Trained, mentored and supported Wikipedians in Residence as they honed the skills needed to develop long-term relationships that encouraged cultural partners to release their content onto Wikipedia. The project employed two Wikipedians in Residence (WiR) – Abel Asrat in Ethiopia and Michael Phoya in Malawi. The year programme was to work collaboratively with cultural organisations in order...
Trained, mentored and supported Wikipedians in Residence as they honed the skills needed to develop long-term relationships that encouraged cultural partners to release their content onto Wikipedia.
The project employed two Wikipedians in Residence (WiR) – Abel Asrat in Ethiopia and Michael Phoya in Malawi. The year programme was to work collaboratively with cultural organisations in order to develop their social entrepreneurial skills to the stage that they could be self sufficient open culture advocates.
The two Wikipedians in Residence worked with the partnering organisations to upload existent data onto Wikipedia (under the correct licensing), and trained members of the institution on the benefits of contributing to Wikipedia in an on-going way focussing especially on information about its core focus and its affiliated subjects. They established institutional systems to make the WikiAfrica project sustainable, and ensured the institutions’ online involvement going forward. Finally, each WiR encouraged new individuals to become Wikipedians in order to work towards activating a formal Wikimedia Chapter and in this way began to seed an active Wikipedian community.
The Wiki Entrepreneur project was developed and managed by Isla Haddow-Flood. It was supported by the Prins Claus Fons and hosted at the Africa Centre.
WikiAfrica is an international movement that takes place on the African continent and beyond. It encourages individuals, interested groups and organisations to create, expand and enhance online content about Africa. This involves motivating for the representation of the continent’s contemporary realities and history, its peoples and its innovations on the world’s most used encyclopaedia, Wikipedia. WikiAfrica is not owned by one organisation and it belongs to all people and organisations contributing to its scope.
In its various guises and hosted at several institutions (including Lettera27, Africa Centre, Ynternet.org, and Wikimedia CH), the WikiAfrica movement has consistently instigated and led multi-faceted innovative projects. These projects have activated communities and driven content onto Wikipedia. Examples include Share Your Knowledge, #OpenAfrica training Courses and Toolkits, Kumusha Bus (in Ethiopia and Ghana), WikiEntrepreneur (in Ethiopia and Malawi), Kumusha Takes Wiki (Cote d’Ivoire and Uganda) and Wiki Loves Africa.
Over 2016/17 it is working on Wiki Loves Women (in collaboration with the Goethe-Institut), WikiPack Africa, WikiFundi and the WikiChallenge African Schools (funded by the Orange Foundation), WikiAfrica Schools (funded by lettera27), Wikipedia Primary (funded by SUPSI) and Wiki Loves Africa (funded by Wikimedia Foundation).
WikiAfrica was started in 2006 as a collaboration between Wikimedia IT and lettera27, since then – via the support of several organisations and the work of a few people – it has grown to embrace the continent and build communities. It has been pivotal in driving the current contributions done by communities across sub-Saharan Africa.
The projects detailed below form the main backbone of the WikiAfrica movement. They have all been conceptualised, instigated and led by three members of Wiki In Africa, although until 2017 through the agency or fiscal sponsorship of different organisations.
2006
2009
2011
2012
2013
2014
2015
2016
2017
The organisations that have hosted or are collaborating on Wiki Africa projects include:
