).

Scotland

Glasgow

Sara Thomas' residency secondment to Glasgow Museums has made a promising start. A Wiki Working Group - who will hopefully continue when the four month secondment finishes - are set to meet at the end of February. Sara will also provide training for Connect @ Edinburgh Napier University 'Writing Women Back into History' Editathon on 6 March.

Sara also attended the Glasgow Wikimeet #5, organised by Wikimedian in Residence at the National Library of Scotland, User:ACrockford

Edinburgh

The University of Edinburgh successfully hosted a week-long series of editathons as part of its 2015 Innovative Learning Week in mid-February; the editathons were a collaboration between the University's Learning, Teaching, and Web Services Division and Academic Support Librarians, the Moray House School of Education, EDINA, and the National Library of Scotland, with training provided by the Wikimedian in Residence at the National Library of Scotland, Ally Crockford.

The events, which focused on the theme of 'Women, Science, and Scottish History' and used the Edinburgh Seven as a catalyst, drew an average of 15 participants each day, often with editors trained earlier in the week returning later to continue work on their articles. This series-style event not only offered the opportunity to create a sustained learning environment in which to support new editors and give them the confidence to continue working, but also allowed for training to focus on particular editing 'goals' each day: people, places, making connections, and illustrating Wikipedia. The result of this approach was that while the number of created and improved articles wasn't significantly higher than single editathons, the quality of the new articles and the improvements was significant for new editors. It is hoped that it will also mean a higher number of participants will continue to edit.

The events attracted a massive amount of attention throughout the University, dominating the extensive Innovative Learning Week programme. The scheme encourages staff and students at the University of Edinburgh to take a week away from classes to explore alternative learning methods. The impact of the editathons has been charted in a Storify of tweets using the hashtag #ILWeditathon. The University of Edinburgh are following this success with open Wikipedia Hours of Power, held over lunch to encourage participants of the editathon and those who were unable to attend to continue editing and share their developing skills. These will begin early March 2015.

Technology

Wikimedia UK has endorsed Europeana's bid for funding for the next phase of the GLAMwiki toolset.

Wikimedia UK was one of the consortium of chapters that funded the first phase of the toolset development and Jonathan Cardy was a member of the task group.

Wales

The Egyptian Centre at the University of Swansea

Over 5,000 images from the Egyptian Centre at the University of Swansea have been identified and will be uploaded on an open licence to Wikimedia Commons. The images are photographs of artefacts donated by Sir Henry Wellcome (of Wellcome Trust fame) to the centre a few years ago. HAM II was instrumental in acquiring these images, following the successful gender-gap edit-a-thon at the university at the end of January.

WiR at the National Library of Wales

Jason Evans, the new Wikipedian in Residence at the Library has organised a few editathons:

Welsh Photographers Editathon. 10 April 2015, which will focus on the Magnum Welsh photographer Philip Jones Griffiths. As a taster, two of his most famous photographes were uploaded to Commons on an open licence. This edit-a-thon ties in with the launch of a major exhibition at NLW on the life and work of Phillip Jones Griffiths. The event will be held at the NLW with support from the Visual Images Curator.

World War I Gallipoli Edit-a-thon. 23 April 2015. This event will be held at NLW and will focus on improving content relating to the role of Welsh soldiers in the First World War, with support from the Wales at War team at the Library and academics/students.

The Library has also identified 20,000 images to be released in the next few months. By supporting and participating in the development of such a high profile resource, this enterprise will contribute towards the NLW's aim of providing ‘Information for All’ and in turn will draw people back to the services and collections of the Library.

Conferences & Exhibitions

Navino Evans has had a presentation accepted, in mid July he will be presenting Wikidata: the potential of structured data to enable applications such as Histropedia at ISKO UK 2015 conference